Posting an "Ask PG" at 3 AM Pacific time seems frighteningly ambitious to me.
And yet it worked!
Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
51–60 of 208 posts
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#52I'm sorry if this is an unsatisfying answer, but if you mean convincingly pitched, I couldn't answer a question like that without disclosing the long-term plans of startups that would prefer to keep them secret. If you mean unconvincingly pitched, it would probably be the applications we get from people who've discovered new power sources that violate the laws of physics.
Few years back, this guy (Ramar Pillai) fooled the whole country and if i remember correctly even got the audience from Indian PM and State Chief Minister. Probably the best pitch ever :).
He claimed he can turn water into fuel using some herbs :).
http://8ate.blogspot.com/2009/09/pramar-pillai-herbal-fuel-m...
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#53Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you say where the scariest and most ambitious convincing pitch was on the following scale? 1) We're going to build the next Facebook! 2) We're going to found the next Apple! 3) Our product will create sweeping political change! This will produce a major economic revolution in at least one country! (Seasteading would be change on this level if it worked; creating a new country successfully is around the same level…
Eliezer, I believe you just created the Yudkowsky Ambition scale. My startup, http://automicrofarm.com/ , rates between a 3 and a 5, depending on how successful it becomes, in my opinion.
That is awesome and I really hope you can pull it off.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#54"We want to make our own rockets and spaceships from scratch. But that's just the beginning, to pave the way to settling Mars and making it affordable for middle-class customers to relocate to Mars." I imagine if Elon Musk had pitched SpaceX for YC, it would be a strong candidate for this.
You can't compare comic book superheroes to normal people. :)
You kinda can. Life isn't a comic book, and if you saw Elon Musk when he was 15, he wouldn't have any special aura of destiny glowing around him. I'm not saying that everyone can grow up to be Elon Musk, but he didn't have any sort of special license which allowed him to do it, either. In the end, superheroes are composed of people who try to become superheroes even though the rest of the world spends the first decade thinking they're committing lese majeste because they don't have a superhero license.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#55I'm sorry if this is an unsatisfying answer, but if you mean convincingly pitched, I couldn't answer a question like that without disclosing the long-term plans of startups that would prefer to keep them secret. If you mean unconvincingly pitched, it would probably be the applications we get from people who've discovered new power sources that violate the laws of physics.
Can you say where the scariest and most ambitious convincing pitch was on the following scale? 1) We're going to build the next Facebook! 2) We're going to found the next Apple! 3) Our product will create sweeping political change! This will produce a major economic revolution in at least one country! (Seasteading would be change on this level if it worked; creating a new country successfully is around the same level…
So anything > 3 requires a bunch of "hard science". That does a great job of highlighting the fact that almost all of the readers of HN will be incapable of producing any of these.
Time for a career change.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#56Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you say where the scariest and most ambitious convincing pitch was on the following scale? 1) We're going to build the next Facebook! 2) We're going to found the next Apple! 3) Our product will create sweeping political change! This will produce a major economic revolution in at least one country! (Seasteading would be change on this level if it worked; creating a new country successfully is around the same level…
So anything > 3 requires a bunch of "hard science". That does a great job of highlighting the fact that almost all of the readers of HN will be incapable of producing any of these. Time for a career change.
3 is pretty decent. I can respect somebody trying for 3.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#57I'm sorry if this is an unsatisfying answer, but if you mean convincingly pitched, I couldn't answer a question like that without disclosing the long-term plans of startups that would prefer to keep them secret. If you mean unconvincingly pitched, it would probably be the applications we get from people who've discovered new power sources that violate the laws of physics.
Can you say where the scariest and most ambitious convincing pitch was on the following scale? 1) We're going to build the next Facebook! 2) We're going to found the next Apple! 3) Our product will create sweeping political change! This will produce a major economic revolution in at least one country! (Seasteading would be change on this level if it worked; creating a new country successfully is around the same level…
And now I have to rescale all my ambitions
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#58Earlier quoted context omitted.
Can you say where the scariest and most ambitious convincing pitch was on the following scale? 1) We're going to build the next Facebook! 2) We're going to found the next Apple! 3) Our product will create sweeping political change! This will produce a major economic revolution in at least one country! (Seasteading would be change on this level if it worked; creating a new country successfully is around the same level…
Eliezer, I believe you just created the Yudkowsky Ambition scale. My startup, http://automicrofarm.com/ , rates between a 3 and a 5, depending on how successful it becomes, in my opinion.
Also, I think you should rework the Yudkowsky Ambition scale a bit:
* 3 and 4 are really on the same level, just interchangeable
* 6 should really be an 8 or a 9, since it enables 7, 8 and perhaps 9
* the whole scale should be expanded so that 2-10 become 11-20, and 1 becomes e.g. a weekend hack that can bring in enough revenue to buy me a new toy every once in a while.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#59Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't PG on the Maker Schedule?
Being on the Maker schedule doesn't imply being awake at 3 AM.
PG writes of the Maker Schedule: "I evolved another trick for partitioning the day. I used to program from dinner till about 3 am every day, because at night no one could interrupt me. Then I'd sleep till about 11 am, and come in and work until dinner on what I called "business stuff." I never thought of it in these terms, but in effect I had two workdays each day, one on the manager's schedule and one on the maker's."
Does kinda imply he may very well be awake at 3AM. That said, he's also wrapping things up then and unlikely to take on a public Q&A requiring nontrivial attention.
Re: Ask PG: What Is The Most Frighteningly Ambitious Idea You Have Been Pitched On?
#60Earlier quoted context omitted.
Eliezer, I believe you just created the Yudkowsky Ambition scale. My startup, http://automicrofarm.com/ , rates between a 3 and a 5, depending on how successful it becomes, in my opinion.
Also, I think you should rework the Yudkowsky Ambition scale a bit: * 3 and 4 are really on the same level, just interchangeable * 6 should really be an 8 or a 9, since it enables 7, 8 and perhaps 9 * the whole scale should be expanded so that 2-10 become 11-20, and 1 becomes e.g. a weekend hack that can bring in enough revenue to buy me a new toy every once in a while.
Or, we can just keep this weekend hack as -9.