Who can forget the MeetUp crazed scene with mostly early 20 something tech startup cosplaying 'founders', mostly lounging and tweeting from their macbook seated on a brown leather couch in their exposed brick 'offices' with a pool table in the back?
What happened to nerds?
71–80 of 541 posts
Re: What happened to nerds?
#72Nerds used to have a internet to discuss tech in, you were allowed to make an argument based on logic and reasoning. Then the ideologues and political commissars showed up, giving zero shit about tech or logical reasoning, this pulled the discourse down to the lowest common denominator and the rest is history. Why should I take the moral high ground and listen to an argument I dislike if I'm not offered the same cour…
I'm sure I'm not the first to say this, but interesting username. This would fly in my language, haha!
I'm sure it has a different meaning, though
Re: What happened to nerds?
#73Nerds used to have a internet to discuss tech in, you were allowed to make an argument based on logic and reasoning. Then the ideologues and political commissars showed up, giving zero shit about tech or logical reasoning, this pulled the discourse down to the lowest common denominator and the rest is history. Why should I take the moral high ground and listen to an argument I dislike if I'm not offered the same cour…
> Then the ideologues and political commissars showed up I think you're seeing the world through rose-tinted glasses. In some FLOSS circles the discussions were dominated by ideologues, to the point some discussions seemed like Monty Python skits. I mean, your choice of window manager, let alone Linux distro, was something you'd be judged by.
At least those were on technical merits. However imaginary or arbitrary those merits were... Which I think was more healthy place.
Re: What happened to nerds?
#74This seems to be a critique of "Can Tech Legends Find the Liar? (Mafia Episode 1)" on Youtube but critiqued from a "nerd subculture" angle, which is a thing in the USA, I guess? As a European, this took me a moment to figure it out.
There definitely is/was a nerd subculture in Europe, it's just that those who represent it were always only vaguely aware of the existence of Jobs and Wozniak. Linus Torvalds on the other hand - that is a household name.
Jobs is not the one to think of when relating to nerds, Wozniak is. Jobs is the one who comes in and takes most of the money as well as the limelight when some nerds have done something interesting but then act like the dog who has caught the car. European nerd culture is more Fabrice Bellard and Linus Torvalds, less Steve Jobs.
Re: What happened to nerds?
#75LinkedIn, Twitter and tons of money
Re: What happened to nerds?
#76This happens in any industry where value/status are at a premium. Finance, Law, VC guys were good too in the beginning but when the value/status change happens it attracts certain kind of guys who are average in talent but excel in demonstrating value and social management of the value/status. Another change which has happened recently is that the economics of engagement farming have become common place wisdom as alr…
> guys who are average in talent but excel in demonstrating value and social management of the value/status
aka techbros
Re: What happened to nerds?
#77I think the issue boils down to money, lots of it. When I worked in the Bay Area, I noticed the nerd-culture was still more or less predominant in South Bay. The arrogant, shallow types were always there (as witnessed by their fancy cars--"should we take the Jag or the Merc today?"), but I could still tolerate it. San Francisco was a different story. I started a new job at a startup once and remember thinking "I'm su…
> We're on the downside of the tech bubble, and maybe that's a good thing.
I think it'll keep having waves, but I agree that a bit of cooling off could be a good thing.
The technologies are genuinely cool, interesting stuff, it's a super exciting time to be building stuff. But the business side of things seems quite vapid and desperate for many companies.
I wonder if more tangible industries like manufacturing have had similar peaks? Was there a time where the Wood Industry was going crazy, making everything out of wood, stuff that didn't need to exist?
Re: What happened to nerds?
#78I don’t know why you’d think “being interested in nerdy stuff like computers” would somehow translate into virtuous behavior. They seem like entirely different things to me, in the sense that I wouldn’t expect a writer, or a baker, or a chef to have typical ethical behaviors as a group.
“What happened” was just that some people got rich and powerful and their real personalities showed through. This is not a new thing in any sense at all, from Rockefeller to Bill Gates – both “technology entrepreneurs”.
Re: What happened to nerds?
#79Maybe identity is the root of all evil? Hear me out: back in the day founding a company wasn't an identity, it was just an action, a verb. Stuff started going sideways when people started thinking of themselves as "founders". Suddenly the product wasn't the top priority anymore, instead it was second to defending their identity as a "founder". Seemingly stupid decisions followed, but seen from the perspective of a CE…
Not at all, the issue is that money and glamour attracted techbros.
Re: What happened to nerds?
#80Nerds used to have a internet to discuss tech in, you were allowed to make an argument based on logic and reasoning. Then the ideologues and political commissars showed up, giving zero shit about tech or logical reasoning, this pulled the discourse down to the lowest common denominator and the rest is history. Why should I take the moral high ground and listen to an argument I dislike if I'm not offered the same cour…
I feel that too many people are confusing arguments they agree with with logical arguments. Most of people, when they claim that something is rational or logical, actually mean that it's a position that they agree with. I have no reason to believe that back in the day when internet was only for nerds the situation was different.
I think there is a difference when you can assume that the other person probably isn't a complete idiot. Compare Reddit's technical subs and HN and there is a vast difference in general civility. Non-nerds look at this site's CSS and their mental parsing breaks entirely, so that filtering still exists.