Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

How many people must have run into Sergey Brin, or Bill Gates or Steve Wozniak at some point when they were young, derided them as 'nerds', ignored them, and later realised that the person they looked down upon is now an incredibly successful and influential person? This is just a (whimsical) parable for that, and I don't think the veracity of this particular instant is particularly relevant.

Re: Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

#6

Post by dfield » Wed, Apr 14, 2010, 11:08 AM UTC

You should never ignore anyone, but not because you're trying to get something out of it...

Re: Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

#7

Post by lukifer » Wed, Apr 14, 2010, 11:26 AM UTC

I'm reminded of what Kurt Vonnegut said about Jesus: "The real lesson of the Gospels is that before you kill someone, you should make absolutely sure they aren't well connected."

Re: Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

#8

Post by philk » Wed, Apr 14, 2010, 11:26 AM UTC

dfield wrote: post #6

You should never ignore anyone, but not because you're trying to get something out of it...

I think you might be reading too much into what is a lighthearted video on YouTube.

Re: Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

#9

Post by plesn » Wed, Apr 14, 2010, 11:51 AM UTC

dfield wrote: post #6

You should never ignore anyone, but not because you're trying to get something out of it...

That's so true, and as I grow I'm trying to break social barriers/shields (being more open/authentic/personnal immediately) more and more with unknown people: it just makes relating to people much more enjoyable and profound! It's not even about the hypothetical profit you could get.

Re: Why You Should Never Ignore A Nerd

#10

Post by adriand » Wed, Apr 14, 2010, 11:59 AM UTC

NickPollard wrote: post #5

rmoriz wrote: post #3

can someone confirm this story?

Does it really need confirming? Even if it's not a true story for this guy, something like it will have happened somewhere I'm sure. How many people must have run into Sergey Brin, or Bill Gates or Steve Wozniak at some point when they were young, derided them as 'nerds', ignored them, and later realised that the person they looked down upon is now an incredibly successful and influential person? This is just a (whim…

Well, given that we're on a site called Hacker News, populated by a bunch of programmers and other assorted techies, I'm willing to be that many of us were, in fact, the nerds that got ignored and picked on when we were kids.

Although I was never nerdy like my bespectacled, asthmatic buddy Marcus, I wasn't too far off, and certainly "geeky" would have been accurate. And of course I took my lumps as a result. In my case, and I'm willing to bet the same is true of many others, this helped engender a powerful motive to succeed.

So ironically, it may be that all of the people trying to put nerds down just end up motivating them to rise up. In which case, you might even be able to argue that without looking down on, ignoring, and even bullying nerds, we'd have less technological innovation today. ;)