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How Basecamp Blew Up

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Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#861

Post by meue »

ylem wrote: post #574

I was debating about whether to comment on this--whether I could add any useful signal to the noise. My thought is that is a tragedy. Let me start with the business case. It resulted in around 30% of the company resigning. As a client, that would disturb me. What is the likelihood of new features being added? Security patches? Maintenance? Also, AFAIKT, Basecamp isn't just a product, but a brand, with the founders wr…

> I was debating about whether to comment on this--whether I could add any useful signal to the noise.

While I seldom partake in threads, I do read and save interesting perspectives and opinions on topics I am interested in for more personal dissection & discussion (with myself and close friends), and I found your comment to be valuable and worth reading, so thank you for sharing.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#862

Post by Huggernaut »

vxNsr wrote: post #706
Huggernaut wrote: post #673

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine the downvotes are mainly because the comparison seems pretty off base, regardless of whether one agrees with the good or bad of the original post. Comparing "you are now in a situation where you may have an opportunity to empathise with difficulties others have had" to "you are trying to build a society where more fortunate people are harmed in the name of sameness" doesn't resonate at all.

Ah, the comparison is coming from the fact that the GP is describing a bad situation he’s in and the response is essentially “you deserve it” and “think of the starving children in Africa”. My point is that sort of thinking creates a less humane society.

Right, I don't really agree with your interpretation, though I can understand how you might read it that way. As I wrote above, I read it as "take this as a learning opportunity to empathise with others", which I would think leads to a _more_ humane society.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#863

Post by vtail »

SantalBlush wrote: post #844
JPKab wrote: post #833

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have no idea how much software I ship, but like your ideology, you make assertions without data. You act as if the only people who are killed by police are "one of my brothers and sisters". Let's unpack that, shall we? https://mappingpoliceviolence.org/ Roughly 3/4 of people killed by police in the US are not one of your "brothers and sisters" if by "brothers and sisters" you are referring to humans who share you…

From the first website you link: >Black people were 28% of those killed by police in 2020 despite being only 13% of the population. You basically just proved the point you were replying to, that racial inequality exists in policing.

This is a very naive view. Black people are responsible for higher share of murders, for example, than their share of population. We should look at the frequency of interactions with the police, not at the population shares.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#864

Post by Can_Not »

rsyring wrote: post #446
MattRix wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are certain issues (like this one) where silence has historically been used as a form of endorsement. It is certainly not irrational to perceive it as being an endorsement.

Arguments from silence are, by definition, illogical fallacies. There could be any number of reasons why someone might choose to remain silent. It's possible they are endorsing it, but you don't really know without additional statements or context. https://www.logicallyfallacious.com/logicalfallacies/Argumen...

Allow me to introduce "Fallacy Fallacy", the fact that someone might have arrived at a conclusion via a fallacy does not mean the conclusion is false.

https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/the-fallacy-fallacy

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#865

Post by dools »

jariel wrote: post #650
dools wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not a matter of disagreement about 2 equally valid viewpoints, it's about one side being wrong about everything following a deliberate and calculated campaign of misinformation, and the other side pointing out how wrong they are and how dangerous their ideology is. No-one likes being told they're wrong, which is why the capitol riots happened on 6 January and Trump still got so many votes despite being an abject…

This kind of rhetoric I think might be at the root of the problem. If you believe the company founders, in the face of being told they occupy their position 'due to privilege' is 'right about everything' then you're the problem. Telling executives that they are 'denying racism exists' when they are actually only denying that it exists at the company is obviously straw manning. If you're of the position that 'anyone w…

"Telling executives that they are 'denying racism exists' when they are actually only denying that it exists at the company is obviously straw manning."

Singer's quote:

“I strongly disagree we live in a white supremacist culture,” Singer said. “I don’t believe in a lot of the framing around implicit bias. I think a lot of this is actually racist.”

He wasn't talking about the company, he was talking about society. Unless you think he was saying they "live in" the company ...

Saying he got sacked for questioning it at the company is a spin added later by his apologists.

To the extent that white supremacy is synonymous with racism (which, at least at this point in history, I think is arguable given the fact that we live in a world dominated by the vestiges of the British empire, and that structural inequality is almost entirely against non-white people globally) then people who question the claim of racism are at the very least inadvertently advancing the causes of white supremacy.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#866

Post by dools »

javagram wrote: post #370
dools wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because anyone who claims reverse racism exists is a defacto racist (even if they would deny it) becaus they obviously don't understand how racism works. If I had someone saying that shit in my company on a Zoom call, I would excuse myself, remove them from the call, schedule a 1 on 1 meeting with them, and explain to them that they need to take training on what racism is and how it is perpetrated, or leave.

Of course "reverse racism" exists (although, it certainly may be much less of a problem in the USA than non "reverse" racism). Discriminating against someone because of their race because you believe their racial group or background is privileged is still racism and the application of a stereotype. Just because they're White, Hispanic, or Asian (depending on the type of "reverse racism" we're talking about here) shou…

"The currently dominant creed" would be ... urr ... white christians.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#867

Post by jhanschoo »

newacct583 wrote: post #773
jhanschoo wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it is a reasonable conclusion from the way the person's workplace is structured, and the way their coworkers judge their coworkers, I don't see how it reflects the person's purported transphobia, but rather the bigotry of their coworkers.

Chuckling at the idea that trans identity amounts to "wearing a dress" is not a "reasonable conclusion", it's a hurtful caricature. People care deeply about this stuff. People agonize for years about how to present this to the people they live and work with. Laughing at them and pretending that they have it easy by "wearing a dress" is absolutely bigoted, sorry.

There's a big gap between

> reasonable conclusion from the way the person's workplace is structured, and the way their coworkers judge their coworkers

and

> Chuckling at the idea that trans identity amounts to "wearing a dress" is not a "reasonable conclusion", it's a hurtful caricature.

The workplace they described discriminated against the dominant white male identity, and waived it for people who deviated from it in dimensions including gender, sexual preference, and race. It is reasonable to conclude that their workplace would welcome or tolerate a dress-wearer as well, being a deviation of Western male fashion norms, with no comment on its relation to trans identity specifically, or even cross-dressing, which you somehow inferred.

To be charitable, sibling comments have made this inference as well, but I disagree that this inference is reasonable. As you mentioned,

> the idea that trans identity amounts to "wearing a dress" is not a "reasonable conclusion", it's a hurtful caricature.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#868

Post by js2 »

efitz wrote: post #647
qtt wrote: post #588

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you read that Wikipedia page, under the Scholarly debates section, the existence of a "Southern Strategy" at all is debated. Nixon never claimed to have a Southern Strategy - he was focused on a national strategy that included the South. Notably, in his 1972 election, he carried 49 states - indicating that he did indeed have an inclusive national strategy. The more likely explanation to contemporary GOP success is…

I find the idea of the “Southern Strategy” to be counter-intuitive as well as self-serving for its proponents. First, under what circumstances would you swap political parties? This is an exceptionally rare circumstance; I don’t see how it could ever happen in any kind of significant way. People change to third parties (eg whigs to Republicans) but leftists and rightists rarely “switch sides”. Party affiliations are…

The parties did not used to be as polarized. Many southern white Democrats moved to the Republican party.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Democrats#1933%E2%80%...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dixiecrat

Strom Thurmond is very notable example:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strom_Thurmond

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#869

Post by dang »

JPKab wrote: post #855
dang wrote: post #797

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you please stop posting ideological flamewar comments? Please see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27052375 in this thread. We've had to ask you this multiple times in the past, also. That's not cool. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27044726 .

Is there a way for me to go back and delete my offending comments? I'd like to do so, because I don't want to be a part of diminishing the community, and would like to make amends.

I wouldn't worry about it - examples are good for learning and the only thing that really matters is to course-correct going forward. Thanks for the kind reply.

Re: How Basecamp Blew Up

#870

Post by virtue3 »

dexterous wrote: post #250
Tainnor wrote: post #124

Honestly, in this story everyone looks like a big child. I would maybe be more sympathetic to DHH if it wasn't the guy who was so opinionated he pushed through Rails features that everyone else disliked or co-wrote several books on company culture that are glorified ads for basecamp (although "it doesn't have to be crazy at work" is still a thought-provoking read, at least in part). I can only imagine that he might b…

https://twitter.com/thejoshtorres/status/1389623426688569345 Relevant excerpt from It doesn't have to be Crazy at Work.

do as I say not as I do!

Yowchhh. Really really good find.

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