41–50 of 62 posts
Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20716878 - Aug 2019 (16 comments)
Down and out in the magic kingdom – A tale of software consulting in the midwest - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11595120 - April 2016 (126 comments)
I think the point was more about the kind of social credit system, in that sense it seemed not to be able to decide if it was depicting a utopia or dystopia. But please tell me if I'm way off, interested in hearing what people felt about this book.
I like this book and I’m never quite sure how some of the terms were Doctorow capturing what’s going on and writing it down vs inventing it. I think how whuffie was described here seems like something that will really exist and I don’t know if there were any sites displaying cumulative karma for people. It was at least the first time I read it. Also, I think the “comm” described in Eastern Standard Tribe is the first…
Related (edit: oops - not related! sorry!) Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom (2011) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20716878 - Aug 2019 (16 comments) Down and out in the magic kingdom – A tale of software consulting in the midwest - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11595120 - April 2016 (126 comments)
Edit: neither link are about the book.
I like this book and I’m never quite sure how some of the terms were Doctorow capturing what’s going on and writing it down vs inventing it. I think how whuffie was described here seems like something that will really exist and I don’t know if there were any sites displaying cumulative karma for people. It was at least the first time I read it. Also, I think the “comm” described in Eastern Standard Tribe is the first…
> I wondered if phone designers ever drew inspiration from Doctorow’s specific books. I'm sure at least somebody was thinking about that because Doctorow's books are popular, but all that specifically happened is vendors discovered if you tell people that the handheld computer you're selling them is a "phone" they'll buy that, and then of course they actually wanted a handheld computer, so they'll keep buying them ev…
So much this.
And we expected tablets to become more popular, but instead phones grew to the max screen size that still allows pocketability.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's science fiction about economics, intellectual property, and the value of community. But that tagline applies to nearly everything Doctorow's written.
Oh that sounds fun. I’m in.
Really a good study in understanding that just growing till we produce "enough" is not going to solve critical human problems. There will still be serious conflict, and the solutions to those are not economic growth.
As far as I know, all of Doctorow's books are on his website for free download anyway. E.g. here is Content ... https://craphound.com/content/download/ DAOITMK is here: https://craphound.com/category/down/
I like this book and I’m never quite sure how some of the terms were Doctorow capturing what’s going on and writing it down vs inventing it. I think how whuffie was described here seems like something that will really exist and I don’t know if there were any sites displaying cumulative karma for people. It was at least the first time I read it. Also, I think the “comm” described in Eastern Standard Tribe is the first…
The book was written when slashdot.org was really big, it basically invented the "Karma" system. There was this idea of user generated and curated content being a bright happy new future, and DAOITMK basically shot that idea dead by showing all the faults such a system would have. Of course subsequent sites (re: reddit) have exhibited all of those flaws. HN stays reasonable because of the mods, but even so the culture is a lot different here than it was 10 years ago. When I first created an account here short comments almost always got downvoted, posters who didn't have anything substantial learned to stay quiet.
(The downside of that culture is people learned to type intelligent sounding long form fluff!)
I like this book and I’m never quite sure how some of the terms were Doctorow capturing what’s going on and writing it down vs inventing it. I think how whuffie was described here seems like something that will really exist and I don’t know if there were any sites displaying cumulative karma for people. It was at least the first time I read it. Also, I think the “comm” described in Eastern Standard Tribe is the first…
Slashdot did for a long time - though there were caps on it. I used to see if I could get it to the top limit, down to the bottom limit and back to the top in a single day. It wasn't really all that difficult.
I like this book and I’m never quite sure how some of the terms were Doctorow capturing what’s going on and writing it down vs inventing it. I think how whuffie was described here seems like something that will really exist and I don’t know if there were any sites displaying cumulative karma for people. It was at least the first time I read it. Also, I think the “comm” described in Eastern Standard Tribe is the first…
> I wondered if phone designers ever drew inspiration from Doctorow’s specific books. I'm sure at least somebody was thinking about that because Doctorow's books are popular, but all that specifically happened is vendors discovered if you tell people that the handheld computer you're selling them is a "phone" they'll buy that, and then of course they actually wanted a handheld computer, so they'll keep buying them ev…