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Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

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Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#331

Post by pydry »

titanomachy wrote: post #291
JonChesterfield wrote: post #201

This is a trap for engineers. If you don't worry about the returns, you won't get any. There are circumstances where that is fine. Be sure you're in one of them first.

Yeah, but the order is still 1. create value, then 2. capture some of that created value. Some people want to skip step 1. Some bigco jobs have felt that way to me: I don't know if I'm actually creating anything valuable, but I'm getting paid. I think the people who are most anxious right now are the ones who suspect they're not really creating anything of real-world value, and they're terrified that they're about to…

It's often way easier to capture value than to get compensated for creating it.

It's definitely indicative of an unhealthy organization or society when this happens but generally I've still found this to be the norm.

Indeed, maybe one of the reasons why free market capitalism functions is because it has a built in check (bankruptcy) against this natural human organizational tendency.

I think a large part of why software devs were so well compensated in the last decade was because we were helping build the systems which made the capture of value more efficient (whether from taxi drivers, smbs, property rentals or whatever), not because we were facilitating its creation.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#333

Post by swiftcoder »

edgyquant wrote: post #277
swiftcoder wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> He's got a winning track record What exactly would that be a winning track record in - as near as I can tell, his actual track record is in buying companies with an already-successful product team, and managing not to run them into the ground for a while?

You have got to be kidding me, you can dislike someone without being this wrong. Hes literally the richest man in the world, started the largest space delivery company in the planet and has brought extreme returns for his investors in every endeavor he’s undertook.

> literally the richest man in the world... extreme returns for his investors

This isn't really a benchmark for effectiveness at anything beyond making money.

I don't think anyone would dispute that he has an eye for investments (helped along by a healthy dose of the ol' silver spoon), not to mention a certain flair for convincing Uncle Sam to pick up the tab (i.e. a significant part of Tesla's growth relied on federal EV subsidies, and NASA heavily buying SpaceX launch capacity).

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#334

Post by graemep »

randomgermanguy wrote: post #132
vintermann wrote: post #24

There are zero-sum games you can't realistically escape. They're really common. Credentials is a zero-sum game. Political power, influence of all sorts, are zero sum games: if you have more of it, someone else has less. Land ownership is basically zero sum, too.

Yes, but in practice land-ownership is only zero sum in places like Europe where every square-kilometer has 300 years of documented ownership etc, or other high-density areas. The Asia, Africa & the Americas have so much unused space that isn't as inhospitable as central Australia

Where in Asia do you have in mind? A few things I know off hand. Sri Lanka has a higher population density than Britain, Japan's is much higher than that, and Java has nearly the population of Russia in an area smaller than England (just England, not Britain or the UK). India and China are big, but have huge populations.

There is lots of "unused space" in places like Alaska or Siberia or deserts or mountains, but land is not a fungible commodity. Unused space is unused for a reason. In practice, almost all ownership of land is a zero sum game.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#335

Post by Klonoar »

kcoddington wrote: post #273
bko wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must be new here. But seriously, I think the level of discourse has gone down considerably on HN in the last few years. I know people always say this in their forum but I think it's true. For instance, you'll see a post about GPT. Top comments are often "I use Claude", completely irrelevant. And then when [political thing happens] you get these passive-aggressive submissions with a lot of upvotes "how to switch t…

I almost posted this exact comment. You're not alone in thinking HN has changed for the worse in recent years. I get that it's just a reflection of cultural change and (over)reactions to anything adding friction. But for a forum dedicated to the "hacker" lifestyle, it's disappointing to see so much gatekeeping and FUD. I really wish this audience could start swinging back towards a response style that contains nuance…

This forum was never dedicated to the hacker lifestyle, it has always been run by profit seeking investor classes.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#336

Post by harimau777 »

keiferski wrote: post #318

As is often the case, the title is a bit misleading and implies a universality that I don’t think the author intended. He is specifically talking about AI, and saying (in my understanding) that you shouldn’t worry too much about whether your specific thing will be overwritten by AI, as long as you focus on actually creating true, real value with your work. I agree with that completely and can see it happening in my o…

That still seems super naive, at least if its extended to software engineering. Companies already treat software engineers like disposable cogs to be burnt out and discarded. I don't see how AI will improve that.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#337

Post by boringg »

kcoddington wrote: post #273
bko wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You must be new here. But seriously, I think the level of discourse has gone down considerably on HN in the last few years. I know people always say this in their forum but I think it's true. For instance, you'll see a post about GPT. Top comments are often "I use Claude", completely irrelevant. And then when [political thing happens] you get these passive-aggressive submissions with a lot of upvotes "how to switch t…

I almost posted this exact comment. You're not alone in thinking HN has changed for the worse in recent years. I get that it's just a reflection of cultural change and (over)reactions to anything adding friction. But for a forum dedicated to the "hacker" lifestyle, it's disappointing to see so much gatekeeping and FUD. I really wish this audience could start swinging back towards a response style that contains nuance…

It feels like the quality of reddit collapsed over the last decade and a lot of the reddit style posting has come over here. Especially the examples above. To be fair both the good and the bad.

The upvoting for political tribalism (whole political spectrum) is so truly mind bogglingly unintelligent and unoriginal. Its just brings the bar down.

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#338

Post by DangitBobby »

fragmede wrote: post #195
mike_hearn wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone needs to make a website explaining why UBI doesn't work conceptually because this comes up over and over again on HN. You cannot make UBI work from money saved by removing means testing. Even UBI is a welfare scheme and would require significant bureaucratic hoop jumping to check that a person claiming it isn't: • Dead • Non-citizen • Already claiming it under a different name/bank account/etc • In prison • M…

I'll come out and get kicked out of communism club to say that I don't support UBI on the basic fact that money is exchanged for goods and services is just so foundational that I can't support UBI. I think everybody should have a roof over their heads and 3 square meals a day, but UBI isn't the way to get there.

You don't support it on principle or because you don't think it works?

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#339

Post by [deleted] »

10xDev wrote: post #179

You will get laid off but you won't if you create value and you will create value if you don't care about money and it will go recursive but it won't go recursive because there are limits. It won't change anything but it will change everything. No one knows what he is actually saying (see comments) but at least he managed to compress the entire discourse on AI impact into a blog post.

[deleted]

Re: Create value for others and don’t worry about the returns

#340

Post by neuralkoi »

This post feels a bit ideological in nature. There are recurring processes at organizations to assess someone's fit in a given role. Generally when someone is no longer performing as expected, they're given time to correct their ways or retrain. If the organization has no system in place, then it really falls on the organization. I wonder if the author overestimates the amount of people who really want to be in a role they're not good at.
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