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Publishing your work increases your luck

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Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#61

Post by ZephyrBlu »

aarondf wrote: post #59
LAC-Tech wrote: post #58

I don't think it's as easy as that. You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. From my own experience, I've been streaming myself coding a lot recently, but the only time I get even low single digits tuning in is when I post a link somewhere. So I guess just be prepared that you can write blogs, stream, post videos, publish software... and people don't take notice. There's a…

I was careful not to say that this is a surefire path to success. My whole point is that publishing increases your odds. If you're writing blogs, streaming, posting videos, and publishing software my position is that you have a better chance of being noticed than if you didn't do those things. "Publishing" has gradations as well, which range from hitting the "post" button to "self promotion," as you say.

> If you're writing blogs, streaming, posting videos, and publishing software my position is that you have a better chance of being noticed than if you didn't do those things

If that doesn't bear fruit then you have wasted your time though. I don't think that framing this as "increasing your odds" or "having a better chance" is helpful for most people.

If you're starting from zero you're looking for a moonshot, because even if you increase your odds by 1000% the chance of a tangible positive result is still probably ~0.

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#62

Post by agileAlligator »

LAC-Tech wrote: post #58

I don't think it's as easy as that. You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. From my own experience, I've been streaming myself coding a lot recently, but the only time I get even low single digits tuning in is when I post a link somewhere. So I guess just be prepared that you can write blogs, stream, post videos, publish software... and people don't take notice. There's a…

>You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it.

If only you would have read the article before commenting

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#63

Post by LAC-Tech »

agileAlligator wrote: post #62
LAC-Tech wrote: post #58

I don't think it's as easy as that. You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. From my own experience, I've been streaming myself coding a lot recently, but the only time I get even low single digits tuning in is when I post a link somewhere. So I guess just be prepared that you can write blogs, stream, post videos, publish software... and people don't take notice. There's a…

>You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. If only you would have read the article before commenting

What I wrote was also in response to many of the comments here.

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#64

Post by chii »

johnny_reilly wrote: post #33

This resonates with my own experience tremendously. I've blogged for ten years - opportunities have come out of it. I've worked on OSS for ten years - opportunities have come out of it. Most of the time I was doing both I felt like I was doing something inconsequential that only meant something to me. That was incorrect. Reliably putting work out there and collaborating with other humans makes things happen.

> Most of the time I was doing both I felt like I was doing something inconsequential that only meant something to me

because the world is so large, it's actually quite likely that any problem you have that you solved is applicable as a solution to a problem someone else have!

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#65

Post by wgjordan »

agileAlligator wrote: post #62
LAC-Tech wrote: post #58

I don't think it's as easy as that. You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. From my own experience, I've been streaming myself coding a lot recently, but the only time I get even low single digits tuning in is when I post a link somewhere. So I guess just be prepared that you can write blogs, stream, post videos, publish software... and people don't take notice. There's a…

>You not only have to to stuff, and publish stuff, you have to tell everyone about it. If only you would have read the article before commenting

"Please don't comment on whether someone read an article."

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#66

Post by ramkarthikk »

This completely resonates with me. Around 12 years back, when I was in my final year of college, I started a blog where I interviewed people who were doing interesting things (mostly online, like influential bloggers, startup founders, etc). Surprisingly [1], most people responded positively to the interview request.

After a few months of consistently publishing interviews, I started to get a lot of nice things come my way. The most memorable one is when one of the interviews led to a short term paid project and eventually a job offer (I didn't take it but wish I had).

I have had similar experiences in the past 12 years whenever I published something or built a side project and posted a Show HN.

[1] I say surprisingly because I didn't have a following at that point or a popular blog

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#67

Post by fcatalan »

I'm experiencing a version of this. I'm burned out at my job, but my life circumstances and personality keep me from looking for another one.

What I have done is strictly confining my job to have a minimal impact on the rest of my day and concentrate all my real effort in a particular hobby. I have gotten decently good at it in about a year, and made myself known in a few communities where the top practitioners hang around by sharing my results or giving feedback for others.

The result is that now I'm continuously rejecting commissions and offers that would turn it into a second job. I don't want that, but just getting asked feels so validating that the effort is completely worth it.

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#69

Post by bowsamic »

ZephyrBlu wrote: post #61
aarondf wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was careful not to say that this is a surefire path to success. My whole point is that publishing increases your odds. If you're writing blogs, streaming, posting videos, and publishing software my position is that you have a better chance of being noticed than if you didn't do those things. "Publishing" has gradations as well, which range from hitting the "post" button to "self promotion," as you say.

> If you're writing blogs, streaming, posting videos, and publishing software my position is that you have a better chance of being noticed than if you didn't do those things If that doesn't bear fruit then you have wasted your time though. I don't think that framing this as "increasing your odds" or "having a better chance" is helpful for most people. If you're starting from zero you're looking for a moonshot, becau…

The point is more about assuaging doubts than about giving motivation, but I do think that it might be a slightly toxic way to view things.

Re: Publishing your work increases your luck

#70

Post by bowsamic »

skippyboxedhero wrote: post #27

...if you get it in front of the right people. I have tried to do this twice over the past ten years. The first time was in equity research. It was actually easier for me to start a business myself than get people hiring to just look at my work casually. And when it came up, almost always suspicion: why are you doing this? Is this legal? Actually showing interest was almost regarded as negative (in one of my last int…

Yeah I think the advice works for academia or the more research or open source areas of tech but for large classic institutions it can definitely arouse suspicion, simply because you’ll be the only one they know of that does these things
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