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100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

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Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#51

Post by Loque »

punkbit wrote: post #6
collyw wrote: post #4

Interestingly I see a lot of comments saying we need more women in tech, but none saying we need more black people in tech. I have worked with a number of women, and only ever seen one consultant come in who was black. Are we more racist than sexist? (I see plenty of Indians however, maybe a disproportionate amount compared to the general population?). I am based in Europe, and I do think there is less of a cultural…

We don't need more women, black, latino, white, red, green people in tech, we need talented people, regardless of how they look like. We need less bullshit, people who produce sane code and go home early to work on what matters about us, our communities, our families, our education! I'm full stack dev living in London, I'm black, huge afro, piercings, english is not my first language, skateboarder, into punk music, e…

I couldn't agree more - fixing gender/racial stereotypes in our society is a separate issue from who needs to be hired in a specific industry - as soon as you combine the issue you end up with some pretty daft solutions.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#52

Post by onion2k »

smanuel wrote: post #43
onion2k wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're both right and wrong. You're right in the sense that we do need to bring in the most talented people, but I suspect you're wrong in the definition of what the talents we need are. When people say "we need talented people" they usually mean that we need people who are best at doing what we do now. And that's not the solution, that's the problem . In order to improve society/business/whatever we have to…

> we need to break the 'privileged white male' echo chamber that keeps coming up with the same dull ideas Can you elaborate on the definition of "privileged white male"?

I'm going to assume you understand the 'white male' aspect. 'Privileged' in the sense that they came from a middle-income home where they had access to things like a computer and books, were fortunate to attend schools that were reasonably well funded, had the opportunity to attend college and university, didn't live in fear of crime throughout their childhood, had outdoor space to play in, had good access to healthcare, etc.

That isn't that sort of background that everyone has, but it is the sort of background that 90% of people in the IT industry had. Consequently IT professionals tend to have somewhat skewed notions of what the world is like. Changing that would make it more likely that people build things that make a positive impact on society because you can't fix a problem if you don't know that it's a problem.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#53

Post by wantab »

brtt wrote: post #49
wantab wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I came to say the same thing. This is another, "Poor black me" article where he's offended by everything he construes to be against him. As if Atlanta is better.

You're a bit off-base there.

No. Not at all. Substitute all the words "black" with "white" and see all the "You're a racist!" comments come out if I had written it.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#54

Post by skillsfirst »

punkbit wrote: post #6
collyw wrote: post #4

Interestingly I see a lot of comments saying we need more women in tech, but none saying we need more black people in tech. I have worked with a number of women, and only ever seen one consultant come in who was black. Are we more racist than sexist? (I see plenty of Indians however, maybe a disproportionate amount compared to the general population?). I am based in Europe, and I do think there is less of a cultural…

We don't need more women, black, latino, white, red, green people in tech, we need talented people, regardless of how they look like. We need less bullshit, people who produce sane code and go home early to work on what matters about us, our communities, our families, our education! I'm full stack dev living in London, I'm black, huge afro, piercings, english is not my first language, skateboarder, into punk music, e…

Here here. Let people find the things they want to learn, support and employ them when they do. Don't patronise people, or worse, discriminate, especially not that horrible pc "positive discrimination" crap, and treat people equally.

A lot of the comment-tards on HN take a terribly patronising view that they should go on outreach knocking of doors of every gender race and religion and try to coerce them into working in tech. How horrible for a person to realise they were targeted and hired specifically because they meet an arbitrary tick box minority category.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#55

Post by onion2k »

yummyfajitas wrote: post #50
onion2k wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're both right and wrong. You're right in the sense that we do need to bring in the most talented people, but I suspect you're wrong in the definition of what the talents we need are. When people say "we need talented people" they usually mean that we need people who are best at doing what we do now. And that's not the solution, that's the problem . In order to improve society/business/whatever we have to…

Lets be concrete. I'm streaming realtime events and then running statistical models on the datastream in order to manipulate user behavior. What "different perspectives" are offered by women, non-Asian minorities or LGBQT+? Is there a secret prediction method that whites/asians don't know about? A special LGBQT+ streaming architecture? On several occasions I've joined a company and been the only diversity carrier. I…

I'm streaming realtime events and then running statistical models on the datastream in order to manipulate user behavior.

Having a more diverse team that includes someone with a more emotionally-driven perspective could lead to someone asking the question "Is the way we're manipulating user behavior actually ethical?"

This isn't about finding different technical solutions to problems; it's about finding different problems.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#56

Post by saiya-jin »

onion2k wrote: post #31
punkbit wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We don't need more women, black, latino, white, red, green people in tech, we need talented people, regardless of how they look like. We need less bullshit, people who produce sane code and go home early to work on what matters about us, our communities, our families, our education! I'm full stack dev living in London, I'm black, huge afro, piercings, english is not my first language, skateboarder, into punk music, e…

I think you're both right and wrong. You're right in the sense that we do need to bring in the most talented people, but I suspect you're wrong in the definition of what the talents we need are. When people say "we need talented people" they usually mean that we need people who are best at doing what we do now. And that's not the solution, that's the problem . In order to improve society/business/whatever we have to…

that's very minor (albeit quite vocal) part of the job market. Most of developers worldwide work on specific projects, with specific goals, budgeting etc. Those who pay want stuff delivered and routinely frown upon too-creative approaches. Having women/minorities on the team? Of course! If they bring expected skillset on the table, good. If they bring anything else on top of it, it's a nice little addition.

But hiring just for the sake of filling some imaginary quota some confused people have in their heads is a bit ridiculous. Want to change it? Start at the point when young people decide which school to pursue, rest will follow

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#57

Post by onion2k »

saiya-jin wrote: post #56
onion2k wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're both right and wrong. You're right in the sense that we do need to bring in the most talented people, but I suspect you're wrong in the definition of what the talents we need are. When people say "we need talented people" they usually mean that we need people who are best at doing what we do now. And that's not the solution, that's the problem . In order to improve society/business/whatever we have to…

that's very minor (albeit quite vocal) part of the job market. Most of developers worldwide work on specific projects, with specific goals, budgeting etc. Those who pay want stuff delivered and routinely frown upon too-creative approaches. Having women/minorities on the team? Of course! If they bring expected skillset on the table, good. If they bring anything else on top of it, it's a nice little addition. But hirin…

That's true, but if we change industry as well as changing education then we can get better quicker. It's absolutely not one or the other. It's both.

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#59

Post by yummyfajitas »

kaybe wrote: post #45
digitalzombie wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no proof that women are systematically targeted to be ousted from the tech field. I haven't seen any research papers with any clear evidence of this other than that there are more boys than girls in a particular field. I'm sure there are other occupation with the same thing. There are too many Fillipino in Nurse career I don't see any body saying to diversify it. There are tons of Vietnamese in nails, my uncl…

https://www.nber.org/papers/w5903 Have a paper from 1997. It's about how after they changed to blind auditions, the number of women hired as orchestra musicians rose severalfold. I'm sure you can draw your own conclusions.

Most diversity activists in tech oppose bringing such approaches into tech on the grounds that it would reduce diversity. Ashe Dryden is the canonical cite:

http://www.ashedryden.com/blog/the-ethics-of-unpaid-labor-an...

In contrast, I think most of those who oppose the diversity activists (e.g. myself) strongly favor such approaches ("death by standardized brainteaser", hire by github, work sample tests).

Re: 100 Days as a Black Man in Silicon Valley

#60

Post by stevendaniels »

I recently watched American Experience's Silicon Valley. I was a bit shocked by the lack of diversity in the those early companies (Fairchild Seminconductor, AMD, Intel, etc.). Andy Grove, a Hungarian, seemed to be the most diverse of the bunch.

There wasn't even a token Black, Asian, or Indian in the company photos I saw.

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