John Carmack Leaves Meta • Hacker News Board

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#781

Post by krisoft » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:08 PM UTC

snovv_crash wrote: post #745

krisoft wrote: post #659

I think Carmack is a great engineer. Part of that is being great at communication. And he is! Usually. But this paragraph is quite hard to follow: > If I am trying to sway others, I would say that an org that has only known inefficiency is ill prepared for the inevitable competition and/or belt tightening, but really, it is the more personal pain of seeing a 5% GPU utilization number in production. I am offended by i…

Low GPU utilisation is a serious issue. Either you massively over-specced your hardware and should have chosen something cheaper and with less power consumption, or your graphics quality is far below what it could be. Let's not beat around the bush: wasted resources are expensive, in some way or another.

> Low GPU utilisation is a serious issue.

Maybe? Maybe not? If you have a low GPU utilisation while loading a new level and only displaying a loading bar, that's not a serious issue. If a CAD software has a low GPU utilisation after loading that's not a serious issue. (It just means that the software GUI is written efficiently and can handle complicated assemblies.) If a chat application has a low GPU utilisation that is not a problem, it is simply not the application which calls for full utilisation of the GPU. If your inside-out-tracker has a low GPU utilisation that is not a problem, it just means that you are leaving more space for the user's applications.

But this is not the issue with the analogy. This conversation between you and me, whether or not 5% gpu utilisation is bad or good, or it-depends doesn't just happen here. It happens in everyones head who reads his post. He wants people to think about the organisational inefficiencies of Meta. And a significant portion of his audience is thinking "what is a GPU?". Because you can absolutely be a useful member of the Meta company without knowing that. And then a smaller portion of the audience is thinking "Is 5% GPU utilisation bad?" You could totally understand his points about organisational inefficiency without having to have any understanding of GPU performance metrics.

He lost clarity, for no good reason.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#782

Post by AceJohnny2 » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:08 PM UTC

From his complaints, I can deduce one of two things:

1. Carmack isn't a good leader. It takes a lot of "soft skills" to lead a large organization, and while Carmack has proven to be an unpaired engineer throughout his career, I haven't seen him build outstanding engineering organizations.

and/or

2. Carmack was fighting for influence with others at Meta VR, and couldn't get his goals take priority over others (Zuckerberg comes to mind).

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#783

Post by 1auralynn » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:08 PM UTC

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #570

kubb wrote: post #466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN is all about that cult of personality, we want to believe in heroic programmers (or founders) who singlehandedly change the world with their geinus clarity. Paul Graham said this, John Carmack said that and we lap it all up. It's been this way since the ancient times, and the stories of Hercules and Theseus. We mythologize these personalities, and in our mind they become demigods. But there's a reason the folk wis…

More than that, I think it's important to remember that no one, even a technologist as strong as Carmack, is going to get more right than wrong. Carmack has been a huge inspiration for me over the years. I grew up eagerly reading his plan files. But if we look at the big picture, a lot of his big calls haven't in fact worked out. His vision for the future of graphics was to stick closer to the original OpenGL state m…

You know, maybe he just has a huge blind spot when it comes to optimization: Because he's so good at it, he overestimates others' ability (and possibly appetite for - I personally find optimization grueling and soul deadening work though of course needs to be done)

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#784

Post by criddell » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:09 PM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #594

criddell wrote: post #524

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the truth is that VR is there. They've sold lots of headsets and people who love it, really love it. Expecting it to sell at iPhone levels was never going to happen.

So by "there" you mean that the tech is good enough to provide a good experience, and so they've basically plateaued? That's my guess too. I rented a Quest for a couple of weeks and it was pretty neat. It just didn't fill any needs we actually had. I was thinking of it as a try-before-I-buy situation, but when I sent it back at the end of the two weeks, nobody cared. The kids were already back on their Switches and t…

Yeah, that's pretty much what I mean. They aren't some new thing that either has to launch into orbit or crash and burn. The likely path is in between.

VR headsets have improved immensely since I first tried it in 1991 (Dactyl Nightmare) and I suspect they will keep improving. Where we are at today is not necessarily a plateau but it might feel like one if you were expecting a growth curve that looks like a hockey stick.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#785

Post by travisporter » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:10 PM UTC

heather45879 wrote: post #671

troupe wrote: post #635

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You’re supposed to lead without authority John seems to be particularly calling out that he was not able to influence the people with high enough rank to make decisions. So it sounds like he at least thought there was an authority structure there wasn't as flat as you describe.

Something that popped into my mind is the role of Linus in the Linux Kernel development. Imagine how things would be without him? Or if a bunch of business exec ran things? A lot of millennials value freedom of choice and open collaboration ad nauseam, but this is the danger of too many voices—nothing gets done. No singular purpose. No authority—or rather, no respect for authority. The reality is: we are not all equa…

No need to bash millennials here. He also admitted he could have pushed more but decided to code instead.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#786

Post by Strom » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:12 PM UTC

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #570

kubb wrote: post #466

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN is all about that cult of personality, we want to believe in heroic programmers (or founders) who singlehandedly change the world with their geinus clarity. Paul Graham said this, John Carmack said that and we lap it all up. It's been this way since the ancient times, and the stories of Hercules and Theseus. We mythologize these personalities, and in our mind they become demigods. But there's a reason the folk wis…

More than that, I think it's important to remember that no one, even a technologist as strong as Carmack, is going to get more right than wrong. Carmack has been a huge inspiration for me over the years. I grew up eagerly reading his plan files. But if we look at the big picture, a lot of his big calls haven't in fact worked out. His vision for the future of graphics was to stick closer to the original OpenGL state m…

> iD tech used to set the standard for the entire industry, but long term its totally lost out to Unreal and Unity.

Unless you fault Carmack for selling id to Bethesda, this isn't so much Carmack's fault. He always proposed more sharing of id tech. Look at the older versions of the engine that are available under GPL. Unreal really took over when they started their cheap licensing with source available. Bethesda was asleep.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#787

Post by afterburner » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:17 PM UTC

jbverschoor wrote: post #332

Is there any reason Epic will not crush Meta’s attempt of VR? They own unreal. They understand immersion. They want to have their own App Store eon mobile devices. They just don’t know “social”, but heck.. meta doesn’t anymore either. Maybe GREE was right about seeing Facebook as their competitor after all.

Getting into social just gets you into a host of other problems. Why even bother. It's a high-wire act, and yes you get $$$ ad money, but it sure is vulnerable to any weird shocks.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#788

Post by yrgulation » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:18 PM UTC

Minor49er wrote: post #225

bluedino wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He might be considered by others as "boomer" that hasn't been relevant "since Quake III"

The man went from making the fastest 3D games ever to grace silicon to literally launching rockets. He's been the fastest nerd alive, and Meta couldn't even give him legs (figuratively and literally [1]) [1] https://youtu.be/ouq5yyzSiAw?t=395

No post body was provided.

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#789

Post by [deleted] » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:23 PM UTC

throwaway_8989 wrote: post #452

Arjuna wrote: post #111

”It has been a struggle for me. I have a voice at the highest levels here, so it feels like I should be able to move things, but I'm evidently not persuasive enough. A good fraction of the things I complain about eventually turn my way after a year or two passes and evidence piles up, but I have never been able to kill stupid things before they cause damage, or set a direction and have a team actually stick to it. I…

Throwaway because it could be easy to identify my position from my normal account name. Carmack is many thing, engineering genius above them. However, he would frequently wade into areas where he had no experience, demand others do what he said, ignore evidence he was wrong, bully people, and disparage entire teams who were doing good, and in some cases legally required, work. When data proved his idea was wrong, he…

[deleted]

Re: John Carmack Leaves Meta

#790

Post by slickrick216 » Sat, Dec 17, 2022, 8:29 PM UTC

theteapot wrote: post #666

slickrick216 wrote: post #650

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Definitely depends on the person. The amount of projects I’ve worked on that were dismissed by such people done anyway and invariably became the saving of the team/org/company is laughable. These always took longer as they were under resourced and the people working on it did because of belief not because it was good for their status in the company. The hallmark of these is the last minute surge in resourcing when ma…

> The amount of projects I’ve worked on that were dismissed by such people done anyway and invariably became the saving of the team/org/company is laughable. That's intriguing. I would love some examples of these projects / products. > The hallmark of these is the last minute surge in resourcing when management figures out they got it wrong. Got what wrong? That they've heard the yeas and nays and chosen to undertake…

Good question hard to bake all the context in. The area I have worked most in is operations where a technique/widget/process is needed to fix a problem present within the environment due to an external actor which otherwise couldn’t be identified/monitored/resolved. Also to clarify I’ve been lucky to be part of such skunk work projects never actually lead one.