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The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

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Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#11

Post by hprotagonist »

readthenotes1 wrote: post #9
hprotagonist wrote: post #3

There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can “overhaul” it, or you can ride it. On the whole, I am not sure that a man who takes his pleasure overhauling does not have the best of the bargain. He is independent of the weather and the wind; the state of the roads troubles him not. Give him a screw-hammer, a bundle of rags, an oil-can, and something to sit down upon, and he is happy for the day. He…

1900? It is a very funny book that also predicted the rise of Hitler. There is an accident that happens early on in the book that my dad replicated over 100 years later in exactly the same way.

did he also crush his testes in between the lobes of a nose-less kidney saddle?

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#12

Post by sushisource »

gensym wrote: post #5
hprotagonist wrote: post #3

There are two ways you can get exercise out of a bicycle: you can “overhaul” it, or you can ride it. On the whole, I am not sure that a man who takes his pleasure overhauling does not have the best of the bargain. He is independent of the weather and the wind; the state of the roads troubles him not. Give him a screw-hammer, a bundle of rags, an oil-can, and something to sit down upon, and he is happy for the day. He…

This is exactly why I switched my sport of choice from cycling to running. In cycling, I kept getting pulled into the gear and tinkering. (It didn't help that I raced cyclocross, so during race season, every Monday was spent cleaning and repairing the result of the previous day's races). TBH, it was fun, but if I spent as much time training as I did tinkering, maybe I would have had some decent race results. With run…

That's part of the reason I love running too. A minimum of fuss. It's funny that you mention rock climbing, because it's the same reason I love bouldering. You only need shoes. Climbing has something for everyone - trad for the gear heads, bouldering for the people who can't be bothered with planning, sport for people somewhere in the middle.

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#14

Post by jiggawatts »

I started off in the "enjoying collecting gear" quadrant of photography, then I heard an insightful comment by a pro: "If you have $5K, you can either buy one good lens and use it to take photos of the pigeons outside your apartment, or spend that money on a destination holiday and take pictures of amazingly beautiful places with your old lens which still works perfectly fine."

I stopped buying new kit and started going on lots of holidays. No regrets so far. I just wish I had the budget for a Nikon Z9 and a holiday, but I don't work in Silicon Valley, so...

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#15

Post by elihu »

It seems like there's some overlap with the Bartle types from online gaming. You tend to have 4 main motivations to play an massively-multiplayer online game: there's the explorers, the achievers, the socializers, and the killers.

Most hobbies don't literally have a "killer" group (I hope), but maybe the real-world analogous thing is people who enjoy telling other people they suck at their hobby. The other groups seem to apply. You have the people who want to know everything about the hobby, the people who want to be the best at that hobby, and the people who like interacting with that hobby's community. (And just like in online games, too many "killers" can ruin the fun that the socializers are there for. We all know communities that fell apart because they were overrun by snobs and trolls.)

This is something that's been debated over the years, but I think Bartle missed a fifth type, which is people who want to create. In online gaming, these could be the people who actually programmed the game in the first place, or it could be players who are very into user generated content (especially in games like Minecraft where that's a big part of the game).

Similarly there are people who are into gear to the point where they're building their own gear, or even designing original equipment.

I'm that way with music. I'm not very good at guitar or piano or any other instrument and I don't know how to compose, but I got into microtonalism and just intonation, and since proper instruments for that don't really exist (save for continuous-pitch instruments like violin), I've been adapting guitars for a variety of different tunings and building electronic instruments. When you think about it it's pretty weird that I'm learning Kicad and PCB layout because the major third on a 12-EDO instrument is out of tune by about fifteen cents (because the 12th root of 2 to the 4th power is a very crude approximation of 5/4), but sometimes that's just how it goes.

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#17

Post by allenu »

dan-g wrote: post #2

I feel like this is me spinning in circles deciding on “the best language” to use for a side project, never committing, and then inevitably losing momentum. Frameworks and languages are a software engineer’s “kit”, I guess?

I think so, but even things like focusing too much on a perfect design or well-tested system can bog you down on a side project if you actually want to finish it.

I know for me I used to spend way too much time trying to organize my code and folders just right. If I learned a new design technique, I'd incorporate it into the project. I was obsessed with doing things right, which I think is fine if my goal was to learn, which it partly was. However, I also wanted to ship!

Over time I relaxed my requirements on perfect design and testing and was able to ship things.

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#18

Post by trillic »

glonq wrote: post #4

A great example of this is my sailing buddy. Last year, we probably spent 60 hours working improvements and noncritical fixes, 100 hours on discussions and watching videos, and about 6 hours sailing.

Hey it’s me, your internet sailing friend.

On the road right now on the way back from Charleston Race Week. 30 hours of driving. 20 hours in the boatyard rigging and derigging. 2 hours each day getting the boat ready and packing/rigging things. We did 10 races total, each about 40 mins. There’s an immense satisfaction moving a large complex object a long distance. Building it, using it, taking it apart, and moving it back once again.

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#19

Post by chris_st »

Learning bass guitar over the past two years I've seen this. There are definitely GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome) people who just buy more guitars and love to show them off and talk about gear in general.

I like how this points out that that's a valid hobby -- they're collectors.

But there's also memes that show up every once in a while that say, "You'd be a better musician if you just got off social media and practiced!". People who discuss like these as much as players!

Re: The Four Hobbies, and Apparent Expertise

#20

Post by bitcurious »

Insightful post. Maybe I’m burnt out, but I was kind of sad to see the pivot to “how to be a better worker” at the end of it.

For me, when it comes to hobbies the it’s pretty sequential. I usually start with discussing, then start doing/gearing while discussing, then abandon the discussing and forget most of what I learned about gear, but usually keep doing.

I spent a few months reading about bicycle sizing and components and geometries and etc., and got a lot of joy from all of that. Then at some point I got a bicycle, and now it’s like 7 years later and I barely remember anything from that first phase, but I still ride the bicycle.

Same with wristwatches, mycology, etc. I always open with the obsession/discussion phase before moving on to a more settled doing phase.

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