Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

bothsidesofthetable.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 74 posts

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#11

Post by OoTheNigerian »

I will state my position unlike those afraid to speak so they can have deal-flow or perhaps enter YC.

I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. Such a statement from someone whom people hang to his every-word should not be put out without clarification.

The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" holds no water. It was an after thought. What about people that are dumb and cannot speak at all? Nothing could have stopped him from saying "people who do not communicate well make bad CEOs. As an example, thick accents, stammering, unclear minds can be the cause.

Instead of clarifying the context which I assume to be "With a strong accent you will find it to raise money on demo day which is very important" or expanding it, Paul Graham goes "Don't say things people want to misunderstand"

It is insulting at best. Heaping the blame/responsibility of understanding on the readier/listener. How ironic considering the topic.

I hope his position does not lead to default bias in YC companies. "He has a strong accent, I cannot ask him to be my co founder". Or "His strong accent means he will be a bad CEO so why employ him at all"

This tread will soon disappear. But I will end with a Martin Luther King quote from the I have a dream speech 5o years ago yesterday. "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter"

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#13

Post by sliverstorm »

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #11

I will state my position unlike those afraid to speak so they can have deal-flow or perhaps enter YC. I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. Such a statement from someone whom people hang to his every-word should not be put out without clarification. The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" hold…

I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation.

pg is an investor. From the point of view of angel investing, causation is not important. Correlation is enough. If some trait historically shows the company will be half as likely to succeed, why should an investor put money in that company, causation be damned?

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#14

Post by corresation »

snitko wrote: post #7

Slightly offtopic: The whole idea of the immigration restrictions is ridiculous. There is not a single justification for it. Unless of course you believe that somehow your people deserve better than everyone else. When people bring up the fact that it drives down wages and residents lose as a result - why don't they also mention that residents win by getting a cheaper product or a service? When people bring up the we…

"The whole idea of the immigration restrictions is ridiculous. There is not a single justification for it."

There are countless justifications for it, but none that you're going to want to hear.

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#15

Post by samatman »

parennoob wrote: post #6
roadg33k wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://www.udemy.com/american-accent-training-for-it-profes...

Ugh. First think I clicked on there told me to prounounce it "Ennerprise" and "innegrade" :) Seriously though, thanks. Will check it out.

Innegraded ennerprise sofware. Not a t to be heard. Good luck.

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#16

Post by nanijoe »

defen wrote: post #8

This whole "controversy" is so stupid. It consists of people taking pg's words out of context and assigning the maximally stupid interpretation to them. I mean, are there any examples of successful U.S. based founders who have accents that are so heavy that you struggle to understand what they are saying? I'm genuinely curious.

What part of what he said was taken out of context? Up until a few years ago, there were no examples of successful black Quarterbacks in the NFL.. IF everyone just looked at that "fact", there would still be none. Data can be used to justify anything you like, as long as you are already sufficiently biased.

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#17

Post by powertower »

snitko wrote: post #7

Slightly offtopic: The whole idea of the immigration restrictions is ridiculous. There is not a single justification for it. Unless of course you believe that somehow your people deserve better than everyone else. When people bring up the fact that it drives down wages and residents lose as a result - why don't they also mention that residents win by getting a cheaper product or a service? When people bring up the we…

And when people bring up the x-fold increased violent crime rates, and no-go zones, and enclaves, all statistical facts - you say the victims must just be getting their privileges checked, or they're causing it themselves by breaking the social contract.

This whole notion that the people in the US are just too stupid and too lazy and too whatever to be able to create jobs is absurd. It takes more than one person to create, fund, build, and grow a company. Stop assigning the job-creation to the “immigrant founder”. There were more people involved in the process.

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#18

Post by gruseom »

OoTheNigerian wrote: post #11

I will state my position unlike those afraid to speak so they can have deal-flow or perhaps enter YC. I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. Such a statement from someone whom people hang to his every-word should not be put out without clarification. The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" hold…

The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" holds no water. It was an after thought.

If that is right then PG has missed the obvious in his own data, since several high-quality YC startups have CEOs who speak American English with moderate accents. One of them is on the front page of Hacker News right now, in fact. So I don't think your claim is either likely or, given that you've offered zero evidence, fair.

Amusingly, you condemn his clarification immediately after condemning him for not offering one.

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#19

Post by [deleted] »

sliverstorm wrote: post #13
OoTheNigerian wrote: post #11

I will state my position unlike those afraid to speak so they can have deal-flow or perhaps enter YC. I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. Such a statement from someone whom people hang to his every-word should not be put out without clarification. The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" hold…

I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. pg is an investor. From the point of view of angel investing, causation is not important. Correlation is enough. If some trait historically shows the company will be half as likely to succeed, why should an investor put money in that company, causation be damned?

[deleted]

Re: Bring Me Your Accents. Immigration Fuels Innovation

#20

Post by OoTheNigerian »

sliverstorm wrote: post #13
OoTheNigerian wrote: post #11

I will state my position unlike those afraid to speak so they can have deal-flow or perhaps enter YC. I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. Such a statement from someone whom people hang to his every-word should not be put out without clarification. The defense of "accents so strong you cannot understand" hold…

I do not doubt that there may be correlation between people who have performed poorly in YC and "very strong accents", it does not mean causation. pg is an investor. From the point of view of angel investing, causation is not important. Correlation is enough. If some trait historically shows the company will be half as likely to succeed, why should an investor put money in that company, causation be damned?

You sir, have just described pattern matching.

e.g Thee cliche white male that attended an Ivy League school was successful. therefore, to be safe I go that way all the time. This then goes ahead and pollutes your data-set because it would be built on that bias.

Now, I am not saying that those that patten match are bad, but they should at the very least try not to make their 'findings' influence other people who might have the chance to to start a new data set without bias.

Post reply on HN