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Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

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71–80 of 312 posts

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#71

> but apparently money makes people do anything. I don't see the link with your example. How would people profit of finding the number of dislikes on YouTube? Also, sharing this would increase the number of users of the exploit, and its general publicity, making it more likely to be fixed. Nothing to do with having each other's back. And then, considering that you are disclosing a security leak, the "having each othe…

I assumed the OP meant that sharing it here would mean someone on the YT team would see it and fix it. As opposed to having their hacker ethos win out and let the bug stay I guess?

Thanks, yes, that's what I meant.

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#72
Yes. There are so many reasons but a lot of valuable knowledge and great conversations are no longer public and it doesn't make sense to have them in public. On the internet the only scale is private DM or potentially seen by the entire world. Software is also a big industry with many people in it for the money or they have no choice but to implement what the PM wants anyways. We have been well trained and domesticated by the business folks to not stick our noses where they don't belong.

I think it's not just software it's every industry. Companies are structured to bubble up any significant decision making to a few people at the top. Software was just the exception for a short while.

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you get 95% of people to use such an extension, it will be mostly useless. And if somebody succeeded in getting 95% of people to use their extension, they would sell it to the highest bidder in a heartbeat, as has happened many times before. YouTube is dead, it's time to create something new.

I kind of agree... we need a new YT

why only kind of, do you have apprehensions?

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

don't understand this sentiment at all. I have no idea what any of what you're posting has to do with "well intentions" or "money mak[ing] people do anything". Pretty sure they're saying that the YT developers would break their cool hack if they knew about it, because they want to keep their jobs (eg, getting paid, or "making money"). Sounds like the OP wants to view all developers as adhering to some Platonic ideal…

Thank you. Yes, that's exactly what I meant.

They will break it sooner or later. IMO it's better to release it and let YouTube break it, so the existence of third-party dislike counters becomes more justified, by their own doing.

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of people are assuming the worst intentions here but anyone who has worked in an enterprise knows sometimes it's useful to build tools for your use and not to share. The tool might not even be allowed, C# is probably not in the supported platforms and even if it was, getting it into the official repos can be arduous. If OP really cared about maximizing everyone's productivity of course they would share the tool…

The question I have is how did incentives get so misaligned that this person feels that doubling the productivity of all their peers is unlikely to be worth the effort of presenting a tool.

I think it's a side effect of Milton Friedman's Shareholder Primacy Theory, which people interpret in different ways, sometimes, resulting in very skewed incentives.

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#79
post #42

Yeah I do this. Most of what I build, nobody knows about it nor is it release into the wild. Latest example: at my current workplace we have some crappy custom compilers for our platform.... I've rebuilt them in a way that I like (and using C# instead of Java), that enables me to use it in a small visual studio code plugin that enables me with real time error messages as I code against our platform, so basically cons…

I get this. If you tell people, and it gets released into the official tool chain, you will also probably then be its "owner". More work for you with no extra money.

Not only that, but once the company owns it, they'll want to start managing it, making changes, etc. You run the risk of it becoming bloated with features, making it harder to maintain and the whole thing loses the reason it existed in the first place. Maybe that's a stretch, maybe not.

Also, if it does decreases work time by 3/4, guess what happens when the business finds out? Deadlines and estimates get pushed up, and everyone is expected to get that much more done. Sometimes, as a developer, you need a trick up your sleeve to keep your head above water fighting unrealistic expectations. If everyone has the same trick and it becomes part of your SDLC, the goal post just gets moved.

Re: Do you ever avoid submitting something on HN so devs won't ruin it?

#80
Not really.

As far as dislikes, I've no reason to think that I KNOW what the 'true' dislike number is / should be or that somehow this hack provides the true value ... it just as easily could be something in use by the typical dislike mobs and etc...

It's YT's platform as far as I'm concerned, their platform to do with what they wish, I might disagree but I'm not going out of my way to hide things / not talk about things on here because someone might see it. One way or another YT is gonna do their thing for whatever reason anyway.

Side note, folks really upset about dislikes thinking fighting the man .. are unwittingly playing the man's game by worrying about dislikes on some website.

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