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Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

earthly.dev

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Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#191

Post by tonyedgecombe »

dsr_ wrote: post #29
rfrey wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OMG it's in four year cycles. We have six months to sell our startups and get out.

You can see it coming, so you can pivot your startup to be buzzword compliant with the new thing instead of the old thing, or you can make your startup into a consultancy to help people do the old thing that they now feel very behind on.

I remember visiting a potential client who ranted about their existing solution before we started talking about replacing it.

I didn't tell them I'd implemented the existing system whilst working for their previous supplier.

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#192

Post by methodsignature »

wnevets wrote: post #95
bombcar wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be a good X you must follow the rules. To be a great X you must have followed the rules so well as to learn why they’re there and when they should be broken. Works for almost any X - writer, programmer, driving, etc.

> To be a good X you must follow the rules. To be a great X you must have followed the rules so well as to learn why they’re there and when they should be broken. In my experience slavishly following the "rules" or "best practices" can actually be worse than never following them. Not understanding when it's good to deviate usually means of a lack of understanding of why the "rules" or "best practices" exist in the fi…

"Rules" often contradict each other. For example, in software development, "keep it simple" often directly conflicts with "dont repeat yourself" as it takes increased complexity to achieve reuse of code. I often see keeping it simple take a back seat in newer developers as they slavishly follow the don't repeat yourself trail. The end result is routinely a brittle, rigid, and overly complex solution.

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#193

Post by Sammi »

labrador wrote: post #12

1996: OOP all the code! 2000: XML all the data! 2004: AJAX all the websites! 2008: JQuery all the browser code! 2012: Nodejs all the website backends! 2016: TypeScript all the JavaScript! 2018: Rust all the system code!

The first half of that list were just the best options available at the time (in any practical sense). After that you start listing things that aren't nearly universal.

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#194

Post by admissionsguy »

labrador wrote: post #12

1996: OOP all the code! 2000: XML all the data! 2004: AJAX all the websites! 2008: JQuery all the browser code! 2012: Nodejs all the website backends! 2016: TypeScript all the JavaScript! 2018: Rust all the system code!

What's up for 2022? k8s all backends?

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#195

Post by FriedrichN »

gumby wrote: post #15
agbell wrote: post #2

Author here, thanks for sharing this. Let me know what you think. I'm trying to connect the dots on research on expert advice and our fields 'thought-leaders'. The connection is a bit tenuous but I think contingent advice can be shown to be better than non-contingent advice. I also think people are too confident in their opinions. Also another submission here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27462255

A side point: the hedgehog/fox analogy originated with philosopher Isaiah Berlin.

One thing to note is that Berlin does not consider the fox as all around better than the hedgehog. Usually you'll see that people have a preference for the fox but Berlin considers some great people as hedgehogs such as Plato, Nietzsche, and Dostoevsky. He also stresses the fact that it's merely a metaphor and shouldn't be applied strictly.

The book is absolutely worth a read if you're into the subject.

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#196

Post by Arch-TK »

I agree that there are usually no general solutions but I think there are generally bad solutions out there.

Regardless of what you think of OOP (I think it's overused) ORMs are genuinely a terrible idea for a multitude of reasons even if a lot of people seem completely oblivious to other options (and as a result think it's a great option because if you can only imagine one option it's automatically great, at least that's how a lot of people seem to think).

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#197

Post by sorbits »

spyckie2 wrote: post #35

Being a hedgehog is useful on the journey to domain mastery because sticking to frameworks saves you time and headache compared to not having any frameworks at all. The 3 stages of domain mastery: Stage 1 - No knowledge or structure to approach a domain (everything is hard, pitfalls are everywhere) Stage 2 - Frameworks that are useful to approach the domain (Map to avoid pitfall areas) Stage 3 - Detailed understandin…

While this progression may exist, it is not what I took from the article, nor the original idea behind the hedgehog classification.

It is more about some thought-leader being keen on blockchains, machine learning, supply-side economics, or what have you, and looking at every problem/situation through the lens of wanting to apply this technology/policy to solve it, possibly ignoring the downsides/details/side-effects.

The article gives the fictional example of a project “just needing a relational database” but the “domain expert” trying to push them to use SpringySearch because that can also work as a relational database (and because this hedgehog is sold on SpringySearch).

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#198

Post by sturadnidge »

dralley wrote: post #83
austincheney wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people agree with this. The actual challenge is to discern real rules from superficial bullshit. That is a level of criticality many people do not possess and some find hostile or disgusting.

Raymond Hettinger talks about this in "Beyond PEP8", which is one of my favorite conference talks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wf-BqAjZb8M

That talk is fantastic, and I don’t even write Python. Thanks for sharing!

Re: Don't Feed the Thought Leaders

#200

Post by tomxor »

spyckie2 wrote: post #35

Being a hedgehog is useful on the journey to domain mastery because sticking to frameworks saves you time and headache compared to not having any frameworks at all. The 3 stages of domain mastery: Stage 1 - No knowledge or structure to approach a domain (everything is hard, pitfalls are everywhere) Stage 2 - Frameworks that are useful to approach the domain (Map to avoid pitfall areas) Stage 3 - Detailed understandin…

> Hedgehogs are at stage 2. You move from stage 1 to stage 2 by adopting frameworks; hence, hedgehogs are seen as "thought leaders" because they teach the frameworks that lead MOST people to more mastery. Except when you're at stage 3, in which case frameworks lead you to more inefficiencies compared to your own understanding.

While interviewing recently, I've found a similar anti-correlation between general competency and people who focus on teaching frameworks and libraries.

The more competent candidates basically don't do any teaching based on frameworks/libraries (but they might have experience mentoring individuals); whereas the candidates who focused on teaching frameworks specifically (often to groups) were the least competent - the more they focused on teaching the less competent they seemed to be! I found this kinda surprising and worrying, though my sample size is fairly small. To clarify, I know only so much can be evaluated in an interview, this is basic competency.

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