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What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

mtlynch.io

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Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#91
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it just me or is this style of comment, where you replicate someone else's comment and change some words to make them appear foolish, tremendously irritating and not conducive to good discussion? Imagine having a conversation in person where someone parrots back your phrases changing a few nouns. Would you do that? It is also such a derivative style of commenting, I've seen it many times on HN and I wish people wo…

You need to use the right commenting style for the right situations. This particular style of comment is best used when you want to emphasize that what a person just said is only one perspective and that there exists an equally valid opposing perspective. It works even better if the original post was written with a tone of superiority, though it’s not required. It wouldn’t be surprising to find it commonly used on HN…

You could also just write a regular comment arguing that point. Your approach risks coming across as condescending, and depends upon the reader having the patience to read essentially the exact same comment twice, keeping an eye out for whatever clever substitutions were made.

edit: that being said, I'm more than happy to move on. To each their own

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm seriously thinking of doing this myself. I have a date set, I have concrete plans. I want to create some side products and get some passive income and learn new things. My biggest fear though, is that when I do look for work again, people will say: "That's great that you took that time to learn, I can see that you learned a lot of valuable skills, we want you to be part of our team! -- here's some poorly thought…

That's kinda like talking yourself out of going on vacation because when you come back you won't be on vacation anymore. Do it for the experience, for the learning, for the growth - don't do it for what happens after.

Thanks for that advice. I think you're right, I'm thinking to far ahead about something that might or might not happen.

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#94

I glad it worked out for the author but so far it hasn't worked out for me. It's been 5 years which wasn't my plan. I thought it would be 6 months until I figured out what I want to do. Things that happened. Travelled: found it mostly extremely lonely to travel alone. Got sick of seeing the same things (this place's contemporary art museum, that place's famous church). Of course I saw some amazing things but I now th…

I spent most of the last 5 years in Tokyo + traveling, mostly not working. Too bad we didn't run into each other. Happy to chat, have some suggestions. My email is in my profile.

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#95
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You need to use the right commenting style for the right situations. This particular style of comment is best used when you want to emphasize that what a person just said is only one perspective and that there exists an equally valid opposing perspective. It works even better if the original post was written with a tone of superiority, though it’s not required. It wouldn’t be surprising to find it commonly used on HN…

It is quite possible that one may judge a statement as being superior when in fact it was not written as such. In that case, the reader could perhaps have some other emotion (inferiority?) coloring their perception. Who is to say how the echo style of reply is generally seen, but I find it snarky. It seems less like saying, "I have a quite alternate point of view" and more like saying, "the originally presented view…

Complete tangent:

Most studies I’m familiar with find that intellectual skills and communications skills are very correlated (highly g-loaded) in the general population.

Your phrasing using “lacking” and “inverse proportion” could actually be interpreted as agreeing with that in a circuitous fashion, but the rest of the tone makes me think your “lacking” was an editing mistake, you meant the two skills are inversely correlated (apologies if I misunderstood your intent).

But you may be right that HN appeals to the outliers whose communication skills/maturity/desire for internet points don’t match the general population.

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#96

I glad it worked out for the author but so far it hasn't worked out for me. It's been 5 years which wasn't my plan. I thought it would be 6 months until I figured out what I want to do. Things that happened. Travelled: found it mostly extremely lonely to travel alone. Got sick of seeing the same things (this place's contemporary art museum, that place's famous church). Of course I saw some amazing things but I now th…

I am glad at least someone is honest. So sick of hearing "This worked out so great" and then everyone shitting on the nay-sayers.

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I assume you are being sarcastic. How do you put off $1M in assets with a $200k median salary in four years? $200k x 4 x 65% is just $520k without even any expenses paid such as the ~$72k you would have paid for a room in a shared apartment.

Well, in addition to salary, he would have also gotten a bonus and stock. The bonus might be $50K/year, and then maybe another $100K/year in stock. The number of shares in the stock grant would have been computed at the date he started -- 5 years ago, GOOG was around $440/share, so at today's price, the shares would be worth $245K/year, assuming he held onto them as they vested. So, that adds up to around $495K/year,…

You lose your unvested RSUs when you leave (so divide your RSU calculations by 2 to start with), and the later grants would be at higher prices and thus have experienced less growth, so your envelope math is off by enough to not be good envelope math.

On the other hand, $100k is by no means the largest RSU grant you can get, so, basically, we have no damn idea. Overall it’s pretty silly to speculate about someone’s net worth unless they’re excited to talk about it.

But the larger point that high performing senior engineers at megacorps can make way more than people outside the megacorp world imagine is true and surprisingly contoversial on HN.

Re: What I’ve Been Doing Since Quitting My Job

#99
post #97

Not a single mention of money, which means that this author has it (or plenty of it). But big-ups to using a Surface!

Nice catch on the Surface! I was trying to figure out how you knew I use one, then I remembered the cartoon.

It's actually a coincidence because I asked my cartoonist to draw a non-Apple laptop, though I didn't specifically say Surface. But she drew a Surface, and that is indeed what I use.

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