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Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

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Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#81

Post by felipe »

fallinghawks wrote: post #75
felipe wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a very close family member who went missing and eventually was found homeless. In the course of the investigation we found that several people exploited and took advantage of him for personal gain. If you study the issue (like we did) you will find that this is a common and recurring problem, as homeless people are mentally vulnerable and open to narcissistic individuals. Nothing against helping others -- I my…

While I'm sorry about what happened to your family member, that doesn't mean the same thing is happening here. I think McConlogue's point is that homeless people aren't all stupid, stoned-out losers. And that some are capable of learning pretty complex stuff. Sure, plenty of homeless are screwed up, some hopelessly so, but we can't blanket them all with that label. Here's a guy who's acting locally. And it takes some…

> homeless people aren't all stupid, stoned-out losers.

And then you say I am biased?

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#82

Post by icpmacdo »

tomasien wrote: post #53
bottled_poe wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would be a donation to Apple or Google then. If you really cared, you'd take real action.

Don't tell people how to care. God I hate this comment so much, care however you want. Care a little bit and give him $0.70, care a lot and try to something, care any way you want.

Dude get out of this thread now, so many of these comments are infuriating. This is possibly the worst HN thread I have ever read.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#83

Post by devilshaircut »

felipe wrote: post #35

Homelessness is a serious and complex issue rooted in mental health and poverty, and the "mentor" behind the homeless coder reduced it to a game, just to show that all one needs to succeed is the patronizing goodwill of some privileged narcissistic clown. Stories like this are actually a disservice to the cause of technology as an agent for social and environmental change.

I actually agree with the view you express here. While I find the story to be positive - after all, it is apparent that someone did something nice for someone else and improved their life a great deal - I think you are right to say that it is a disservice to the gravity of homelessness in the United States. It is such a complex problem, as you said, rooted in extremely serious issues like mental health, wealth inequality, and lack of proper healthcare. While I love to talk about how code literacy is the solution to many problems, it really has almost zero salience to the topic of homelessness. Ultimately, what helped this guy was the kindness of a complete stranger. Not the education. Not the computer.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#84

Post by tomasien »

icpmacdo wrote: post #82
tomasien wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't tell people how to care. God I hate this comment so much, care however you want. Care a little bit and give him $0.70, care a lot and try to something, care any way you want.

Dude get out of this thread now, so many of these comments are infuriating. This is possibly the worst HN thread I have ever read.

Have you ever read a thread about gender issues? It's worse.

Side note: I appreciate the concern over whether this is exploitative. It doesn't make me mad. If you've read the stories, it hasn't been at ALL or even close, but the concern is fine.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#85

Post by jnbiche »

felipe wrote: post #39
jnbiche wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Macdonough was smart to offer $100 or the opportunity to learn to code. It was a good way to screen out unmotivated people -- if someone is homeless and turns down $100, it's likely that that they're very motivated.

Are you arguing that lack of motivation is the root cause of homelessness, rather than poverty and mental health issues?

Not at all, why would you think that? I'm arguing that learning how to code while living on the street is going to require a spectacular amount of motivation, and only a certain percent of people will be able to pull it off (not sure I could).

Since $100 has a higher marginal utility for a desperately poor homeless person than most people with adequate shelter, the fact that someone turns it down shows an uncommon amount of motivation.

But really, if you're going from what I said to "root causes of homelessness", I can't help but feel you're just looking to pick an argument.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#86

Post by jnbiche »

hngiszmo wrote: post #40

Ok, my name is Leo and I'm an Android developer. In 2000 I actually investigated the potential of dynamic ride sharing and came to the conclusion it is not feasible due to software being in the hands of the network and device providers. Later, when Android and iOS came along I had other stuff to do but noticed how many tried to enter in this market and my conclusion is still that you would have to seed it in a way th…

Sorry, but you're asking a homeless guy who has just made his first app to make it free? Look, I'm all for nature, but I'm more for giving him a chance to make a good living.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#87

Post by jnbiche »

yapcguy wrote: post #51

I hate this story. It's pure exploitation. Firstly, and most importantly, Leo is still homeless. Second, who the hell is Patrick McConlogue? This whole charade is like the film Trading Places, it's like those awful Bum Fights videos, it's Patrick using a homeless person as an object of amusement. Some aspects of the story seem implausible, e.g. how does a homeless person afford to pay the developer fees, or supply a…

>Finally, nobody seems to be talking about Leo's homelessness and how he's going to survive a bitterly cold winter,

If everyone keeps talking about Leo and his app, he'll have more than enough money to get off the streets, assuming his homelessness wasn't caused by mental illness or addiction.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#88

Post by ChrisNorstrom »

Woah... He beat me to it: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6721221 Actually a lot of people did. I had an rough idea for this but never got around to working on it. I do have Carpoolians.com registered though.

I really hope apps like his become something everyone uses in 5 years. Generally, people might not think carpooling strangers together will work but, contrary to popular belief, it's already tried and true in the Washington, DC area. Slug lines, where strangers are picked up from park ride lots by drivers so they can all use the HOV lanes, have been operational for years without a murder or incident.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#89

Post by tomasien »

This hasn't reached a flame war, did this get flagged off the front page? Is it because Slate is perhaps a marked site? This doesn't seem right, this is like a "Show HN" and followup to a story lots of people on HN have been following for a while now.

Re: Leo the Homeless Coder Finished His App, and You Can Download It Right Now

#90

Post by jnbiche »

tomasien wrote: post #84
icpmacdo wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Dude get out of this thread now, so many of these comments are infuriating. This is possibly the worst HN thread I have ever read.

Have you ever read a thread about gender issues? It's worse. Side note: I appreciate the concern over whether this is exploitative. It doesn't make me mad. If you've read the stories, it hasn't been at ALL or even close, but the concern is fine.

I don't know -- the concern seems more about political correctness than actually fixing a problem.

And as someone who has been here for a while (a throwaway became my main account), this is probably the most disheartening thread I've ever read here. Where's the hacker mentality of trying to make something better? Criticize if you absolutely must, but then you damn sure better have a better idea on hand than "it's a complex problem".

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