Snap out of that filter bubble, programming community != hacker news and hacker news != programming community.
Upvotes for scandal outrages don't mean we've all become grumpy.
The Positive Programmer
91–100 of 119 posts
Re: The Positive Programmer
#92Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the nicest way possible: You are coming off as extraordinarily abrasive. If you think that doesn't matter because "facts are facts", you must be new to human society.
I don't mean to come off as _extraordinarily_ abrasive, though I do mean to convey my sentiment strongly. I do not think that overlooking the actual content of what somebody says in the name of "thinking positive" is good, or healthy, or itself positive at all. When somebody says the equivalent of "X group of people have Y attribute", they are making a category distinction. This is what the person I originally respon…
> When somebody says the equivalent of "X group of people have Y attribute", they are making a category distinction. This is what the person I originally responded to said.
So, look, here's the problem: that never happened. I shouldn't have to quote something that's just a few comments up, but here it is: "... I can't help but think "Of course a white male programmer wouldn't see an issue with that". To be very clear, not because I think all white males are mean-spirited misogynists. ... But because being part of the majority blinds people to minority issues."[0]
Mind you, that's not the post you responded to. The post you responded to was a bit of a backpedaling from that utterly inoffensive statement. From that you read, quoting again, "Don't worry, silly white males, it's not your fault that you don't know The Truth, because you're silly white males! Here, let me tell you what's up!"
That sentiment or anything like it exists nowhere in anything that was said. That goes quite a bit farther than simply not assuming good faith. I used the term "extraordinarily abrasive" quite deliberately, since where your parent reads as reasoned and contrite, you come off as slightly psychotic.
If that's the sentiment you intended strongly to convey, you have succeeded.
[0] Neither here nor there, but as a white male I find nothing the least bit challenging in that. It's completely true (if a bit oversimplified).
Re: The Positive Programmer
#93Earlier quoted context omitted.
Just curious - why not jump on the grand ideas now? (I would assume the usual reasons.. financial, time, etc.)
Reach. And to an extent money. Money is easy-ish to get, but reach takes time to build. MOst importantly though, I don't have any ideas I would consider good. Or possibly ideas I would consider myself able to carry out. Probably both.
Maybe try the altucher approach: http://www.jamesaltucher.com/2011/02/how-to-be-the-luckiest-...
Basically he picks random topics and writes lots of ideas about them every day in order to train his mind to think in that way.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#94When I discovered Hacker News, I loved it because it seemed to be 100% about technology and internet startups. It doesn't feel like that to me any more. I've been involved with other sites where the political discussions overwhelmed the core topic, and the audience just collapsed in a tailspin of high emotions. I hope Hacker News doesn't go that route.
You can help by flagging submissions on (mostly US) politics that are off-topic. I rarely flag, but do in such cases as those threads suck a lot of oxygen out of this place.
I do as well. This place is definitely changing recently (past two years), but it's not all bad. The political stuff is the worst of it.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
I kind of like the mixed bag that Hacker News seems to be. I'm pretty new here, but I enjoy reading about the future of programming languages alongside posts about Marcus Aurelius' writings. It just seems that it's mostly content about being the best you that you can be and having a broad range of knowledge.
Do you think the recent "Inappropriate comments at Pycon 2013 called out" thread contributed to that mixed bag in a good way? I worded that carefully. I don't want to draw out sides on that thread topic, just whether it contributed to an educational atmosphere and meaningful discussion on HN.
I think it's a discussion that needs to take place. I am not sure HN is the place to do it, but where else?
Re: The Positive Programmer
#96Earlier quoted context omitted.
In the nicest way possible: You are coming off as extraordinarily abrasive. If you think that doesn't matter because "facts are facts", you must be new to human society.
I don't mean to come off as _extraordinarily_ abrasive, though I do mean to convey my sentiment strongly. I do not think that overlooking the actual content of what somebody says in the name of "thinking positive" is good, or healthy, or itself positive at all. When somebody says the equivalent of "X group of people have Y attribute", they are making a category distinction. This is what the person I originally respon…
I think you need to read the post again. It's not unreasonable to think that white males don't necessarily understand minority issues as they are vastly the majority in this community. He never claimed it was inherent or universal or even insurmountable. I don't even view what he said as negative, just trying to remind people of their potential biases.
Anyway, get off your high horse. We all stereotype, it's natural, and it's often very useful for seeing patterns in populations and hypothesizing a cause or correlation. There are definite trends that aren't just people stereotyping: men don't generally wear dresses, women don't generally go around topless to the same extent men do. Those are complete stereotypes that're pretty essential for understanding society.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#97The more we tolerate this here, the more it will become the norm.
HN's most attractive feature from day one has always been the positive, intelligent, supportive community. Those are not traits you tend to find in your typical 9-5 programmer (in my experience, at least), and are the exact opposite of what you find in the communities that most of our early adopters fled from (Slashdot was already hopeless by 2007, and programming.reddit.com was already headed that way).
But those other communities are dying, and this place has taken over their role as The Place to Talk About Tech Stuff. So we see a lot of their users coming across, bringing with them the general depressive negativity and inclination to snark and hostility. This behavior sometimes doesn't get swatted down fast enough nor ruthlessly enough and bad comments are left to stand. People see these comments and think they're acceptable. And the standards erode.
There's not much to be done about it, unfortunately. We can't kick everybody out, and it's not yet quite bad enough to form a new community and abandon this place to the rabble.
Still, it's worth at least trying to fight. Flag ruthlessly, downvote comments that don't belong here, based on tone rather than disagreement. Upvote the few good things that do in fact belong here. Write good comments and otherwise behave the way you want to see others behave.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#98The more we tolerate this here, the more it will become the norm. HN's most attractive feature from day one has always been the positive, intelligent, supportive community. Those are not traits you tend to find in your typical 9-5 programmer (in my experience, at least), and are the exact opposite of what you find in the communities that most of our early adopters fled from (Slashdot was already hopeless by 2007, and…
You're right this is a cycle I've seen time and again online. I've been using the Internet since before the web, and seen this cycle again and again... newsgroups becoming popular, the negative argumentative types moving in, folks who weren't that way getting dragged into the negativity (I know I've been dragged there myself), then they just become festering shells of what they once were as the nice people move on and just the negativity remains to harshly parody the original community...
The same has happened with web community after web community I've enjoyed only to see them get popular... slashdot was good once. Heck, there was even a time when you could get a civilized conversation in TechCrunch comment threads.
So, with the obvious caveat of http://www.despair.com/dysfunction.html ...I sincerely hope that HN doesn't end up going down that road too.
Long winded way of saying I like your comment and I'm gonna try to take the advice.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#99I've been working as a developer for about 10 years, and was involved in some tech communities for about 6 or 7 years prior to that (early high school, doing things like LAN parties, Linux install fests, and generally socializing amongst the "nerd" set). If there's an overwhelmingly common personality defect I've seen amongst tech aficionados, it's a proclivity towards the negative. My observation is that people with…
I think using "highly logical thought processes" to excuse (or at least explain) highly negative and antisocial behaviour is an unfortunate, but common, fallacy among some very intelligent people. It's great that you're taking steps to overcome negativity you've seen in yourself. Did you notice, however, that the only explanations you went to for these negative approaches were "dealing with people not as logical as u…
>having people turn the mirror on themselves, first and foremost, before judging others.
Indeed. In any disagreement you have, there are two people at fault, but only of those faults is in your power to fix.
Re: The Positive Programmer
#100The more we tolerate this here, the more it will become the norm. HN's most attractive feature from day one has always been the positive, intelligent, supportive community. Those are not traits you tend to find in your typical 9-5 programmer (in my experience, at least), and are the exact opposite of what you find in the communities that most of our early adopters fled from (Slashdot was already hopeless by 2007, and…
You're right this is a cycle I've seen time and again online. I've been using the Internet since before the web, and seen this cycle again and again... newsgroups becoming popular, the negative argumentative types moving in, folks who weren't that way getting dragged into the negativity (I know I've been dragged there myself), then they just become festering shells of what they once were as the nice people move on an…
Slashdot's current state really breaks my heart. Even with the occasional drive-by troll or the "apk" lunatic (what's his deal anyway?) things were tolerable, but lately it seems some of the older posters have lost interest and moved on (maybe to HN? Ha!) or have reverted to petty squabbling and deliberate obtuseness. I mostly go there to read comments from the veterans who've stuck around over the years and only recently bothered with creating an account. Thankfully there are still nuggets of gold among the threads.
There's a tricky Goldilocks zone when it comes to any forum and the biggest challenge is not treating it as a personal blog. You share ideas, yes, but the very platform demands you give up some control. Of how your ideas are perceived, what feedback you get and even weather those ideas are welcome in the first place. And all communities change... away from a Beowulf cluster of X and into the cloud, I suppose.
Trying too hard to hold new members to the light of older burning candles will cause them to flicker out or if you just let them burn willy-nilly, you risk starting a fire.
I'm hopeful we're not all doomed to walled gardens the likes of Twitter and Facebook just to avoid negativity raining on our parade (of course even they're not devoid of doom and gloom either, but "blocks" do give you an umbrella of sorts).