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What I Worked On

paulgraham.com

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Re: What I Worked On

#371

Post by MayeulC »

username90 wrote: post #326
MayeulC wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not a parent either, but constraints such as "you can only play videogames that you code yourself" could be an entertaining way to teach: they might want the reward, teach them to enjoy the path as well. I am not saying they should learn computer science, but it's one of the best ways to use computers, and having some basic skills with it is incredibly useful still.

You can't really do that today. In 1980 Frogger was the state of the art of video games, a kid could code a clone of it over a few weekends so the hurdle was reasonable. However modern games takes years to clone even for professionals, even the indie ones, so you banning them from games they haven't made themselves today essentially means you banned them from ever playing games. The main problem is that basically eve…

Well, there are plenty of game engines out there that empower the user a whole lot. And I bet any kid who codes a simple snake today would still play the hell out of it, and have plenty of ideas on how to improve the game even further.

You are right, however, that some parts are simply impossible to replicate: narratives, for instance, have to be experienced. Gameplay however, is where the fun is when it comes to games and game programming (this might be subjective), and is usually quite simple to replicate.

Re: What I Worked On

#372

Post by Tycho »

It seemed to me that the web would be a big deal [...] If I wanted to get rich, here was the next train leaving the station.

What other trains have left the station? What ones are leaving now? I'm referring to growth areas that are not 'winner takes all' and do not require extreme ability/talent to get into. The ones that come to mind are:

- smart phone apps when the iPhone first launched

- crypto currency mining/speculation (still ongoing I suppose)

- maybe some period 2005-2015 when there were still many novel and lucrative applications of machine learning to try out?

Re: What I Worked On

#373

Post by solveit »

alisonkisk wrote: post #153
_Microft wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'll have to say reading this makes me feel a bit sad for pg. It seems that he worked on Bel extensively for four years, and the end result was something which appeared on the front page of Hacker News for one day and then disappeared. This is not unlike a doctoral dissertation. Invest years of your life and effort, produce nice results, have people cheer for you after you successfully defend it and then nobody car…

At least a dissertation is a school project where you learn a skill to use in future.

PG doesn't need skills, he needs to be fulfilled.

Re: What I Worked On

#374

Post by Aloha »

IkmoIkmo wrote: post #358
Aloha wrote: post #332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, they have for all of us at some point. No, not for great wealth perhaps, but using myself as an example - the fact that I'm in my own apartment across the country from where I grew up, with an engineering job, that pays well enough for me to afford an expensive pocket computer cum telephone to write this on - anyone of those things alone would have blown the mind of 18 year old me - all three of them as one c…

Now you're talking about technological change and about how we're all living potentially richer and more interesting lives because of it. But that's a separate point to the one being discussed: Jobs was referring to personal life choices and how they work out if you connect the dots looking back. Point being that there's plenty of people for whom personal life choices didn't see their dots connect looking back, and t…

My personal dots did connect, largely, thats my point. I took a highly unconventional path to where I am in life, and feel lucky for making it.

Re: What I Worked On

#375

Post by avnfish »

Tycho wrote: post #372

It seemed to me that the web would be a big deal [...] If I wanted to get rich, here was the next train leaving the station. What other trains have left the station? What ones are leaving now? I'm referring to growth areas that are not 'winner takes all' and do not require extreme ability/talent to get into. The ones that come to mind are: - smart phone apps when the iPhone first launched - crypto currency mining/spe…

*[nascent] EVs and autonomous driving

*[departing now] ecommerce economy

*[departing now] ESG investing

*[departing now] derisking semi-conductor supply chain

*[departing now] activist / populist retail investing (e.g. Gamestop)

But, as ever, the challenge really is the imbalance between labour and capital. All these opportunities are easy to invest in but difficult to get rich from if all you have is your labour. Appstores are saturated, ML labour market is terrible outside of a few pockets of excellence, etc.

Re: What I Worked On

#376

Post by mattmaroon »

It’s so hard for me to believe I was in YC over 13 years ago. I thought I was old at the time because I was 27 and most of the people there were a few years younger. I had also already had an entire career in a current field behind me at that point so while not rich, I was not living on ramen.

The part about the air conditioners was nostalgic. We were the second summer in Cambridge (07) and it was also hot. We tracked down this behemoth on Craigslist that took two of us to move. It was old. Like probably from the 80’s old. But man did that bad boy put out some cold air. We left it behind as a gift for the college kids who were renting us the apartment.

We worked so hard that at one point I (normally a very light sleeper) slept right through a fire alarm and firefighters banging on my door. I was lucky it was a false alarm.

I remember a double date dinner with Paul and Jessica and my then fiancée at a restaurant that had murals (I think of the movie Casablanca or gone with the wind). I think it was a not-well-kept secret at the time that they were dating so I didn’t tell anyone.

What a fun, interesting time that summer was. I miss all of that.

Re: What I Worked On

#377

Post by lovecg »

oblio wrote: post #360
lovecg wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have we read the same essay? Like half of the time he’s running on zero or negative dollars in the story. Some people just value different things in life.

Didn't he have his (rather rich) family as a safety net? That's got to cause wonders for your mental health and emotional stability, even at 0 income.

I think that’s true but the “rich” part is not really relevant. Personally I can sort of relate to his life journey, and I come from a very much not rich immigrant family. I just remember not understanding why people cared about money instead of say learning more math. But looking back there was always an implicit understanding that no matter how bad things got I could crash on the couch and get a meal at my parents place or something, so hardship never really crossed my mind.

Re: What I Worked On

#378

Post by SyzygistSix »

meheleventyone wrote: post #340
xapata wrote: post #269

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. Equally plausible is that we only write quotations from the people whose dots serendipitously connected.

Yeah we had a very emotional essay this week from Chris Crawford whose life work failed to materialise.

I'm having trouble finding this. Any title or other info that you remember? I don't see it on his web page.

Re: What I Worked On

#379

Post by IG_Semmelweiss »

TheJoeMan wrote: post #307
desireco42 wrote: post #130

So a weird thing is happening today. When I was a kid, like Paul, I had to beg my parents to get me a computer ie. spend money on it. Once I got it, I couldn't stop using it and hacking and figuring things out. Kids these days... :) have everything, I made sure my kids have all good equipment, they have good instruction but they are kind of not interested it all. If they do something, this is more to please me, as th…

I got into computer programming when I got a Mindstorms Lego set, which built off my love for Legos. My younger brother learned some about C literally because he wanted to write cheats for Counterstrike, or more accurately how to remove the DRM-components of cheats that he didn't want to pay for. You just gotta find a gate-way drug activity, as well as a gate-way programming language because going straight to Lisp is…

You nailed it.

I've found the "drug" for foreign languages , by letting them watch certain cartoons when home goals are met (good behavior etc), with the caveat they can only watch with audio that is a specific foreign language.

The next step is the hardest one. Once they read, I can probably migrate to a 4th language, and leverage RPGs for that purpose. Or I can branch out to programming like you say, but that may be much more difficult.

You need to have a partner that is supportive of this. If you don't present a united front, any (learning) policy will soon be forgotten.

Re: What I Worked On

#380

Post by oblio »

lovecg wrote: post #377
oblio wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Didn't he have his (rather rich) family as a safety net? That's got to cause wonders for your mental health and emotional stability, even at 0 income.

I think that’s true but the “rich” part is not really relevant. Personally I can sort of relate to his life journey, and I come from a very much not rich immigrant family. I just remember not understanding why people cared about money instead of say learning more math. But looking back there was always an implicit understanding that no matter how bad things got I could crash on the couch and get a meal at my parents…

Ok, then treat it as "always having a plan B".
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