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Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

jlericson.com

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Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#261

Post by paxys »

starbugs wrote: post #195
paxys wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who is "we"? Unless you have a large financial stake in the company you aren't part of the discussion at all.

As SO contributors, _we_ have a say with regard to our future consideration of SO as a destination of our contributions. Since SO is just a platform, it can't survive without _our_ content. People have much more power than they think.

That only works if all SO contributors band together and make decisions as a collective bloc. At the moment you are only speaking for yourself. Most others who add value to the platform are going to keep doing so regardless.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#262

Post by bambax »

jlericson wrote: post #234
bambax wrote: post #46

> It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends on his not understanding it! — Upton Sinclair Slightly OT, but it's counter-productive to start a blog / an article with a well known quote that's been used and re-used ad nauseam. It makes the reader suspicious that they're not going to read something truly original, and tells them the author may have a thing for authority. I think it's…

Author here and I agree actually. The quote was the first thing I wrote and I never went back to consider if it still made sense for the post as a whole. Given the title (which is maybe more combative than I intended?) I don't think I need it. I'm planning on watching the CEO's announcement today and updating the post. Unless there's a better use for the quote, it'll be gone in the next edit. Thanks for the feedback!

Thanks for taking it well and graciously... Sorry for the tone! (I really feel this specific quote is so used it's kind of meaningless now. But still, I could have said it better.)

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#263

Post by a_c »

a_c wrote: post #130
hathchip wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's doubtful that ChatGPT would be able to answer so many tech questions, if it wasn't for the existence of SO.

I don't remember which podcast was it coming from, several years ago there was motion to shut down the US National Weather Service, or is it the NOAA I don't remember, because AccuWeather is all people need. No one seems to question where AccuWeather get the meteorological data. It is from the government service

Found it. Turns out it is an audio book by Michael Lewis, The Coming Storm https://www.audible.com/pd/The-Coming-Storm-Audiobook/B07F43...

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#264

Post by teh_klev »

JimDabell wrote: post #232
teh_klev wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But it was still faster than trolling the internet. I'm guessing you mean trawling the internet rather than trying to upset and annoy the internet:)

No, “trolling” is actually correct. It’s less widely used than the meaning you refer to these days though. > the act of searching among a large number or many different places in order to find people or information you want > It takes me 45 minutes of trolling on the internet and I’m still confused. — https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/trolling

"Mainly US" though which explains a lot ;)

I see as well that the US English spelling for "trawl" (as in fishing) is troll. Again, mainly US.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#265

Post by teh_klev »

scarface_74 wrote: post #253
teh_klev wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But it was still faster than trolling the internet. I'm guessing you mean trawling the internet rather than trying to upset and annoy the internet:)

Even though the sibling comment said I was technically not wrong, I think “trawling” is the better term. And I assume trawling vs trolling is one of those things that you feel the urge to point out just like I hate when someone says “jive” instead of “jibe”. That last sentence was not meant to be passive aggressive at all. It was just an observation.

> That last sentence was not meant to be passive aggressive at all.

I certainly didn't read it that way. It just stood out because British English is my native language.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#266

Post by ecf »

chx wrote: post #31
JimDabell wrote: post #4

I have a hard time feeling sorry for Stack Overflow. They had most developers in the world visiting frequently. They have detailed information on exactly which languages, libraries, toolchains, and platforms those developers use and their pain points. All of their content is given to them for free by volunteers. All of their moderation is done for them for free by volunteers. The only thing they have to serve is text…

Having a lean and mean company doesn't make for happy investors. The company was finished in 2020 when they raised $85M in a Series E. The fall after that is inevitable. Even the $40M they took in 2015 is a questionable decision for the very reasons you detail. What did they need tens of millions in investments for?

> Series E

A company needing that many rounds deserves to die. Sorry to have known you SO.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#267

Post by thaumasiotes »

cfiggers wrote: post #173
thaumasiotes wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> meanwhile it seems SO is constantly being driven off a cliff by bimbos in management A bimbo is a woman who makes up for a lack of intelligence or competence by having sex appeal. Don't take my word for it: https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bimbo Did you mean to use a different word?

It's 2023! There's no reason we can't assume gender-neutrality of previously-gendered terms. Maybe the parent commenter finds Prashanth Chandrasekar absolutely smoking hot (despite his seeming incompetence).

If you assume gender neutrality, you're still left with the near-explicit implication that management at Stack Overflow is chosen for their sexuality. It's not at all rare to accuse management (wherever) of being chosen for something other than competence, but usually you'd be saying they are where they are for political reasons, not because they slept with someone.

This claim is unusual enough that I wanted to know if it's what my parent commenter meant.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#268

Post by mcmoor »

nolok wrote: post #15
janalsncm wrote: post #3

> In May I wrote about Stack Overflow's business, which lost $42 million over 6 months and had just laid off 10% of its employees. Since then, the company's fiscal year-end results came out. Despite growing revenue, it lost $84 million over the year ending on March 31, 2023. Thank god Wikipedia isn’t run like Stack Overflow. As an end user, they have pretty much the same value proposition: user generated answers to m…

While I mostly agree with your point, I want to point out that on a financial level Wikipedia is really not that well handled. They keep increasing expenses into project that are not core to the experience, or that will never see the light of day (like when they had two different teams working on two different new text editor for the site). I have a belief that they're caught in a very bureaucratic "we need to use yo…

Even knowing those issues and hating it, after all the news last year I'm starting to appreciate the fact that Wikimedia at least still isn't changing its core function at all. Any new things they try is independent to Wikipedia and funding for Wikipedia itself still isn't cannibalized ao far for those other projects.

I can't say the same for other enshittified companies.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#269

Post by nerdponx »

mcdonje wrote: post #141
lawgimenez wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does not make any sense, I have no use for it. I work only on a MacBook.

Pretty much nobody would use that on a standalone keyboard either. They had to know the design isn't practical for the stated purpose. However, it does make a nice little trophy/trinket. It's merit based, so getting one could become a goal for contributors. It's branded. It fits on a desk. If they made it twice as big and called it a trophy, it'd probably make more sense. But then costs would be higher and it'd be mo…

Look up "artisan keycaps". Not only do people use them, they collect them, and certain specific rare and desirable artisan keycaps can be worth a lot of money. The high quality ones tend to be cast out of resin in small batches (sometimes literally just 1 in a given color/sculpt combination) and sold in short-duration raffles. People tend to put them on less-used keys.

Re: Stack Overflow's CEO Doesn't Understand Stack Overflow

#270

Post by nerdponx »

IshKebab wrote: post #140
EnderMB wrote: post #99

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It still boggles my mind that they closed this down. To date, it was the best job board for software engineers, and had filters you just don't see anywhere else - like filtering by companies that sponsor visas. Finding work there was a dream, and while there weren't many roles available, they were usually great quality roles. Finding candidates was also great, and all of them were solid candidates that met the basic…

I agree. It was the only useful job board. One of the very few useful adverts on the internet in general. Mind boggling that they shut it down.

Well it goes to show that they truly didn't/don't understand their own platform.
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