171–180 of 542 posts
Because we have unreasonable expectations. Making things work well is hard, and thus expensive. Take a chair, for example. Anyone can make a chair: just get a bucket, turn it over, and sit on it. Boom; backless chair. Want a backrest, arms? Get a 2x4, a saw, a drill, and some bolts. An hour later: Boom; chair. You want a chair that works well? How do you even define works well for a chair? Do you need cushioning? Do…
Because we have unreasonable expectations. Making things work well is hard, and thus expensive. Take a chair, for example. Anyone can make a chair: just get a bucket, turn it over, and sit on it. Boom; backless chair. Want a backrest, arms? Get a 2x4, a saw, a drill, and some bolts. An hour later: Boom; chair. You want a chair that works well? How do you even define works well for a chair? Do you need cushioning? Do…
an aeron chair costs about $2000 dollars (give or take). The construction is sturdy, so i expect it to last at least 10 years, if not 20 (you take care of it etc). So the amortized cost is some 100-200 dollars a year for an excellent chair. If you buy a crappy chair, i bet that the cushion starts failing after a year or so of constant sitting. So you'd probably replace it yearly, or suffer a bad chair for a few years…
I just moved to the USA from the UK (having lived in Germany before) and the quality of the services I'm experiencing here is appalling. To get concrete, we submitted an application for an apartment let. After not hearing back for 4 days we reached out and it looks like somehow they misplaced our application. By then the unit we wanted was gone so they asked us to pay a holding fee to ensure they would keep another u…
Same experience coming from France. Everything in the USA is just lower quality. Be it goods or services. And Americans seem ok with it. There is a lot of overhead everywhere. Dentists have an army of assistants. Any product to order requires it's sale agent. Even if you already know what you want. You must deal with the agent. Car dealership have so many sales but good luck getting an appointment for fixing the shit…
I agree with you on housing. The agents charge commission and closing costs and closing companies do charge quite a bit.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think what you're calling weasel words are weasel words. "Up to 50% faster!" is weasel wording. It says "slower or faster, but not more than 50% faster," but it sounds like it's saying faster. What GP is asking for is calibrating for uncertainty. Phrases like "I've seen this tendency in multiple teams I've been part of," or "study[ref] after study[ref] has confirmed this" help clarify what premises and hypoth…
> IMO It serves a useful purpose! I have to disagree! I simply do not understand what useful purpose it serves—IF we are allowed to assume that our readers have a proficient level of prose literacy. The default assumption, when someone is talking or writing, is that they are communicating their own opinions and thoughts, experiences, anecdotes. I don’t know about you, but when I think back to taking writing classes i…
> The ability to sort out opinions and anecdotes from factual claims and evidence is… well… something you’d expect from a proficient reader!
How does a proficient reader separate facts from opinions if good writing doesn't disambiguate facts and opinions? Do they just assume?
e.g.: Butter is about as healthy as vegetable oil. Arugula is healthier than lettuce.
I can cite a meta-analysis for one of the above statements. The other is just my opinion, and I have done no research into the topic. How would a proficient reader tell them apart if there's no calibrating for uncertainty?
Side note: I went through the original blog post again, and there are lots of examples of Dan Luu doing exactly what I'm writing about, to the point where I'm confused why the original commenter thinks he's not using a different tone based on uncertainty.
Examples:
"I once watched, from the inside, a company undergo this cultural shift"
"I've both worked at companies that have tried to contract this kind of thing out as well as talked with many people who've done that"
That's not the efficient market hypothesis but a complete misunderstanding. The hypothesis is that the market (not products as you assume) are efficient, leading to the optimization of share prices to reflect reality. [1]
[1] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/e/efficientmarkethypothes...
It's pretty depressing how many of the comments are purely answering the title and not discussing the content of the article. In particular, the comments seem mostly focused on consumer product build quality whereas the article is more focused on e.g. businesses trying to outsource something (like same day delivery) and getting a worse result even when they pay more than doing it internally. And the cultural obstacle…
I read the article so I'm gonna respond here ;) As a counter-anecdote I'll offer my experience working for a company that built large precision machinery. Many of the parts of said machinery were built by subcontractors. The quality was extremely high. We did do certain things in house if they require special expertise and we did have the capability to do rapid prototyping but it wouldn't make any business sense for…
The amount of effort put into ensuring that suppliers do what they need to do and do it well is huge. Companies always have two (or more) suppliers and if you keep only to the letter of the contract, you get cut.
They can afford to put so much effort into managing suppliers because volumes are large and margins are low.
There are also cultural issues at play; he makes the point that things that are inevitable in one culture are unthinkable in another and different industries have different cultures
Great article! As a consumer that cares a lot about buying long-lasting quality products, here are a few resources: Project Farm (youtube.com/projectfarm) - Great independent reviews of tools Mcmaster.com - Higher quality products than you can get at your local hardware store and excellent customer service. When I've gotten the rare incorrect or damaged item, 1 email gets me a refund and a replacement overnighted. Wi…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Foundations change (tensioned slab, etc) and water inside of houses (copper vs pvc vs PEX vs lead). Electrical is even in frequent flux under those timescales. Insulation as well. Very little stays consistent…
But the concept of water being fed through pipe, from a reservoir, chlorination, etc have been around a long time. Sure implementation details change, but they and the concepts they build off of have been around. You mention pvc, copper, and pex (lead is over 50 years old and many have been replaced). Those are just materials. How do they affect end user on a daily basis? How long has electrical be 120v AC? How long…