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How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

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Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#11

Post by knz »

ecaron wrote: post #5
duck wrote: post #4

Great to read things like this and gives us a reminder that there is a person behind everyone of these "Show HN" posts and every comment written (at least besides the few bots and spammers on HN). Love the advice on how if you "actually finish your side projects", you'll be well ahead of the pack - very true.

Another good take-away, though not directly mentioned in the post, is befriend HN users both in the real world and online.

Following this advice... If any other Minneapolis/St Paul based HN users are lurking out there and are interested in meeting up (or know of any similar events) then please reply here or email.

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#13

Post by eric_bullington »

ecaron wrote: post #5
duck wrote: post #4

Great to read things like this and gives us a reminder that there is a person behind everyone of these "Show HN" posts and every comment written (at least besides the few bots and spammers on HN). Love the advice on how if you "actually finish your side projects", you'll be well ahead of the pack - very true.

Another good take-away, though not directly mentioned in the post, is befriend HN users both in the real world and online.

Ditto to HNers in South Carolina, particularly the Midlands. I'd love to have an HN meetup in Columbia, but would make the trek to Greenville or Charleston for one.

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#15

Post by citricsquid »

HN hasn't changed my life -- yet? -- but it has taught me that a lot of my assumptions about new technology startups were wrong. I'd always assumed "networking" was only something a specific type of person could do, that if you wanted to do anything you'd have to be really great at selling yourself or get lots of media attention.

Through my usage of HN I've learned that this really isn't the case, sure being able to sell yourself is a useful skill but if you can build great things and put your work out there you can achieve a lot without needing to focus on people. A good example I think is Gumroad founder Sahil (http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=sahillavingia), he's very talented, he made cool stuff and people took notice and now he's doing really cool things.

HN has made me confident that if I ever build anything great that I won't need to spend 12 hours a day cold calling every Techcrunch writer hoping that they post nice words about me, I can let my work speak for me.

Now I just need to build something cool :)

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#16

Post by patio11 »

As long as we're on the love boat: I've met at least three good friends here. Y'all have collectively pushed my career in a quite different direction than it was probably on when I started. I think I'd probably have ended up quitting ye olde day job and putting the BCC phase of my life in the "That was fun and I learned a lot, but time to get serious, what is next?" bucket. Then I would have done what everyone other than the Internet always suggested I do: get a job at a megacorp. I think I literally know the exact office I'd be working at in Tokyo. It is a nice office, and a nice megacorp, but it is still a megacorp.

I'd probably be a lot less happy doing that, because my current gig is pretty much everything I could ask for in a job. More importantly, the most consequential thing to ever happen to me was meeting my future wife. It is likely that I would have been in a soul-deadening crunch in Tokyo rather than at the BBQ where that happened.

So, thanks.

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#17

Post by samstave »

ecaron wrote: post #5
duck wrote: post #4

Great to read things like this and gives us a reminder that there is a person behind everyone of these "Show HN" posts and every comment written (at least besides the few bots and spammers on HN). Love the advice on how if you "actually finish your side projects", you'll be well ahead of the pack - very true.

Another good take-away, though not directly mentioned in the post, is befriend HN users both in the real world and online.

We need an HNers meetup.

Anyone in SF who may be interested in the next month or so?

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#18

Post by aaronbrethorst »

OP: I'm curious to know whether we've ever crossed paths. It looks like we're about the same age (assuming the age you listed on some game website I just found is accurate).

I was born and raised in Minneapolis, graduated from the U of MN with a Computer Science degree in 2003, and pulled up stakes to move to Seattle as soon as I could.

If you were ever in debate, speech, or quiz bowl in high school between 1997 and 2000, or if you attended the U of MN between 1998 and 2003, I'm guessing we did at some point.

In any case, congrats!

Re: How Hacker News Completely Changed My Life

#19

Post by _feda_ »

I guess what I love so much about HN is the generally high amount of content that is relevant to me, which seems to be hard to find elsewhere on the vast expanses of the internet. I can read articles from HN all night, but it doesn't feel like a waste of time. 99% of the time I'll have learned quite a lot by the end of the night.
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