Donald Knuth's advice to young people
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Donald Knuth's advice to young people
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Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#2tl;dr:
Follow your instinct rather than the herd. Don't do something just because it's trendy. Do it because you believe it's important and will have a long-term impact to the world.
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#3Is Donald Knuth's approach the complete opposite of the lean startup methodology? Are too many people just trying to follow the latest trends?
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#4Don Knuth, original hipster.
I couldn't help thinking of Ryan Dahl while watching this.
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#5Is Donald Knuth's approach the complete opposite of the lean startup methodology? Are too many people just trying to follow the latest trends?
His advice was to follow your instinct rather than the herd. I don't see how that's related to learn startup methodology.
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#6Is Donald Knuth's approach the complete opposite of the lean startup methodology? Are too many people just trying to follow the latest trends?
His advice was to follow your instinct rather than the herd. I don't see how that's related to learn startup methodology.
because the lean startup methodology is currently the herd favorite...
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#7Is Donald Knuth's approach the complete opposite of the lean startup methodology? Are too many people just trying to follow the latest trends?
Too many people are definitely trying to follow the trends, but that is by definition since they wouldn't be be trends otherwise.
But yeah, people need to learn to think independently.
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
His advice was to follow your instinct rather than the herd. I don't see how that's related to learn startup methodology.
because the lean startup methodology is currently the herd favorite...
The lean startup methodology is a process for following either the herd (coupons!) or your instinct (something useful).
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#9"Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority, it is time to pause and reflect." -- Mark Twain
Re: Donald Knuth's advice to young people
#10Speaking as a young man, I always found this counter intuitive and here is why (and this is an argument which has been called many things including cute). Wouldn't following the heard be safe? Suppose I don't really want to change the world, rather I want to enjoy myself. Now following the heard is easy, I do whatever everyone else is doing and have the advantage that I can learn from their mistakes. Now I have a large amount of data on what works and what doesn't so I can pick and choose how I wish to follow the heard. On the other hand I have this gut feeling thing which isn't really based on data and more so on... well nothing tangible really. I just feel it may pay out. Their is a high failure rate in such methods and a high frustration attached to it since like minds are rare. So is it that if I want to change the world I should not follow the herd and should follow if I want to just live?