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Hard Startups

blog.samaltman.com

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Re: Hard Startups

#311

Post by TeMPOraL »

jwatte wrote: post #309
TeMPOraL wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There's also general health benefits of the added greenery consuming excess CO2. Added greenery only consumes excess carbon dioxide if you harvest it and bury it in a very, very deep hole, where neither sun nor oxygen can reach it. Otherwise, it only briefly buffers some amount of carbon.

If it increases total biomass, then it does on average sequester that additional biomass. And even if you burn it, well, the next crop will sequester it again. The main problem with burning fossil fuels is that we dug them up out of the ground, rather than take them from replenishing sources that draw CO2 out of the atmosphere.

It perhaps increases the amount of biomass in circulation - but then again, probably not, as it displaces other food (it's not like the western world is facing food shortages at the moment). It doesn't meaningfully affect anything, given that the problem we have is exponential emissions increase.

The best argument for extra consumable plants would be if they displaced carbon-positive farming. Then, all that carbon added to the circulation would subtract from emissions growth.

Re: Hard Startups

#312

Post by erikpukinskis »

dana321 wrote: post #154

Solving hard problems is the trap of the genius. I know. We want a simpler world, but create complex software to do that. All we are doing is moving the complexity under the rug somewhere else. The complexity is still there, warts and all. Doing something mundane over a large surface area (quantity being the hard vector) is better than solving a really difficult problem that has little reach in terms of real-world va…

I am on a similar arc, attacking a multi-facet problem space and assuming some % of facets will fail. Would love to chat with someone on a similar path. Email me if you are interested in that!

Re: Hard Startups

#313

Post by erikpukinskis »

chubot wrote: post #8
dickjocke wrote: post #3

This seems very related to the blog post that introduced me to Paul Graham, and in turn Hacker News, about a phenomenon he calls Schlep Blindness. http://www.paulgraham.com/schlep.html I would be curious what people think today's most obvious schelps or hard problems are? Nuclear Fission as in OPs post is cool, but Im thinking more along the lines of something a team of competent developers could do.

I feel like one of the hardest problems in tech is making search engine that credibly competes with Google. It's not just because the tech is hard (and it is), but also because they have some of the strongest network effects, user lock-in, and distribution deals. It sounds almost dumb/crazy for people to try, but there is a newer effort from Europe that I saw on HN recently (i.e. they've been working for ~5 years and…

My guess is that the company that beats Google will be the one that lets users create and monetize their own multifarious search engines that each has an editorial slant and an aptitude in a specific area.

Essentially, Google is CBS/NBC/ABC and their value is based on their name being the destination. They’ll be taken down a peg by a YouSearch (née YouTube).

Although Google, like CBS/NBC/ABC, will still exist they’ll just lose half the market (the middle tail).

What I’m describing is a technical challenge, but not like Nuclear 2.0 is a technical challenge. You could create an MVP for a niche market in a year or so. I think it’s mostly just hard work, doing marketing, understanding early adopters, doing the tech support, having a good feature-request-to-patch pipeline, managing investor expectations, etc... all the normal grunt work of a startup.

The search doesn’t even have to be that good if you can search psychological spaces Google could never prioritize.

Re: Hard Startups

#314

Post by m0zg »

TimPC wrote: post #302
modo_mario wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of this tbh is probably because of infighting between renewables and nuclear. Fusion seems like a bit of a black box to throw money into which isn't appreciated. Throw too little and you don't get there. Throw enough and you don't know when you'll get there. Fission solves a lot of problems but nobody likes it in their back yeard and some countries have gotten a scare of it (japan, germany,etc) It also takes a…

Most renewables aren't viable for base load power. Nuclear is viable only for base load power. Realistically they are competing for different parts of the power utilization and shouldn't be infighting at all. You want nuclear for the amount of power that's always on the grid. You want renewables to be able to handle spiking. The hard part of renewables now is the unpredictable output from varying winds and levels of…

Not sure why this was downvoted. It's the truth. The two don't (or at least shouldn't) really compete, they (and especially solar) are almost exactly complementary to each other.

Re: Hard Startups

#315

Post by MetalGuru »

rexreed wrote: post #234
vapemaster wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So where is the geographic location that does fund hard problems? SV $ is far from perfect but it is surprisingly audacious and fault tolerant. A few examples old and young: Genentech SpaceX Joby TAE Technologies

The geographic location of the company or the money? These aren't the same thing. * There's a lot more biotech in Boston than SV * There's even more biotech in Pennsylvania * Battery tech companies are all over the country * There's a ton of space tech in Texas and Mississippi. Yes, Mississippi. And Florida. * Telecom? Look outside the US for strength * Cybersecurity? Maryland. Virgnia. and Israel. * AI? Literally ev…

You specifically reference funding, so I would assume he's referring to VC capital allocation.

Re: Hard Startups

#316

Post by pfdietz »

m0zg wrote: post #314
TimPC wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most renewables aren't viable for base load power. Nuclear is viable only for base load power. Realistically they are competing for different parts of the power utilization and shouldn't be infighting at all. You want nuclear for the amount of power that's always on the grid. You want renewables to be able to handle spiking. The hard part of renewables now is the unpredictable output from varying winds and levels of…

Not sure why this was downvoted. It's the truth. The two don't (or at least shouldn't) really compete, they (and especially solar) are almost exactly complementary to each other.

It's not the truth. The grid could be powered with no "base load sources" at all. Intermittent + dispatchable could cover everything.

Re: Hard Startups

#317

Post by starpilot »

mkl wrote: post #277
starpilot wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Side note, but I've noticed how less/fewer confusion has ceased being considered a grammatical error. Interesting since pg has previously stated how important good writing is, and the YC app contained the same error.

It was never actually a grammatical error. The idea that it was "in fact arose as an incorrect generalization of a personal preference expressed by a grammarian in 1770." [1] Less has been used for countable things at least as far back as Alfred the Great in 888 CE [1], i.e. before English was English. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fewer_versus_less

Interesting. Lies my teacher told me.

Re: Hard Startups

#318

Post by Paul-ish »

Chris2048 wrote: post #283
Paul-ish wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gosh, a lot of what you are talking about sounds like what it is like to finish a PhD that doesn't have a future in academia as well. Sometimes I feel like a failure for choosing software engineering, but I should probably be grateful I have that option.

> Sometimes I feel like a failure for choosing software engineering Why? what would be better?

Go straight to software engineering, skip the PhD.

Re: Hard Startups

#319

Post by pfdietz »

TimPC wrote: post #302
modo_mario wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of this tbh is probably because of infighting between renewables and nuclear. Fusion seems like a bit of a black box to throw money into which isn't appreciated. Throw too little and you don't get there. Throw enough and you don't know when you'll get there. Fission solves a lot of problems but nobody likes it in their back yeard and some countries have gotten a scare of it (japan, germany,etc) It also takes a…

Most renewables aren't viable for base load power. Nuclear is viable only for base load power. Realistically they are competing for different parts of the power utilization and shouldn't be infighting at all. You want nuclear for the amount of power that's always on the grid. You want renewables to be able to handle spiking. The hard part of renewables now is the unpredictable output from varying winds and levels of…

They are both competing for the "inflexible" part of the power supply. They step on each others toes, and do not work well together. A grid with a lot of renewables will have the price of power driven to near zero too often for nuclear to survive.

Re: Hard Startups

#320

Post by chrisco255 »

saagarjha wrote: post #272
chrisco255 wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CO2 has a logarithmic effect on temps. Doubling the current PPM will have half as much of an effect. I don't think the situation is dire or critical at all. It's mild. And people instinctively believe this even if they overtly signal that they don't.

> And people instinctively believe this even if they overtly signal that they don't. I think it's rather condescending to literally claim you know people's beliefs, even when they vehemently voice otherwise .

Yes, because I look at what people do rather than what they say.
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