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Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

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Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#501

Post by rgovostes »

codeulike wrote: post #202
em500 wrote: post #49

iPhone (2007) Ok, maybe not so much the original 2007 model, arguably it wasn't until the iPhone 4 (2010) until it really came into its own. But few products released in my lifetime changed modern life as the iPhone did. And unlike most other seismic tech products (world-wide-web, linux) that took years to build momentum, it had lots of pre-release hype.

This should be at the top. Until that iPhone unveil, no-one had ever seen swipe-to-scroll, now its second nature to at least half the planet. Video of the 2007 unveil: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vN4U5FqrOdQ

My favorite thing about the iPhone announcement is when Steve shows Cover Flow of album art (at about 18 minutes in your link), which spins around to show a track listing. It was a slick 3D animation on a phone, when most of us were carrying bar or flip phones navigated with stiff arrow keys. Yet the audience reaction is pretty tepid. Already the future seemed ordinary just a few minutes into the announcement!

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#502

Post by sircastor »

yodelshady wrote: post #36
keiferski wrote: post #16

- A lot of people watch it with no background knowledge and subsequently don’t quite understand the “best film ever” label, but Citizen Kane is indeed a fantastic film. Just read about Orson Welles first. - Most religious books that have stood the test of time have lived up to the hype. The Bible (especially certain books like Ecclesiastes or Proverbs), The Quran, The Upanishads, to name a few. Again, don’t just go i…

Casablanca for me. Oddly I can't think of many stand-out moments in it. If you asked me why you would enjoy it, I couldn't say. But you would.

I had a film professor who always thought that Casablanca should be number 1 on AFIs Top 100. I tend to agree with him. I think Citizen Kane is a cinematic masterpiece, but Casablanca has a much better and more coherent story.

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#503

Post by aerovistae »

keiferski wrote: post #16

- A lot of people watch it with no background knowledge and subsequently don’t quite understand the “best film ever” label, but Citizen Kane is indeed a fantastic film. Just read about Orson Welles first. - Most religious books that have stood the test of time have lived up to the hype. The Bible (especially certain books like Ecclesiastes or Proverbs), The Quran, The Upanishads, to name a few. Again, don’t just go i…

Seconding Ecclesiastes. I'm an atheist and I have never read a more eloquent affirmation of nihilism. It's fascinating knowing someone had these same thoughts 2500 years ago.

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#504

Post by Eric_WVGG »

paulnechifor wrote: post #309
ddek wrote: post #155

The Wire. I'd tried to watch it a few times, but only a few months ago actually got past the first two episodes. I think it helped that I quite quickly saw it as a morally ambiguous discussion of the institutional ineptitude of conservative western cultures in mitigating the effects of crime, rather than a typical 'good vs bad' cop show. With that mindset, the possibly-underwhelming finale of S1 is much more effectiv…

I started watching The Wire recently expecting a very dry show that's difficult to understand but I found it gripping from the start. The characters felt real and the world very fucked up and interesting. Season 2 was good, but I didn't understand why they kept the drug dealers plot on ice. It seemed like filler. By season 3 it turned into every other TV show where characters are just tools used to express a story ra…

I get the argument that good tv/literature/whatever shouldn't need to be explained, but I think the Wire really benefits from reading a lot of serious criticism alongside watching. There were a ton of details and ideas and motifs that just flew over my head, but upon some reading and a second watching… well I started out loving The Wire, but the second time I loved The Wire. Even seasons 3 and 4. (not 5, at least I understand what they were trying to do)

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#505

Post by modernerd »

kortex wrote: post #312
modernerd wrote: post #295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any resources in particular that helped you grok Rust?

Having someone you can ask questions to is huuuge. I have a friend who knows it pretty well and that was supremely helpful to get through some initial stumbling blocks and confusions. I use Clion which is also super helpful in letting me inspect, autocomplete, and lint code before compiling. The main rust-lang.org is quite good, but beyond that nothing in particular stands out. But lots of one-off blog posts on speci…

Thank for the tips! I use CLion too (and even built a theme called Blackbird with good Rust highlighting).

It looks like there’s a Rust mentorship program here: https://rustbeginners.github.io/awesome-rust-mentors/

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#506

Post by misiti3780 »

The Sopranos - even though the end was controversial it was the consistently the best TV ever created.

Ken Burns Docs Series - especially Civil War and Vietnam

Nassim Taleb's - Incerto - so much interesting and useful info int those books. Really eye-opening stuff.

Robert Caro's Biographies - I am not finished with all of them yet but the ones I have read are excellent

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#507

Post by sircastor »

Aunche wrote: post #282
em500 wrote: post #49

iPhone (2007) Ok, maybe not so much the original 2007 model, arguably it wasn't until the iPhone 4 (2010) until it really came into its own. But few products released in my lifetime changed modern life as the iPhone did. And unlike most other seismic tech products (world-wide-web, linux) that took years to build momentum, it had lots of pre-release hype.

The original iPhone nailed so much on the first time. The UX was truly ahead of its time: intuitive touchscreen gestures, portrait and landscape modes, a surprisingly usable touchscreen keyboard, and proximity sensor to prevent accidental touches. Before the iPhone became popular, there was so much variety in phone design like the Juke or Nokia Ngage. Today billions of people use a phone that resembles an iPhone.

I remember thinking that the iPhone wasn’t a big deal and I didn’t really care until I walked into an Apple store and used one. I was blown away. I think we really forget how many things the introduction of the iPhone brought about.

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#508

Post by dmitriid »

zests wrote: post #136
dmitriid wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Most religious books that have stood the test of time have lived up to the hype. They really haven't. Not a single one of them. There is, however, organized religion around them that has twisted those book to mean whatever it is that brings the flock. Are they influential? Yes. Have they stood the test of time? Hell, no

You’re talking about the best selling book of all time (by far). Its more likely that you misunderstand it than all the readers misunderstand it. Its just one of those things that is so popular that people find any way possible to criticize.

It is estimated that around 5 billion copies of the Bible were sold and distributed throughout history. [1] This has happened over the course of over two thousand years. Which makes it less popular than Harry Potter (120 million copies of the first book in 20 years) or Twilight.

And that 5 billion number includes a very significant chunk of bibles which are just distributed through various religious centers (same goes for all other religious texts).

And, of course, the number of books sold says literally nothing about whether a book has stood the test of time.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_best-selling_books?wpr...

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#509

Post by darkhorse13 »

sanitycheck wrote: post #359
obblekk wrote: post #194

The iPhone. Unbelievable hype when it launched and it delivered beyond what was expected in 2007.

My N95 did more, and did it better. Style over substance won.

I would argue the opposite. Substance won over style, and this is coming from someone who bought an expensive Symbian phone a few months before the first iPhone came out.

Re: Ask HN: What Lived Up to the Hype?

#510

Post by misiti3780 »

ddek wrote: post #155

The Wire. I'd tried to watch it a few times, but only a few months ago actually got past the first two episodes. I think it helped that I quite quickly saw it as a morally ambiguous discussion of the institutional ineptitude of conservative western cultures in mitigating the effects of crime, rather than a typical 'good vs bad' cop show. With that mindset, the possibly-underwhelming finale of S1 is much more effectiv…

The Wire is amazing television for sure, but the last season kinda sucked. I know that they were forced to end it early because HBO cut it short, but I thought the whole serial killer story line just didn't add up.
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