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Earlier quoted context omitted.
The blog post is an open letter: the author wants everyone reading to follow the those rules.
No. Crocker's rules are a request for people to act a certain way with respect to you , not wrt anyone else.
Crocker's rules - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12881288 - Nov 2016 (54 comments)
For example, I had a job interview a couple years ago where the interviewer showed up fifteen minutes late for a thirty minute interview. Eventually he did show up, and the interview proceeds more or less fine, and near the end he asks if I have any questions. I said "is it common to show up fifteen minutes late for interviews that you schedule? Because it comes off as unprofessional to me".
He started giving me a bunch of excuses about how busy he was and eventually I interject and say "Listen, I don't really care. I'm sure your reasons are valid to you but from my perspective it just looks like you were happy enough to let me waste half the interview just sitting around staring at my watch."
A day later the recruiter tells me that they don't want to move forward. I asked if they gave a reason why and apparently they thought I wasn't a good "culture fit".
I wish I could say I'm above it and that I'm some hyper-stoic who always wants the most direct version of everything, but I'm certainly not immune to wanting some niceties instead of complete blunt directness all the time. I try and be above it, but I'm not.
Everyone says that they value directness, and from what I can tell the vast majority of people actually don't. For example, I had a job interview a couple years ago where the interviewer showed up fifteen minutes late for a thirty minute interview. Eventually he did show up, and the interview proceeds more or less fine, and near the end he asks if I have any questions. I said "is it common to show up fifteen minutes…
Everyone says that they value directness, and from what I can tell the vast majority of people actually don't. For example, I had a job interview a couple years ago where the interviewer showed up fifteen minutes late for a thirty minute interview. Eventually he did show up, and the interview proceeds more or less fine, and near the end he asks if I have any questions. I said "is it common to show up fifteen minutes…
Of course they didn't want to move forward. That's what you had decided/wanted though right? I can't imagine you hoping for any other outcome with that kind of question and follow up?
Everyone says that they value directness, and from what I can tell the vast majority of people actually don't. For example, I had a job interview a couple years ago where the interviewer showed up fifteen minutes late for a thirty minute interview. Eventually he did show up, and the interview proceeds more or less fine, and near the end he asks if I have any questions. I said "is it common to show up fifteen minutes…
Presumably the rest of the company operates like that too, so you were indeed not a good culture fit.
> The person invoking Crocker's Rules is saying, in effect, "your feelings about how I might receive this are your problem to manage, not mine, just give me the information." Isn't it quite the opposite? The person invoking Crocker's Rules is saying, in effect, " my feelings about the information and how I might receive it are my problem to manage, not yours , just give me the information."
This is not something that will change within our lifetimes. Learn soft skills, learn how to be indirect. You don’t have to be as verbose with it as some of the examples in this article.
“Gassing them up”, “Letting them down gently”, “Little white lies”, etc - these are all examples of how benign emotional manipulation is essentially the crux of pleasant social interaction in most of the Western world.
It’s not my personal preference but it works because most people have unhandled insecurities.
I agree with the sentiment that gratuitous happy-talk adds noise to what ought to be clear, bottom-line-up-front engineering communications. But the recipients of those communications are people, and most people have feelings. So a good engineer ought to optimize those communications for overall success, and that means treating the intended recipients as if they matter. Some human-level communication is usually benef…
A lot of people never get past this level of sureness, so the signal is lost (or at least compressed). You can ask them for a number from a digital display and they’ll say it “looks like 54”.
One way to rectify the idea that these messages have signal (which I agree with) and what the article says is that it’s declaring bankruptcy on additional context. The extra text has so little value it’s worth removing as a rule.