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What I Worked On

paulgraham.com

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Re: What I Worked On

#151

Post by alisonkisk »

hinkley wrote: post #21
chrisaycock wrote: post #9

> during the first year of grad school I realized that AI, as practiced at the time, was a hoax. I had a similar realization during grad school about a lot of the popular topics at the time (early 2000s). I even used to call them "the hoaxes of computer science". Things like grid computing or formal methods of software engineering had a lot of resources behind them, but nobody was able to use the results. Instead, ve…

An alternative that seems to work is chasing grants, or defense contracts. But then the choice becomes "build something usable, or only work for someone who hired a 'grant writer' that is making 125-250% of your salary"

I don't have the skill to be a grant writer, so I don't begrudge their pay. Grant writer isn't a job you get through nepotism.

Re: What I Worked On

#152

Post by [deleted] »

jeremysalwen wrote: post #100
DC1350 wrote: post #14

This was a good read. I wish I could understand the mindset of people who can live spontaneously like this. I always plan so far in the future because I feel like it’s way too easy to ruin my life financially. Is this a generational thing? A class difference?

Definitely a class difference. From the essay > Computers were expensive in those days and it took me years of nagging before I convinced my father to buy one, a TRS-80, in about 1980." Based on a quick search, the price was probably about $1200-$2000 inflation adjusted dollars. I grew up in probably a similar environment, my dad was also a physicist, and I also had access to computers from a young age, and I was enc…

[deleted]

Re: What I Worked On

#153

Post by alisonkisk »

_Microft wrote: post #6
judofyr wrote: post #4

> Working on Bel was hard but satisfying. I worked on it so intensively that at any given time I had a decent chunk of the code in my head and could write more there. I'll have to say reading this makes me feel a bit sad for pg. It seems that he worked on Bel extensively for four years, and the end result was something which appeared on the front page of Hacker News for one day and then disappeared. I haven't seen it…

> I'll have to say reading this makes me feel a bit sad for pg. It seems that he worked on Bel extensively for four years, and the end result was something which appeared on the front page of Hacker News for one day and then disappeared. This is not unlike a doctoral dissertation. Invest years of your life and effort, produce nice results, have people cheer for you after you successfully defend it and then nobody car…

At least a dissertation is a school project where you learn a skill to use in future.

Re: What I Worked On

#154

Post by dhskdhakdh »

egypturnash wrote: post #144

All this time spent going in and out of the art world makes me wonder if there is any kind of art grant program going on in YC.

I think it's fair to say that the art world's way of thinking didn't rub off on Graham. It's not clear to me that he ever had a genuinely creative attitude to art making. He didn't get the art world and it didn't get him.

As a technical term, "art world" refers to the professionalized aspects of art production—and explicitly not the business of actually working on your art or training as an artist. It's the nonsense and PR side of art.

When Graham says "Art galleries didn't want to be online, and still don't, not the fancy ones." it really doesn't reflect the reality of the most prestigious contemporary galleries like Gagosian and Hauser & Wirth. They are very online, but Graham clearly is just not keeping up with that. He might be thinking of some tiny stuffy and elitist gallery in New York, who knows. He is out of touch.

Re: What I Worked On

#155

Post by dang »

jeremysalwen wrote: post #100
DC1350 wrote: post #14

This was a good read. I wish I could understand the mindset of people who can live spontaneously like this. I always plan so far in the future because I feel like it’s way too easy to ruin my life financially. Is this a generational thing? A class difference?

Definitely a class difference. From the essay > Computers were expensive in those days and it took me years of nagging before I convinced my father to buy one, a TRS-80, in about 1980." Based on a quick search, the price was probably about $1200-$2000 inflation adjusted dollars. I grew up in probably a similar environment, my dad was also a physicist, and I also had access to computers from a young age, and I was enc…

I think you might be overestimating how much money pg's family had; I'm pretty sure they were squarely middle-class (e.g. the next sentence reads "The gold standard then was the Apple II, but a TRS-80 was good enough," and that took "years of nagging"). Strictly from a class point of view his background would have been risk-averse. But your point about the intellectual environment seems solid.

Re: What I Worked On

#156

Post by guytv »

judofyr wrote: post #4

> Working on Bel was hard but satisfying. I worked on it so intensively that at any given time I had a decent chunk of the code in my head and could write more there. I'll have to say reading this makes me feel a bit sad for pg. It seems that he worked on Bel extensively for four years, and the end result was something which appeared on the front page of Hacker News for one day and then disappeared. I haven't seen it…

Bel is painting in code.

Like all good paintings it goes unnoticed in its time.

It might become a classic in the future, it might be forgotten.

Re: What I Worked On

#157

Post by mywittyname »

hinkley wrote: post #120

> One of the most conspicuous patterns I've noticed in my life is how well it's worked, for me at least, to work on things that weren't prestigious. You might be able to reinterpret this through the lens of the old saying about how, during a gold rush, the people who "made shovels" made most of the money while a few miners got all the press. We don't usually hear about the folks making provisions or shovels. If you d…

> If you're not a local, you'd never hear and probably never care about such things.

Regardless of whether or not you're a local, the Underground Seattle tour is definitely a must-do if you ever find yourself there.

Re: What I Worked On

#158

Post by randomsearch »

pnathan wrote: post #97

This is a very good essay. It feels that pg is more reflective now than he was a few years ago. In particular, he is calling attention to how the dice fell; how things worked out well. I'd be interested, as a purely personal matter, in seeing a painting show of pg's work. I came to painting long after I came to programming. I'm almost 40. This statement: > If you can choose what to work on, and you choose a project t…

Agreed. When you start thinking “I have 25 years of work left to do everything I want” the phrase “I do not have time for this s**” becomes part of your everyday vocabulary. Not in a cynical way, rather you realise the time for playing and exploring is over; now is the time to get it done.

Re: What I Worked On

#159

Post by [deleted] »

tinyhouse wrote: post #78

I don't share the sentiment here. I find the essay too long and boring. I usually enjoy reading his valuable essays but this one is too much about his life which is not that interesting to be honest, given I don't know him personally. But that's OK, not every essay needs to appeal to everyone.

[deleted]

Re: What I Worked On

#160

Post by probe »

> "How should I choose what to do? Well, how had I chosen what to work on in the past? I wrote an essay for myself to answer that question, and I was surprised how long and messy the answer turned out to be. If this surprised me, who'd lived it, then I thought perhaps it would be interesting to other people, and encouraging to those with similarly messy lives. So I wrote a more detailed version for others to read, and this is the last sentence of it."

I loved the ending. The essay was primarily for him. It seems that some of the best writing, similarly to the best products, is when you yourself are the recipient.

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