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Kevin Rose Will Join Google

allthingsd.com

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Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#111

Post by Timothee »

vibrunazo wrote: post #94
Timothee wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a distinction to be made between "idea guys" and "product people". You're criticizing "idea guys", while it seems that Kevin Rose might be more of a product person. The "idea guy" is the guy who comes to a developer and start with "I've got this great idea for an app…", thinks it's genius but never dives down to all the details of said-app. A product person might or might not know how to code but s/he will(/s…

I agree that knowing how to code is not utmost necessary. But don't you think it's highly important and, at least,very close to necessary? An idea/product guy will never come up with a solution he didn't know was technically viable. So his pool of solutions is more limited than that of a hacker. He'll also waste time overthinking ideas that are not technically viable. So he's not as efficient. You don't need both leg…

Yes, but to some extent only. (and typically the "idea guys" don't have a clue of the technical reality behind their "genius" idea)

To me, there's actually a difference between knowing how to code and knowing the technology. You can know how things work and what's technically possible without really knowing how to code it.

But this goes both ways too: developers don't necessarily have a good product sense, and without knowing about interaction and design patterns for example, or know what the current product landscape looks like, they would also be limited in their implementations. My comment above was mostly to contradict comments like the parent, that are fairly common: hackers can do it all, knowing how to code is the most important thing. Coding is not important. Knowing what can be coded is.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#112

Post by Tycho »

xpose2000 wrote: post #16

Sorry if this sounds harsh, and I know he has a lot of fans out there. But this guy struck gold 5 years ago with Digg. Sure, he deserves props for this. However, he's not a developer. He's an "ideas guy" as far as I can tell. As a developer, I hate these kinds of people because more often than not their ideas suck. In any case, what I am saying is that it seems like people in the industry get by based on one previous…

He made something called Pounce too that did quite well.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#113

Post by joering2 »

samstave wrote: post #99
alaskamiller wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is the wrong storyline. Reddit didn't evolve from Digg. They started around the same timeframe and it was as much Mac/PC in terms of fanboyishness. Reddit won because of the power of subreddits and capturing the long tail for content and communities. What's out of touch with your story is that Digg users thought Reddit's UX was horrifying and avoided it like the plague. Even to this day without enhancement suite…

I was not trying to imply reddit evolved FROM digg. (I have been using all three sites since their inception - starting with /. in 1997, I am familiar with their history). I am saying the IDEA of social content sites evolved from one, to the next, to the next. As I mentioned, it is not about UI, or content, it was about UX! The UX that digg had, especially in V4 wrapped too much UI around the content resulting in a p…

> If you were worth getting $1.7MM to piss away you would have had $1.7MM to piss away.

So you are implying that a luck and contacts and more other things such as your experience, geolocation, etc. don't matter as long as you are worth getting $X, you will have $X to piss away.

uhm, is there any website to sign up? I want to try my skills against it -- perhaps I am "worth it".

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#114

Post by PagingCraig »

xpose2000 wrote: post #16

Sorry if this sounds harsh, and I know he has a lot of fans out there. But this guy struck gold 5 years ago with Digg. Sure, he deserves props for this. However, he's not a developer. He's an "ideas guy" as far as I can tell. As a developer, I hate these kinds of people because more often than not their ideas suck. In any case, what I am saying is that it seems like people in the industry get by based on one previous…

You sound jealous.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#115

Post by functionform »

beatle wrote: post #103
untog wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um he had an idea, paid someone to build it (ojbyrne on HN). Promoted it on air in his role at TechTV and had it take off. Right, so he made it a success. I just find it disheartening sometimes that developers (and I am one) seem to think that good code is all that matters. It isn't. You can have the most functional, highly-tuned web site in the world and have no-one use it. Even if Kevin Rose is nothing but a giant…

developers are a dime a dozen. I can hire ten people from India or China who are better than you (xpose2000). most developers hate successful people who don't have technical skills (Steve Jobs, MBAs, managers, non-technical founders, etc.) because they make the developers look a lot less important.

Maybe you've never heard the famous expression "Ideas are like *, everybody's got one".

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#116

Post by aarondf »

alaskamiller wrote: post #89
samstave wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He had an idea and spent years working on it, iterating and improving until Digg finally hit the big time. I think he deserves credit for that. I don't think anyone has argued against this. He does deserve credit for this. The problem is that he has been given too much credit. I.E. that there were far more ideas of the same caliber. I am sure this must have been tough on him, to fail at producing again like the ear…

This is the wrong storyline. Reddit didn't evolve from Digg. They started around the same timeframe and it was as much Mac/PC in terms of fanboyishness. Reddit won because of the power of subreddits and capturing the long tail for content and communities. What's out of touch with your story is that Digg users thought Reddit's UX was horrifying and avoided it like the plague. Even to this day without enhancement suite…

If you were worth getting $1.7MM to piss away you would have had $1.7MM to piss away.

If you were the inventors of the facebook, you would've invented the facebook.

For some reason, I really like this type of argument. There's really no comeback to it. It's so, matter-of-fact.

"If you were [x], then you'd be [x]"

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#117

Post by untog »

beatle wrote: post #103
untog wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Um he had an idea, paid someone to build it (ojbyrne on HN). Promoted it on air in his role at TechTV and had it take off. Right, so he made it a success. I just find it disheartening sometimes that developers (and I am one) seem to think that good code is all that matters. It isn't. You can have the most functional, highly-tuned web site in the world and have no-one use it. Even if Kevin Rose is nothing but a giant…

developers are a dime a dozen. I can hire ten people from India or China who are better than you (xpose2000). most developers hate successful people who don't have technical skills (Steve Jobs, MBAs, managers, non-technical founders, etc.) because they make the developers look a lot less important.

Looks like your post is getting a mixed reaction. I think you're both right and wrong.

You can outsource to a lot of cheap, technically talented developers (you can also very easily end up with awful developers, though). But they won't think on their feet or be able to make independent decisions- they are contractors, and they will make exactly what you tell them to.

If you're technically minded yourself that might be fine- you can give very specific, down to the pixel instructions. But if you're an "ideas guy" you're not going to have any answer when feature X is not technically possible, and the contractors aren't going to help you.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#118

Post by joelmaat »

grokaholic wrote: post #81
freshfunk wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true but Google has always been an engineering-led organization as opposed to a product-led one. Social networking is less of an engineering problem than it is a product problem. This is true for other social products as well. Fundamentally, Google is taking the wrong approach. Listen to how Vic Gundotra talks about Google+ as opposed to how Zuckerberg talks about Facebook. This may be a step in the right dir…

"Listen to how Vic Gundotra talks about Google+ as opposed to how Zuckerberg talks about Facebook." Many similarities and differences in how they talk--which particular differences do you have in mind?

"Vic's" ego is getting bigger. That usually spells failure.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#119

Post by waldes »

Good for him! I've been a fan since tech TV days. I think this board is suffering from an overdose of hateraid. Yeah Digg blew up and then sunk, but to be involved in so many sucessful businesses this guy is talented.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#120

Post by unreal37 »

The allthingsd article specifically says Google is NOT acquiring Milk. They have hired Kevin Rose and a few key members of the Milk team. The techcrunch article says Milk is being acqui-hired, for $15-$30 million. I wonder which is correct.

It's nice to see the investors taken care of, if that's what happened. But it doesn't sound like Milk or Oink will survive past today.

Congrats to Kevin and all who were hired. I still stand by my position that it kinda sucks that they abandoned their customers at the drop of the hat. But at least now it makes some sense.

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