Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
21–30 of 77 posts
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#22Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#23Quoted post unavailable.
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#24Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#25> I came to expect pedantic, judgmental feedback on everything I wrote, regardless of what it was. And this is one reason I've been resistant to identifying with nerd / hacker culture for a long time. Everytime I encountered it it was often just a pissing contest about things anyone could easily look up and prove both the arguing assholes were both wrong / right as often was the case.
There's a reason why "Ackchyually Guy" and The Simpsons Comic Book Guy resonate.
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#26More polite than some.
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#27I agree with all of that. The defensiveness that comes with writing for HN (and Twitter) makes me a worse writer too. It's not just about being careful and precise, but about being super defensive to avoid the most uncharitable possible reading. Perhaps more unfortunately, I find that writing for academic conferences and journals makes me a worse writer too. It's different, but having to laser focus on 'selling' the…
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#28Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#29> Should you explicitly forestall likely misinterpretations? Yes, if they're misinterpretations a reasonably smart and well-intentioned person might make. In fact it's sometimes better to say something slightly misleading and then add the correction than to try to get an idea right in one shot. That can be more efficient, and can also model the way such an idea would be discovered.
> But I don't think you should explicitly forestall intentional misinterpretations in the body of an essay. An essay is a place to meet honest readers. You don't want to spoil your house by putting bars on the windows to protect against dishonest ones. The place to protect against intentional misinterpretations is in end-notes. But don't think you can predict them all. People are as ingenious at misrepresenting you when you say something they don't want to hear as they are at coming up with rationalizations for things they want to do but know they shouldn't. I suspect it's the same skill.
Re: Macwright.com redirects HN readers away
#30I agree with all of that. The defensiveness that comes with writing for HN (and Twitter) makes me a worse writer too. It's not just about being careful and precise, but about being super defensive to avoid the most uncharitable possible reading. Perhaps more unfortunately, I find that writing for academic conferences and journals makes me a worse writer too. It's different, but having to laser focus on 'selling' the…
Had my eyes opened recently by just how wild people can get with their inferences. Defense is impossible when you're asserting X, but also have to explicitly assert the entire universe of not-X.