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The Religion of Speed

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Re: The Religion of Speed

#121

Post by SetTheorist »

Zxian wrote: post #118
TeMPOraL wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird analogy. Nonsensical from both physical standpoint (the only energy input when swinging is the person on the swing "pumping their legs"), and practical one (you usually sit down with the swing already at an angle and then kick off, so a good 50% of the arc/momentum is there from the setup ).

You clearly didn't read this. It's about rowing. Not being on a playground.

The original quote is a bit unclear, but it does refer to being on a playground:

"Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung."

Re: The Religion of Speed

#122

Post by xivzgrev »

As a manager I'm guilty in part of driving the cult of speed

However I noticed that whether a team member thought for a day, or thought for a week, the result was essentially the same. The tactics may have more details but the overall plan and impact id expect was roughly the same. They had blind spots, opportunities that could make it more impactful that only came to light when they talked thru it.

So for me, it was better to touch base sooner than later and get the broad plan right, then let them figure out the details and get to it

(Note I work in marketing, not engineering)

Re: The Religion of Speed

#123

Post by ricardobeat »

SetTheorist wrote: post #121
Zxian wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You clearly didn't read this. It's about rowing. Not being on a playground.

The original quote is a bit unclear, but it does refer to being on a playground: "Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung."

It's a bit confusing since it starts with "Rowers have a word for this frictionless state..."

I spent a good minute or two trying to picture what 'drive our arc higher' could mean during rowing, as that is not when force is exerted...

Re: The Religion of Speed

#124

Post by ricardobeat »

jcelerier wrote: post #96
latexr wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most deadlines are artificial and self-inflicted. The author is not advocating that if you have a literal fire consuming half your home that you should sit down on the floor, ponder your possibilities, schedule a few calls for discussion, then send a few messages on Slack to decide what to do; of course some things are more urgent than others. The author is calling out a “speed cult”; they’re not making an absolutist…

> Most deadlines are artificial and self-inflicted. most software in the world is built by consulting companies for external customers and under their customer's deadline, thus not self-inflicted

When I worked in consulting, the majority of deadlines were still self-inflicted, based on estimates provided by us.

If you fall into the fast -> unexpected -> iteration -> alignment cycle the author mentions, those estimates tend to be based on the 'fast' part only; that closes deals.

Re: The Religion of Speed

#125

Post by monknomo »

xivzgrev wrote: post #122

As a manager I'm guilty in part of driving the cult of speed However I noticed that whether a team member thought for a day, or thought for a week, the result was essentially the same. The tactics may have more details but the overall plan and impact id expect was roughly the same. They had blind spots, opportunities that could make it more impactful that only came to light when they talked thru it. So for me, it was…

I think the desire for longer term planning is to smooth out the variance.

Yes, frequent base touching, to ensure alignment on the broad contours is right, but I find yeeting a significant project with one day of planning has a tendency to turn up either requirement gaps, cross team coordination problems, or wildly inaccurate effort estimates (the classic "20 minute adventure" taking a month or two).

Now this can be fine, and in my experience management loves this approach _provided nothing unexpected happens_, but totally loses their shit when your two week effort turns into a 6 week slog with a "not sure boss" estimate for a completion date because the scope and methods are so ill defined

Re: The Religion of Speed

#126

Post by dgellow »

simianwords wrote: post #113
dgellow wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

depends on the exact chain of events, but if the economics are indeed solved, and AI labs are found to have a sustainable business model, that concern would be addressed. I would still see the technology as anti-human and would still see the concept of an agentic economy as deeply unserious, wasteful, and risky. Not exactly sure what your point is though. FWIW my concerns aren't only for OpenAI, it's just the poster-…

Here’s what you said earlier > It's a capital misallocation problem, a number problem, that has nothing to do with subjective feelings regarding LLMs Now you say > I would still see the technology as anti-human and would still see the concept of an agentic economy as deeply unserious, wasteful, and risky. Not exactly sure what your point is though. You can see how someone might be confused with this. Is it your subje…

No, I don’t see the confusion. There are a lot of distinct issues with LLMs. In my initial message I made it clear I was talking about the economics issues.

> your concern would be invalid if the AI companies overall make profit. If they don’t, then you would have been right on the point of being careful.

No, that’s fallacious reasoning. If the AI vendors are currently profitable that doesn’t mean the concerns regarding their unsustainability is invalid, but that changes the calculus depending on the details. They could be profitable right now on paper and still be economically not viable. The core problem is that the amount of money allocated to the AI bet is completely disproportionate compared to the actual economical value of the technology. That’s where the imbalance is. The exact reasons for the imbalance can change over time, but there would still be a misallocation. The companies would need to be profitable, and/or their expenditures would need to pay off, and the overall demand needs to grow exponentially, and they need to be protected from Chinese competitive pressure, etc.

I still don’t understand your overall point

Re: The Religion of Speed

#127

Post by drob518 »

andai wrote: post #93
austin-cheney wrote: post #81

Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. My learnings about speed: * people tend to not measure things and when they actually do bother they tend to measure the wrong things, the things of immediate comfort * measurements, when executed correctly, are objective with numeric evidence, thus some people are wholly incapable of measuring things for the same reasons some people cannot introspect * people tend to guess at measures…

>Rowers have a word for this frictionless state: swing... Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung. The boat swings you. The shell wants to move fast: Speed sings in its lines and…

Aka “mechanical sympathy”

Re: The Religion of Speed

#128

Post by roughly »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #117
andai wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Rowers have a word for this frictionless state: swing... Recall the pure joy of riding on a backyard swing: an easy cycle of motion, the momentum coming from the swing itself. The swing carries us; we do not force it. We pump our legs to drive our arc higher, but gravity does most of the work. We are not so much swinging as being swung. The boat swings you. The shell wants to move fast: Speed sings in its lines and…

Weird analogy. Nonsensical from both physical standpoint (the only energy input when swinging is the person on the swing "pumping their legs"), and practical one (you usually sit down with the swing already at an angle and then kick off, so a good 50% of the arc/momentum is there from the setup ).

Right, and remember how getting the rhythm right was the whole trick of it? Learning when to bend back and when to lean forward? When to pump your legs, so that your relatively small inputs were additive to the momentum of the swing, not fighting it? How when you kicked at the wrong time, you could feel the balance upset, you could feel the swing slow?

Re: The Religion of Speed

#129

Post by drob518 »

prinny_ wrote: post #115

From an engineering perspective slow is smooth is fast, but from a sales perspective slow is smooth is slow. If you quote superior quality with 6 months later delivery your competitor will get to sign a contract that could very well last 5-10 years and comes up just so rarely. Missing out on that contract doesn't always mean you get to focus on other projects, it could mean you have to fire whole teams of people that…

Sure, it seems true for a short period. But rushing something forward means you cut corners and that catches up with you over time. Anyone who has ever had a sales team asking for special features to be hacked into a product with little or no time for any proper architectural considerations or releasing before all the testing is complete in order to “get the big deal” has felt this. Yes, the other side may win a deal, but rarely the war.

That said, I’ll very deliberately make the distinction between going slow in a thorough and responsible way from just being slow in an incompetent way. Market forces are real and a consistently slow team gets canceled. To put it another way, sometimes slow is smooth and smooth is fast, and sometimes slow is just slow. The trick is knowing the difference between.

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