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Some things need to change

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Re: Some things need to change

#191

Post by dbrush »

hk wrote: post #43
dbrush wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"He's relentlessly promoted himself..." How is that?

I don't really know how to respond to that in less than a thousand words, so let's just say: 1. because he obviously has 2. I consider this to be generally accepted as truthful 3. if you don't agree then we are probably not going to agree on anything, ever and leave it at that. This is probably breaching some law of argument ("Fallacy of Call to Common Sense" or something?) but hey, who has the time.

There really isn't a response to what you wrote other than to concede that I believe that I can't provide a reasonable response to what you wrote.

Re: Some things need to change

#192

Post by dbrush »

unalone wrote: post #153
geedee77 wrote: post #27

For a while now I've been wondering about the industry and the people in it, and this story just makes me question it all so much more. It seems that the majority of people who work in IT (or at least, those that contribute to the various sites) are acting like they are still in high school. You've got to be associated with this person or that site to be 'cool' and a 'guru' and if you're not you're nothing. It's gett…

Partly it's because this is an industry that acts like it's very geared towards youth. The emphasis is on the young millionaires: Zuckerberg comes to mind. (I'm 18 and applying to YCombinator, so I fall into this category too.) The environment is much more geared towards the hotheaded youth. It's not that you have a few outliers that act immature that get kept in check: everybody is immature, and the outliers are the…

"The environment is much more geared towards the hotheaded youth. It's not that you have a few outliers that act immature that get kept in check: everybody is immature, and the outliers are the people who act mature."

My experience being a part of Y Combinator is that everyone is precisely the opposite, though my experience is limited them the people I've met directly a indirectly because of Y Combinator.

Re: Some things need to change

#193

Post by gravitycop »

froo wrote: post #184
pclark wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

why does everyone think startups are doomed if they get a bad TC review? There's a perfect example of this THIS WEEK! Arrington has been ripping into Cha Cha for years, and they just got a massive funding round.

Just because ChaCha got funding, doesn't necessarily make it a good idea. I've never used it before, so I decided to give both it, Google, Yahoo, Live Search and Ask.com the same search phrase in response to this comment and see what the results are. What is the speed of light? - I felt a simple enough question. Google took just 0.11 seconds to give me an exact answer. Yahoo took 0.28 seconds Live Search has no timer…

What is the speed of light? - I felt a simple enough question.

Why didn't you try a non-simple question? Google is basically an almanac. When I have an almanac question, I don't hire a professional researcher. I consult an almanac.

Re: Some things need to change

#194

Post by matthavener »

rudyfink wrote: post #112
gravitycop wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you break someone's jaw, you go to jail. If you break their heart by verbal assault, you don't. That is not necessarily true. Commission of verbal assault can land a person in jail. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fighting_words_doctrine#United_... The fighting words doctrine, in United States constitutional law, is a limitation to freedom of speech as granted in the First Amendment to the United States Constitution.…

I am not a lawyer, but I believe this doctrine has essentially not been enforced in recent memory. The subsequent paragraph to the one you quoted steadily showed it being rejected by those who attempted to bring it before the court in the US.

the test for assault is that a reasonable person would fear for their safety or life

the test for battery is that you harmfully or offensively touched someone or something on them

i think spitting would fall under both for most juries..

Re: Some things need to change

#195

Post by jeroen »

zhyder wrote: post #144
biohacker42 wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

an example of how low folks in our industry can go There's nothing special about our industry, crazy people are everywhere. It's a simple numbers game, become popular enough and your popularity will cover some number of mentally unstable individuals. Actresses, singers and presidents have all been shot for no other reason then they were famous. Public criticism or lack of coverage probably makes things worse for Arri…

Actresses, singers and presidents are a little different though. Actresses/singers want much of the popularity, but struggle to maintain the right balance. And presidents -well- many folks have logical reasons to want them dead. I can't see the logic behind wanting Michael Arrington dead though, and I don't think he wants to be popular himself (as much as to make his blog/events popular). And somehow I hope our indus…

How can wanting someone dead ever be logical? I understand not liking someone, or disagreeing with their policies, but wanting them dead seems a bit extreme.

Re: Some things need to change

#196

Post by chollida1 »

xenophanes wrote: post #160
RobGR wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So suppose the cops arrest him. He is unlikely (statistically speaking) to be held without bail, so he's out in a day or two. Then you have a trial. Suppose you have people like me on the jury -- I know that morons threaten to kill each other all the time on the internet, in person, and on CB radio and via snail mail and every other means of communication man has invented. I would likely acquit unless you can present…

Why can't you have a very brief trial where you explain the definition of assault and present the uncontroversial evidence of the assault, and that's that? Not trying to argue. Just don't see why that wouldn't work. the jury should just be like "well, it's a crime, and he did it" instead of saying it's common so we'll ignore it.

> Why can't you have a very brief trial where you explain the definition of assault and present the uncontroversial evidence of the assault, and that's that?

The reason I've heard that assault charges aren't always filed is that there has to be, and I'm paraphrasing because I don't remember the exact wording, "sufficient reason " to believe that the accuser can and will carry out his/her thread in order to make it assault.

The situation often cited for this is a 90 lb weakling gets drunk and threatens to beat up someone who fights in MMA for a living. Since the thread isn't credible this technically isn't assault.

On the other hand, if I shove a gun in your face and threaten to kill you then that very much is assault as my threat is very credible.

Some where in between is the line between assault and just being a dick, which isn't a crime.

This is often why many verbal assault cases aren't tried.

The other, unfortunate, reason is that court time is very finite. Prosecutors can only take so many cases to court and prosecutors know that people will often make these types of threats for a short period of time and then just leave that person's life.

If that's the case then the situation often resolves itself and they don't have to take up their valuable court space with this case.

It sucks but that's the way things are:(.

Re: Some things need to change

#197

Post by unalone »

dbrush wrote: post #192
unalone wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Partly it's because this is an industry that acts like it's very geared towards youth. The emphasis is on the young millionaires: Zuckerberg comes to mind. (I'm 18 and applying to YCombinator, so I fall into this category too.) The environment is much more geared towards the hotheaded youth. It's not that you have a few outliers that act immature that get kept in check: everybody is immature, and the outliers are the…

"The environment is much more geared towards the hotheaded youth. It's not that you have a few outliers that act immature that get kept in check: everybody is immature, and the outliers are the people who act mature." My experience being a part of Y Combinator is that everyone is precisely the opposite, though my experience is limited them the people I've met directly a indirectly because of Y Combinator.

That's why I like YCombinator, and consequently why I like Hacker News: it avoids that level of immaturity. All the HN users who have YCombinator-funded companies tend to have great conversations. I can't think of a troll here who also was part of YC.

That said, this is the exception. I can't think of many more online groups that are this adult.

Re: Some things need to change

#198

Post by j2d2 »

pg wrote: post #124
hk wrote: post #15

Spitting in his face is going a bit far, but it's pretty difficult for me to feel sympathy for the guy. I struggle to think of a more dislikable, arrogant jerk. This belated plea for human-to-human sympathy falls on deaf ears, for me at least. In my group, Arrington symbolises everything we hate about the "Web 2.0" greed culture. He's relentlessly promoted himself as the gatekeeper to this bullshit world of easy VC m…

I know Arrington, and he's much nicer than you sound. Can you give an example where he's said anything even half as nasty about anyone as you've just said about him? From the way you describe your beef with him, it sounds as if you're making up a personality for him-- that you're projecting onto him your bitterness about "Web 2.0 greed culture." You're wrong about that too, incidentally.

holy crap well said

Re: Some things need to change

#199

Post by okeumeni »

fallentimes wrote: post #63
_b8r0 wrote: post #52

I hope he stops writing. I really do. If you're reading this, Michael Arrington, please go away and never touch the Internet again.

Like him or not, Techcrunch has helped tons of startups out.

It has destroyed a whole lot too; depending of what side of the fence you are you should be able to recognize this too. They rush to say something nasty about a startup but most of the time will say something nice about startups in their friend circle.

Re: Some things need to change

#200

Post by froo »

gravitycop wrote: post #193
froo wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just because ChaCha got funding, doesn't necessarily make it a good idea. I've never used it before, so I decided to give both it, Google, Yahoo, Live Search and Ask.com the same search phrase in response to this comment and see what the results are. What is the speed of light? - I felt a simple enough question. Google took just 0.11 seconds to give me an exact answer. Yahoo took 0.28 seconds Live Search has no timer…

What is the speed of light? - I felt a simple enough question. Why didn't you try a non -simple question? Google is basically an almanac. When I have an almanac question, I don't hire a professional researcher. I consult an almanac.

I wasn't planning to ask it too difficult a question as I really don't feel like waiting hours for a response... although given the circumstances I don't think it matters.

Its now 1:30am, I'm just about to head to bed and still have been unable to sign up for chacha (even though I've attempted to do so again with a different email address/username since I last updated my comment) I feel that I can quite comfortably say that I wont use them for my searching requirements anytime soon.

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