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

It's not what the world needs right now

thebaffler.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

121–130 of 181 posts

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#121

Post by dnissley »

noobermin wrote: post #81

This man has lived a life many fantasise about, although perhaps not a very comfortable one. I think sometimes I lived a colourful, varied life but what a story for this piece. I can't believe I have to do the reddit edit postscriptum but really, does everyone dislike the author? I certainly could never be this sort of person, but what a story, living life on the edge and making it up as they go along. Do commenters…

I didn't read it super closely but it doesn't seem like he's blaming anyone but himself (and chance) for his various problems. For that, I can respect it. Even if I have a very hard time imagining what it would take for me to choose it.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#122

Post by dnissley »

nothercastle wrote: post #108
linguae wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t think hacker culture is dead. Rather, computing entered its Eternal September; a career in software engineering, especially in the United States, now carries a similar cachet to being a doctor or lawyer, and the startup world has attracted those who want to make a fortune. The geeks, nerds, scholars, artists, and other varied misfits who once dominated the field have been outnumbered by those looking for mone…

It’s not just money they made so much money they actually dislodged and eliminated the conditions and opportunities that created hacker culture in the first place

That doesn't seem true to me. But say more about this.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#123

Post by seoulmetro »

mlsu wrote: post #39

It's a clever bit. It is intellectually amusing to read, and I'm sure to write, a character that the reader hates. But the detachment becomes exhausting quick. It's a dead end; you spent all of this effort being clever, with what to show for it? After reading it, I find myself questioning which side of the joke is real and which is false, and whether I'm in the real part of the joke or the false part. Which is ultima…

It just sounds like an artist who is trying really hard to be an artist and forgetting that real artists don't try, they just do what they like and someone else loves it.

But also the compulsive lying, the drugs, the weird lack of self awareness is cringe inducing here.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#124

Post by anal_reactor »

labrador wrote: post #116
dj_mc_merlin wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Counterpoint to that would be that no matter how interesting other people's lives may be, mine is still special because it's the only viewpoint I can actually have (before you hippies come at me I've done enough LSD and meditation and no I still only have my viewpoint). My dramas and problems are more important than everyone elses to me since I'm the one who has to deal with them. They're not more important in an obj…

My life is special to me too, but I don't feel like the main character anymore. My family appreciates my move out of self-absorption towards giving them the attention they deserve from me.

I really don't know what to think. Sure, there's 8 billion people on Earth, the chances that I am the main character are tiny. But at the same time whenever I try treating people the same way I treat myself, I quickly get into misunderstandings and disappointments, and navigating the world with an assumption that most people are NPCs while just a handful are actual sentient beings has proven way more practical.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#125

Post by MuffinFlavored »

jyunwai wrote: post #31

Most other comments so far have viewed this artist's lifestyle negatively, as he wrote that he got by via abusing various policies and tax fraud (via "[hallucinating] a DJ software skin" to claim as a business expense). But he's an interesting person for sticking to his craft for close to a decade now: he has persisted in working hard to produce artwork and submit it for exhibition. However, to what extent is this li…

> However, to what extent is this lifestyle necessary as an artist?

I have a stable career and lots of disposable income and I've been to 1/10th the places this guy has been to / done 1/10th the things / probably have 1/10th the stories/life experiences/friends

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#127

Post by kalleboo »

linguae wrote: post #117
nothercastle wrote: post #108

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not just money they made so much money they actually dislodged and eliminated the conditions and opportunities that created hacker culture in the first place

As a researcher, I concur. I’m a 80s/90s kid who got into computing through seeing the technological changes around me and who got inspired by the stories of Steve Jobs, Dennis Ritchie, Ken Thompson, Alan Kay, and other pioneers. I wanted to pursue a career where I was given the freedom to explore and to create technologies that made an impact. Unfortunately what I’ve found in the past decade of working in the field…

Although at the same time, with the plateuing of computer hardware, you don't need to be a Bell Labs or PARC in order to do research. People are doing cutting-edge AI research on their gaming graphics cards. On a developer salary you can command a massive cluster on AWS (for a few minutes to run tests).

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#128

Post by labrador »

anal_reactor wrote: post #124
labrador wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My life is special to me too, but I don't feel like the main character anymore. My family appreciates my move out of self-absorption towards giving them the attention they deserve from me.

I really don't know what to think. Sure, there's 8 billion people on Earth, the chances that I am the main character are tiny. But at the same time whenever I try treating people the same way I treat myself, I quickly get into misunderstandings and disappointments, and navigating the world with an assumption that most people are NPCs while just a handful are actual sentient beings has proven way more practical.

I know what you mean. Since I've been using ChatGPT4 and now Claude Opus to answer questions I think of while day dreaming, I find myself drifting further away from ordinary people. I don't know how to describe it yet. Maybe people who don't agument their thinking seem more like an NPC and say NPC like things?

I don't want to get to far out there, like in Kurt Vonnegut's "Breakfast of Champions." The protagonist wanted to kill himself because he thought everyone except him was a robot.

Re: It's not what the world needs right now

#130

Post by linguae »

kalleboo wrote: post #127
linguae wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a researcher, I concur. I’m a 80s/90s kid who got into computing through seeing the technological changes around me and who got inspired by the stories of Steve Jobs, Dennis Ritchie, Ken Thompson, Alan Kay, and other pioneers. I wanted to pursue a career where I was given the freedom to explore and to create technologies that made an impact. Unfortunately what I’ve found in the past decade of working in the field…

Although at the same time, with the plateuing of computer hardware, you don't need to be a Bell Labs or PARC in order to do research. People are doing cutting-edge AI research on their gaming graphics cards. On a developer salary you can command a massive cluster on AWS (for a few minutes to run tests).

This is true; consumer hardware is crazy capable these days. Even less powerful hardware such as the Raspberry Pi enables various sorts of projects that can be done inexpensively. While it’s hard to find a Xerox PARC- or Bell Labs type of job these days, we have hardware that Dennis Ritchie could only dream of, not to mention a vast ecosystem of open source software to build off of that didn’t exist 50 years ago.

Thanks for giving a positive counterpoint; while there’s much to lament about modern computing, there’s also much to praise.

Post reply on HN