Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit) • Hacker News Board

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#71

Post by henning » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 1:31 AM UTC

ecuzzillo wrote: post #52

morris wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such as?

I expect Matt will have more personal bad experiences, but the most well-publicized one goes approximately as follows: - Aaron applies to YC, starts Infogami with a co-founder who drops out (presumably because of Aaron's special interpersonal sparkles). - Aaron launches Infogami, with a promise of a new feature every day. - Aaron complains for a long time about how he doesn't have a co-founder, and then merges with R…

startup/nerd drama! more, more, more! this is better than Perez Hilton!

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#72

Post by portLAN » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 1:34 AM UTC

morris wrote: post #66

steve wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed, so what if his startup fails and he doesn't release a feature per day as he promised? That's what startups (usually) do. They fail. Shouldn't hold that against him personally. As far as the reddit guys go, there's a reason you're not supposed to do a startup with your closest friends. Aren't you supposed to hate your partner to some degree by the end? I know I did... But I understand that to be normal so I ju…

What I find amusing is that, barring personal interactions, I put Matt and Aaron in the same category - they both have annoying and arrogant internet personas. The only difference is that I believe Aaron is a very talented programmer. The only thing I believe about Matt is that he is an above average poker player. On a personal level, both of them are irrelevant to me.

Good for them. If you're pissing people off, you're probably doing something right.

The funny part is, for most people here, Aaron and Matt aren't reading your blog -- but you're reading theirs! This is like a Denial-Of-Service attack against their competition by inducing them to waste time they could be spending on their own startup instead reading about someone else's.

Id software was a master at this. Everyone was so busy playing Quake, Quake II, etc. that they weren't working on their own games. Did you know actual celebrities are horrible at recognizing other celebrities? They are too busy making movies to read celebrity gossip magazines.

Speaking of, I probably should get back to work!

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#73

Post by bluishgreen » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 1:35 AM UTC

If aaron wants to indulge let him please go ahed. But this post is so insincere when it gives the bit about users loving perfectionism that it makes me dizzy. Its either insincere or is delusional.I don't want to have anything to do with either.

PG wants to indulge with arc, he went ahed. But I don't remember him giving some insincere explanation.

I am now a strong believer in motherfucker's theory of insincerity http://atomicwang.org/motherfucker/Index/E06C66BF-E7D5-48FF-... (sorry, but that what he calls himself)

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#74

Post by menloparkbum » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 1:49 AM UTC

euccastro wrote: post #68

pg wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some interesting and useful things have to be done as companies rather than open-source projects.

What are those, in the software world? I can only think of projects that involve a lot of drudge work that nobody wants to do unless they're paid to. I suppose this includes most services. What else has to be done by a company?

Any software project, no matter how cool it seems, is at least 50% drudge work. I'd be willing to argue that the inverse-pseudo-pareto-principle applies... 20% of any non-trivial software project is fun, and the other 80% is drudge work.

Even certain open source projects require paid staff. The only reason FireFox exists is because the Mozilla foundation can pay programmers to work on the ugly parts.

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#75

Post by mattmaroon » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 2:09 AM UTC

ecuzzillo wrote: post #52

morris wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such as?

I expect Matt will have more personal bad experiences, but the most well-publicized one goes approximately as follows: - Aaron applies to YC, starts Infogami with a co-founder who drops out (presumably because of Aaron's special interpersonal sparkles). - Aaron launches Infogami, with a promise of a new feature every day. - Aaron complains for a long time about how he doesn't have a co-founder, and then merges with R…

Mine wasn't that bad, but it did involve me being told I had an apartment in Cambridge locked up, only to find less than two weeks before Y C began that I didn't.

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#76

Post by euccastro » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 2:21 AM UTC

pg wrote: post #69

euccastro wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are those, in the software world? I can only think of projects that involve a lot of drudge work that nobody wants to do unless they're paid to. I suppose this includes most services. What else has to be done by a company?

Google probably has to, for example.

Yes, Google is a service. But then again, Debian repositories are a service, as is Wikipedia, as is Usenet (although you said 'open source', I'm assuming your argument extends to donated effort in general). So there must be some other difficulty to Google.

There are high stakes, business wise, in web search. But then again, that was just as true for operating systems and web browsers. So cross that one too.

Google is resource intensive. Open source is good at providing manpower, but not so good at sustaining huge running costs of other type. But then again, Google started quite small, and I'd guess Wikipedia, Usenet or Debian need more resources than many small companies. So, is it only a matter of size? In any event, this doesn't apply to Aaron's new startup.

Anything else?

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#77

Post by euccastro » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 2:32 AM UTC

menloparkbum wrote: post #74

euccastro wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are those, in the software world? I can only think of projects that involve a lot of drudge work that nobody wants to do unless they're paid to. I suppose this includes most services. What else has to be done by a company?

Any software project, no matter how cool it seems, is at least 50% drudge work. I'd be willing to argue that the inverse-pseudo-pareto-principle applies... 20% of any non-trivial software project is fun, and the other 80% is drudge work. Even certain open source projects require paid staff. The only reason FireFox exists is because the Mozilla foundation can pay programmers to work on the ugly parts.

OK, so that would prove that open source can get drudge work done, right? Or do you think 80% of open source work is sponsored by companies? For all I know, that might be the case, but are sponsored efforts any less open source?

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#78

Post by menloparkbum » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 2:46 AM UTC

euccastro wrote: post #77

menloparkbum wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Any software project, no matter how cool it seems, is at least 50% drudge work. I'd be willing to argue that the inverse-pseudo-pareto-principle applies... 20% of any non-trivial software project is fun, and the other 80% is drudge work. Even certain open source projects require paid staff. The only reason FireFox exists is because the Mozilla foundation can pay programmers to work on the ugly parts.

OK, so that would prove that open source can get drudge work done, right? Or do you think 80% of open source work is sponsored by companies? For all I know, that might be the case, but are sponsored efforts any less open source?

The sponsored efforts are indeed open source. However, the only reason the drudge work got done was because someone was paid to do it. People don't like doing crappy stuff if they aren't getting paid.

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#79

Post by mattmaroon » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 2:55 AM UTC

bluishgreen wrote: post #73

If aaron wants to indulge let him please go ahed. But this post is so insincere when it gives the bit about users loving perfectionism that it makes me dizzy. Its either insincere or is delusional.I don't want to have anything to do with either. PG wants to indulge with arc, he went ahed. But I don't remember him giving some insincere explanation. I am now a strong believer in motherfucker's theory of insincerity htt…

That post about sincerity is interesting but exactly, completely wrong. He's completely reversed the entire cause effect relationship. I'll write a blog post as to why.

Re: Aaron Swartz: Perfectionism (and his new startup, Jottit)

#80

Post by euccastro » Sat, Sep 01, 2007, 3:21 AM UTC

menloparkbum wrote: post #78

euccastro wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, so that would prove that open source can get drudge work done, right? Or do you think 80% of open source work is sponsored by companies? For all I know, that might be the case, but are sponsored efforts any less open source?

The sponsored efforts are indeed open source. However, the only reason the drudge work got done was because someone was paid to do it. People don't like doing crappy stuff if they aren't getting paid.

I can think of other reasons why people would do boring stuff. This is by no means an orthogonal breakdown!

- Militance: They believe in a cause and do some sacrifices to further it. Like translating software and docs into an obscure language. This can be done by zealots of the software, of the language, or both.

- Self-image (somewhat related to the above): After having completed the sexy parts, you care about the appearance of your project as a whole, so you fill in the boring parts.

- Pleasing users (somewhat related to the above): You get hooked in a virtuous feedback cycle with your users. Some things that would be boring in themselves get done in anticipation of the positive feedback.

- Competitiveness: a mix of the two above. You want to be the best at what you do, and the boring stuff offers opportunities to differentiate.

- Scratch a personal itch: I think many Linux device drivers get done because of this. Also most of the external bug reporting (and most of the business sponsorship.)

- The long tail of vocation: what is boring to most is probably someone's joy.

- Retribution: You love an open source product as an user, so you give back.

- Social acceptance: You want to become part of the community of contributors. You aren't qualified to do the hard stuff yet.

In MMOG's, lots of people volunteer for Game Masters, which is an euphemism for unpaid customer service. They do very boring, repetitive work for the benefit of a for-profit company that gives them absolutely nothing in return (indeed, it's legally dangerous to give them anything in return).

So don't underestimate people's ability to do drudge work for free.