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Kevin Rose Will Join Google

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Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#161

Post by jayliew »

secretasiandan wrote: post #153
jayliew wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To quote pg: "A hacker who has learned what to make, and not just how to make, is extraordinarily powerful." As a developer, it is frustrating to see fellow developers place too much importance on being able to code as a necessary ingredient for startup success. As a hacker, I'd say that most hackers know how to make, but don't know what to make. That is to say, most startups from these type of hackers with the "if I…

I think you've entirely missed his point. Note that he says: "It doesn't matter if they understand how to code or not." His main point? "Once they have that reputation as being awesome it will stick around no matter how badly they perform after their initial success" And I totally agree. In fact, after a success the odds are more in your favor. So if you can't succeed again, it calls into question your 'true' level o…

Did Oink fail because of product, or market? If it's product, being technical will help, if it's market, being technical won't help. (edit: to add, the product worked - so it likely wasn't a problem with the product.)

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#163

Post by jayliew »

xpose2000 wrote: post #155
jayliew wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To quote pg: "A hacker who has learned what to make, and not just how to make, is extraordinarily powerful." As a developer, it is frustrating to see fellow developers place too much importance on being able to code as a necessary ingredient for startup success. As a hacker, I'd say that most hackers know how to make, but don't know what to make. That is to say, most startups from these type of hackers with the "if I…

I agree with you: "Just because you can't code, doesn't mean you can't build a business - and vice versa - just because you can code, doesn't mean you can build a business." I have worked for start-ups where people told me what to do, and also have my own bootstrapped start-up. I prefer the later. I think it is important to be well rounded in abilities from coding to business development. That way, you can see throug…

This is a hits driven business. How many people do you see with a string of successes and zero failures? Kevin has had a few ventures, with varying degree of "success", which is more than most people can say. Consider the statistically typical case: it's complete failure and lost of time, money, and sweat. If you even break even, you're already way above average. So having even just a series of small wins is a big deal (not saying that Kevin's "win" was small - I have no inside info)

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#164

Post by surgeterrix »

untog wrote: post #26
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…

I don't want to be some sort of Kevin Rose defender in this thread, but I don't think it's fair to say that he just "had an idea". 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. As a developer, I agree that some "ideas guys" suck. But some of them are fantastic, and have a huge talent in taking a core concept and fleshing…

He also wrote some of the code for the first iterations of Digg himself, so its not like he didn't do any coding originally. He just passed in on to more skilled people once the requirements were out of his league.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#165

Post by yangtheman »

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…

I agree on people seen as successful based on one prior successful project. I have seen it playing out a few times before. It didn't matter what the circumstances were (e.g. mostly luck) or how the story was spinned, once you can place a successful exit under your name, VC's seem to fall head over heels for you.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#166

Post by prince_hakeem »

wavephorm wrote: post #75
revorad wrote: post #66

Hardly anyone knows the details, but the amount of jealousy and hatred that comes out on HN on these stories is shocking.

If it's jealousy and hatred, then it's not because of being jealous of success. A lot of developers work really, really hard on their startups for years bootstrapping, just scraping by, and being ignored by investors because they're not famous. And Kevin Rose comes along with a half-baked idea of posting pictures of the food you're eating to the Internet, and his "startup" that he's "really dedicated to" get's almost…

I couldn't have said this more perfectly myself. So tired of the B.S. around here with failure being rewarded. The golden parachutes have arrived from the finance and corp. exec. world for the chosen ones sprinkled with pixie dust. How about these "stars" step aside, go do something to make the world a better place now that they've made their money and let someone else succeed. (Looking at you Caterina Fake too)

We don't need more B.S. webapps that let people comment on food, people, or anything else. We're all stocked up.

/rant

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#168

Post by gwern »

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…

Why do these people become stars? Economics suggests it's because they're already proven to some degree; eg. http://www.overcomingbias.com/2009/04/why-not-superstar-slav... summarizes a Tervio article predicting superstardom when the following conditions are met:

    Desired abilities are rare and lasting.
    It is very expensive to try someone new.
    Everyone can see which trials worked or not.
    Winners are free to demand more money or walk.
#1 is arguable whether it's true, but people seem to think it's true - any endeavour by someone like Rose comes with built-in interest & buzz. Why? Personal affection? No, because people think it's better than a random newly launched project. #2 is fairly true - how do you test someone on whether they can build a successful Facebook clone or innovate on it with less than thousands of dollars of their time and other resources (at a minimum)? #3 is pretty true, especially for web communities. #4 is very true; as Hacker News people love pointing out, it's a free country.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#169

Post by clark-kent »

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…

I don't get the KR bashing. Kevin is both a product and content guy. From TechTV (where he went from a tech support guy to a TV show host) to revision3, Diggnation, Foundation, Random. This guy is always creating content, very much like a hacker. He built the first prototype for Digg. This is the type of guy HN/Startup school aspires to produce.

Re: Kevin Rose Will Join Google

#170

Post by ootachi »

jayliew wrote: post #53
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…

To quote pg: "A hacker who has learned what to make, and not just how to make, is extraordinarily powerful." As a developer, it is frustrating to see fellow developers place too much importance on being able to code as a necessary ingredient for startup success. As a hacker, I'd say that most hackers know how to make, but don't know what to make. That is to say, most startups from these type of hackers with the "if I…

In fact, I'd say you should do more. Stop being a programmer. It's hard to get a job as a developer these days, and it'll all be outsourced to India and China soon anyway. Instead, you should go into sales and marketing.
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