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Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
51–60 of 97 posts
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#52Well maybe I live in another world but I think more or less the opposite. You can write about programming and people will love it, and in our industry there are a great deal of people that are at the same time not gross and with good arguments. But... there are many ways to write about programming: one is to actually write about programming, that is, posts containing some experience to share about some technology, or…
There's another dichotomy: abstract vs concrete. The more abstract, the larger the potential audience. That's the reason why Joel is so much more popular than the guy writing about OCaml optimization techniques for numerical analysis.
But writing about generalities is not only hard more open to criticism as you suggest, but they are also harder to come up with because they require more condensed knowledge. Coming from that perspective I can understand why Joel says he has nothing more to write about, and I think it's reflected in the quality of his posts recently.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#53%99 of the time, Joel-style posts about programming in general are a boring rehash of ideas already expressed better before (often by Joel himself). Same goes for "10 things every start up should know" etc. They're great for HN karma, poor as reading material. Blog posts about actual programming, as in "here's how I implemented x" are almost always a great read, and if they are really good they will sustain their val…
I agree 100%. There's a million posts by people (like Mark Cuban for example) full of the same old boring crap: "maintain good communication", "don't spend money on swag / unnecessary items / etc.", blah blah blah. If generalized advice actually worked for human beings, the entire human race would probably be a lot better off. In practice, I find it hard to believe that anyone takes these lists of dos and don'ts and…
To be honest it's more that the vast bulk of people read these things then do whatever they were already planning to do.
Losing weight, for example, should be really simple but there's a boatload of people out there who don't seem to be able to follow the "heavy weightlifting + calorie controlled diet" advice.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#54Anecdote:
I write about programming, and it is entirely worthwhile for me. I changed my style of writing at a certain point, but that had more to do with what I wanted to explore than with whether people were critical.
Speaking of which, lots of people have said critical things about my writing. But lots more said nice things. Overall, I feel that I get far more positive feedback than negative. I could be wearing rose-coloured glasses.
So... My experience differs from the author. But that makes sense, we are different people.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#55I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
I first read the comment, then saw who has written it. I was shocked its PG. This is the person who wrote essay named trolls. I thought PG is oblivious to trollish comments.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#56I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
So you don't consider the huge comment threads in response to your articles value-added?
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#57I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
You know the "send in the puppet" trick for dealing with abusive customers? (Pretend the customer is talking to a puppet, your only job is to manipulate the puppet such that the customer and the business reach a mutually satisfactory conclusion. If the customer curses a blue streak at the puppet, no biggie, the puppet doesn't care.) If you feel like comment threads are getting you down, send in the puppet. Hah, silly trolls, spending all that time tearing into a puppet. The puppet doesn't care.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#58I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
Can't you just have the YC alumni ban or temp ban people from HN when they post nasty comments? Seems like you accomplish two goals: (1) You don't have to read nasty comments about your writing and (2) you help slow the decline of HN. If it's a site wide policy and someone other than you is doing it, you'll probably be able to avoid accusations of censorship.
Of course, that only works if the comment falls into the obviously nasty category. I suspect the comments that annoy you the most fall into the subtlety nasty category.
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#59I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
What would the consequences be if you dramatically amped up the censorship here? Certainly it would improve discourse at the expense of inspiring lots of hatred...
Re: Why I don't write about programming and why it's not really worthwhile to do so
#60I think it's just as well not to allow comments on one's site. If someone wants to say something about something you've written, they can say it on their own blog or on Twitter. When it's something of theirs they're writing on instead of something of yours, they think twice before being jerks: most people won't create a whole blog post just to make a trollish comment, and someone whose Twitter stream is a series of n…
What would the consequences be if you dramatically amped up the censorship here? Certainly it would improve discourse at the expense of inspiring lots of hatred...
It might also inspire unrest à la reddit when the HD-DVD keys were posted to the site.