Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
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Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
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Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#2The title is misleading. This is not by Bill Watterson, it is inspired by Watterson's work...
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#3The title is misleading. This is not by Bill Watterson, it is inspired by Watterson's work...
The art is not Watterson's, but the words are.
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#4I wish more people in software followed this kind of advice. I see posts about air hockey or ping-pong tables and fully stocked mini-fridges as if that is an acceptable replacement for ones free time and best creative years. Are we children, so easily fooled by the shiny, bright candy in the checkout aisle? Worse yet those who take the corporate-ladder type jobs at a big corp like MS, and sacrifice their friends, family, and home for something as meaningless as office or tablet apps.
Your startup is probably not changing, or even improving the world. Your social media killer app is part of the problem, not the solution. And I know Microsoft/IBM/Oracle/etc gave up on improving the world a long time ago, instead opting for "shareholder" value, whatever that is. What good is money you can never enjoy? Your kids won't thank you if they don't even know who you are and have never spent time with you. Exhausted evenings don't count.
I have chosen door number 3. I live an ultra-frugal lifestyle and am already planning an exit from my day job in the next decade, to retire before 40.
People like Bill Watterson, Cory Doctorow, and Richard Stallman are on to something. They are actually enjoying life now - Are you?
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#5Again and again, the same point comes up: It is VERY difficult not to compare yourself to others. Once you can stop doing that, you can decide for yourself how to live on your own terms (if - and this is a big "if" - if you are fortunate enough not to have any circumstances on your plate that prevent that - disabilities, debt, bad circumstances, and so on).
On top of this challenge, if you have the support of a loving family, your chances are orders of magnitude better. Without such support - or with resistance - then things can be even more difficult.
No one said it is easy.
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#6I wish more people in software followed this kind of advice. I see posts about air hockey or ping-pong tables and fully stocked mini-fridges as if that is an acceptable replacement for ones free time and best creative years. Are we children, so easily fooled by the shiny, bright candy in the checkout aisle? Worse yet those who take the corporate-ladder type jobs at a big corp like MS, and sacrifice their friends, fam…
Both approaches aren't mutually exclusive. I give priority to what you and the article are saying, but once you realize that, there's no reason why it can't be complemented by a high paying job. 40 hours of work a week, if you manage to find something you (half-)like, is a minor inconvenience compared to the alternative of not being able to enjoy many of the things our modern world has to offer.
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#7I wish more people in software followed this kind of advice. I see posts about air hockey or ping-pong tables and fully stocked mini-fridges as if that is an acceptable replacement for ones free time and best creative years. Are we children, so easily fooled by the shiny, bright candy in the checkout aisle? Worse yet those who take the corporate-ladder type jobs at a big corp like MS, and sacrifice their friends, fam…
I do not have a corporate job, nor have I ever. The closest I have come is teaching in schools. However, I find your sentiment at odds with the experience of many I know in the corporate world. Most work long hours, but they find time for what is important to them and they find their work rewarding. The family time comes from what used to be Call of Duty or sport-watching time. When the kids grow up they get to do those things with them too. These people take care of their health, travel, and have rewarding family lives, they just have to be ruthlessly organised and priority-driven to focus on what is important to them (of which a respectable career is one aspect).
In the past I have thought the way you do and the way the original post outlines, but I concluded that I was actually a little jealous of people with more stable, better-paying jobs who were well enough organised that they could still do the things that they considered important and I was actually just looking for ways to frame the situation to my superiority. When I hung out with these people I almost wanted them to sneer and demonstrate values that "someone who takes an undemanding job because it affords him the time to pursue other interest and activities is considered a flake", but they never did. I feel like most corporate folk I know totally "get" what people who haven't taken the same path as them are doing.
At the moment I live in Japan and have friends who work some insane hours. Their Facebook efficiency to set up band practice and baseball (and even now cricket!!) for the few hours they have to spare is a source of constant astonishment to me.
Right now, I'm looking at getting myself organised in that way and heading for a corporate job, not fleeing from one.
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#8Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#9I wish more people in software followed this kind of advice. I see posts about air hockey or ping-pong tables and fully stocked mini-fridges as if that is an acceptable replacement for ones free time and best creative years. Are we children, so easily fooled by the shiny, bright candy in the checkout aisle? Worse yet those who take the corporate-ladder type jobs at a big corp like MS, and sacrifice their friends, fam…
Both approaches aren't mutually exclusive. I give priority to what you and the article are saying, but once you realize that, there's no reason why it can't be complemented by a high paying job. 40 hours of work a week, if you manage to find something you (half-)like, is a minor inconvenience compared to the alternative of not being able to enjoy many of the things our modern world has to offer.
Problem is that many of the things the modern world has to offer fall conveniently between the short pauses of sanity we have to enjoy them in that 40 hours of work a week.
And excluding work, we also need time for life as well. Things like shopping, laundry, cooking (if we do that at home) and fixing things that break. I hear plumbing does this quite often. Almost as much as code. The modern world has created an atmosphere that specifically caters to these things. Even games, if you think about it, are to be quickly done with in time for the next expansion or chapter. When was the last time you spent 6 hours working your way up to get a magic key with a picture of a goat to unlock a treasure cave... that itself holds another key to somewhere else?
Re: Startup - Bill Watterson, a cartoonist's advice
#10A great cartoon but wasn't this posted just two days ago with the exact same title: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6303776