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

My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

thingist.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

31–40 of 249 posts

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#31

Post by gte910h »

PakG1 wrote: post #17

I'm glad that HN is a place where people are normally really helpful to each other, but I see it even occasionally here. On the other hand, let's not take it too far. It's nice for people to have a little bit of backbone. They don't need to endure jackasses unnecessarily, but there are times when criticism is rightly required and backbone is rightly needed to respond well.

Yes, however the criticism the author is complaining about it not any criticism at all, it's about the low order, non substantive, non-topical type.

Spolsky or PG wrote up a piece on this a bit back.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#32

Post by Semiapies »

Ehn. There's a reason he rhetorically asks whether we're back in high school - this isn't just geek behavior. I've experienced this attitude from plenty of people who aren't at all geeky, and I've encountered some very nice geeks.

Under certain sets of circumstances, people just tend to be dicks - and the internet contains many cases of those circumstances.

http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2004/03/19/

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#33

Post by bartonfink »

dexen wrote: post #22
agentultra wrote: post #11

It's true. I don't know how many times I've watched eager hackers get lambasted for "reinventing the wheel," or "don't bother doing it yourself, you'll just screw it up -- someone has probably done it already and did it better than you could." This happens most often at the intersection of technology and entrepreneurship. The business advice is that it's cheaper to buy it than build it. The engineer's perspective is…

There is reinventing the wheel and reinventing the wheel. It's cute when a person, learning as she goes, comes up with something that's been already invented. Only goes to show she understands the field. [1] It's unbelievably irritating when something that was widely implemented 10 or 20 or 30 years ago (and then even improved significantly) is now asserted as the next big thing. C'mon, be serious -_-' [2] [1] a nice…

Garbage collection back in the 90's. Java really ran with that one.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#34

Post by Jach »

dexen wrote: post #22
agentultra wrote: post #11

It's true. I don't know how many times I've watched eager hackers get lambasted for "reinventing the wheel," or "don't bother doing it yourself, you'll just screw it up -- someone has probably done it already and did it better than you could." This happens most often at the intersection of technology and entrepreneurship. The business advice is that it's cheaper to buy it than build it. The engineer's perspective is…

There is reinventing the wheel and reinventing the wheel. It's cute when a person, learning as she goes, comes up with something that's been already invented. Only goes to show she understands the field. [1] It's unbelievably irritating when something that was widely implemented 10 or 20 or 30 years ago (and then even improved significantly) is now asserted as the next big thing. C'mon, be serious -_-' [2] [1] a nice…

There are lots of examples for [2], but we should avoid listing them as they'll lead to arguments.

In fact, we should also avoid listings for [1] since that can lead to anger venting.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#35

Post by dexen »

amalcon wrote: post #26
dexen wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is reinventing the wheel and reinventing the wheel. It's cute when a person, learning as she goes, comes up with something that's been already invented. Only goes to show she understands the field. [1] It's unbelievably irritating when something that was widely implemented 10 or 20 or 30 years ago (and then even improved significantly) is now asserted as the next big thing. C'mon, be serious -_-' [2] [1] a nice…

For [2], I'd normally suggest the thin client... except that it's got enough momentum that it may actually be the next big thing.

Heh, perhaps Sun's demise helped thin client in a way? ;-)

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#36

Post by edw519 »

Condescending feedback says more about the speaker than the listener. It is almost invariably about their own insecurity. This is true is almost all fields of endeavor, not just programming.

Just a few examples of my own:

Insecure bridge player: The queen of spades was a stupid play. What's wrong with you?

Excellent bridge player: The queen of spades would have been a great play against a 4/2 split. But since you had a 3/3 split, what do you think would have happened if you had played the ace instead?

Insecure public speaker: You look like an idiot playing with your hands like that.

Excellent public speaker: You talked about a lot of cool things. I bet I would have been even more interested if I wasn't distracted so much by your hand gestures.

Insecure parent: If you can't keep that baby quiet, you should just stay at home!

Excellent parent: Here's something that has really worked well for me when my kids cried in public...

Insecure programmer: How lame. I can't believe you .

Excellent programmer: I see that works. I have found a few ways to make it work even better. Let me know what you think.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#37

Post by jgrahamc »

I don't like this generalization. I've met all sorts of geeks, nerds and hackers. Some are horrible to each other, some are very nice. I can't see that it's helpful to accuse all of us of being bastards.

On the other hand, I have seen code that I found horribly upsetting and I'm sure I've expressed my opinion of it. I know that I have the patience of something with a very small amount of patience when I come across someone who just doesn't instantly get concepts (for this reason I cannot do family tech support) and I did make my college girlfriend (also doing computer science) cry once because I just rattled off an entire programming assignment without touching the computer (she switched courses).

So, it really depends. If it was someone junior to me I'd cut them a lot of slack, if it was someone I considered my intellectual peer they'd need to roll with the punches.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#38

Post by blhack »

gte910h wrote: post #31
PakG1 wrote: post #17

I'm glad that HN is a place where people are normally really helpful to each other, but I see it even occasionally here. On the other hand, let's not take it too far. It's nice for people to have a little bit of backbone. They don't need to endure jackasses unnecessarily, but there are times when criticism is rightly required and backbone is rightly needed to respond well.

Yes, however the criticism the author is complaining about it not any criticism at all, it's about the low order, non substantive, non-topical type. Spolsky or PG wrote up a piece on this a bit back.

>Spolsky or PG wrote up a piece on this a bit back.

I'd love to see it if you can remember the title...

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#39

Post by michaelbuckbee »

Much of this isn't "geekdom" it's the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory in action: http://www.crunchgear.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/shitcoc...

I've been to many BarCamps, local Ruby on Rails and Web design meetups and people are incredibly giving of their time, knowledge and patience.

It is a profoundly different thing to meet someone in person, who is struggling with some technical issue, than to read about it (devoid of all context) on some wall of electronic text.

Re: My fellow geeks, we need to have a talk.

#40

Post by crux »

dools wrote: post #9
JoachimSchipper wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If "fuckwit" adds anything to your comment, can you explain what that is?

It's a noun I've used to attach the adjective sanctimonious to which adds more emphasis than the word "person" would have, and also confirms to the reader that I disapprove of a holier than thou attitude.

To be honest, I thought you were being sarcastic. OP was all about how people ought to be less harsh, less judgmental, more open-minded, kinder and more welcoming. 'Fuckwit' might as well be the poster child for the culture of unquestioning, caustic certitude of which he disapproves.
Post reply on HN