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Show success before asking for help

sivers.org

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Re: Show success before asking for help

#11

Post by mjnaus »

edw519 wrote: post #3

"I quickly took it to the Xerox machine, made a copy, and put it back." 1. Don't leave anything confidential out on your desk. 2. Don't let this guy loose in your office. 3. Ethical behavior should be a prerequisite to blogging :) [EDIT: This was downvoted within 2 minutes of posting, exactly what I expected. It happens every time. Why do people here have such a problem when someone mentions ethical behavior? Is is b…

I don't have any problem with people mentioning ethics; however in this case it has NOTHING to do with the point the writer of this article is trying to make.

If you feel so strongly about ethics, write an article about it and post it here.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#12

Post by edw519 »

axod wrote: post #9
anamax wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> AFAIC, nothing OP had to say mattered once I understood how he got his raw data. Why does that make sense?

Perhaps data is only correct if it was acquired ethically? :/ Maybe the unethical collection of data introduces large margins of error from the ethic-goblins.

You're missing the point. It has nothing to do with the correctness of the data, and everything to do with the means used to collect it. See also: torture & search warrants.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#13

Post by [deleted] »

edw519 wrote: post #12
axod wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps data is only correct if it was acquired ethically? :/ Maybe the unethical collection of data introduces large margins of error from the ethic-goblins.

You're missing the point. It has nothing to do with the correctness of the data, and everything to do with the means used to collect it. See also: torture & search warrants.

[deleted]

Re: Show success before asking for help

#14

Post by kirubakaran »

edw519 wrote: post #3

"I quickly took it to the Xerox machine, made a copy, and put it back." 1. Don't leave anything confidential out on your desk. 2. Don't let this guy loose in your office. 3. Ethical behavior should be a prerequisite to blogging :) [EDIT: This was downvoted within 2 minutes of posting, exactly what I expected. It happens every time. Why do people here have such a problem when someone mentions ethical behavior? Is is b…

Let us say someone posts something like this: "Hey guys, I wrote a webapp in C and used Google AdWords to get traffic. I spent $n and made $(n+m) (where m=|m|). This is what I learned about AdWords using my analytics..."

Your comment is like talking about why it is not best to write webapps in C. Yes, you will be correct in saying that it is not a good idea to write webapps in C. Everyone knows that already! For whatever reason and under whatever circumstances, this guy wrote his webapp in C. It perhaps still is a Bad Thing™ but here we are talking and trying to learn about AdWords and analytics!

I didn't downvote you btw :) And let me preempt anyone about to reply "are you saying unethical behavior is only as bad as language of choice of webapps?". That is not what I am saying.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#15

Post by CodeMage »

edw519 wrote: post #3

"I quickly took it to the Xerox machine, made a copy, and put it back." 1. Don't leave anything confidential out on your desk. 2. Don't let this guy loose in your office. 3. Ethical behavior should be a prerequisite to blogging :) [EDIT: This was downvoted within 2 minutes of posting, exactly what I expected. It happens every time. Why do people here have such a problem when someone mentions ethical behavior? Is is b…

You were probably downvoted because:

1. People don't come here for education in ethics. They might decide to discuss ethics if they find that discussion interesting, though, which leads me to my next point.

2. The first two points of what you said were completely obvious and, by virtue of adding nothing useful, devoid of interest.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#16

Post by _pius »

[deleted] wrote: post #13
edw519 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're missing the point. It has nothing to do with the correctness of the data, and everything to do with the means used to collect it. See also: torture & search warrants.

[deleted]

This is an inflection point. The thread only goes downhill from here.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#18

Post by anatoly »

edw519 wrote: post #3

"I quickly took it to the Xerox machine, made a copy, and put it back." 1. Don't leave anything confidential out on your desk. 2. Don't let this guy loose in your office. 3. Ethical behavior should be a prerequisite to blogging :) [EDIT: This was downvoted within 2 minutes of posting, exactly what I expected. It happens every time. Why do people here have such a problem when someone mentions ethical behavior? Is is b…

It was downvoted because people anticipated you'd be whining about downvotes, and no one likes whining about downvotes.

Re: Show success before asking for help

#19

Post by _pius »

_pius wrote: post #7
edw519 wrote: post #3

"I quickly took it to the Xerox machine, made a copy, and put it back." 1. Don't leave anything confidential out on your desk. 2. Don't let this guy loose in your office. 3. Ethical behavior should be a prerequisite to blogging :) [EDIT: This was downvoted within 2 minutes of posting, exactly what I expected. It happens every time. Why do people here have such a problem when someone mentions ethical behavior? Is is b…

I'm not sure the ethical merit of what he did is germane to the message of the article. Either way, a down vote should be accompanied by a comment. I said this once and PG smacked me down. I think he's wrong. Unless you made an incredibly vapid comment with no substance whatsoever, you don't deserve to be downvoted unless there's at least one comment beneath your post. (Not to say I follow this rule all the time.)

Ooh, now that's ironic. Someone just did a drive-by downmod of all my posts!

edit: and again. I see the Reddit and Digg refugees are out in full force!

Re: Show success before asking for help

#20

Post by alex_c »

edw519 wrote: post #10
axod wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Down-voted because it's irrelevant to the point he's trying to make. Arguing ethics isn't really that interesting. Discussing success, cash advances, etc etc is far more interesting.

Success = (Factor1 + Factor2 + Factor3 + ...) * Ethics Ethics is a binary 1 or 0. Maybe not that interesting, but hardly irrelevant. (Don't believe me? Let your customers find out about you lieing, cheating, or stealing. Then see what happens to your revenue stream.)

(Don't believe me? Let your customers find out about you lieing, cheating, or stealing. Then see what happens to your revenue stream.)

That really just convinces me of the equation

Success = (Factor1 + Factor2 + Factor3 + ...) * Appearance of Ethics

Which still doesn't explain Microsoft, oil companies, tobacco companies, etc.

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