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People who own businesses should not act like assholes

blog.kamens.us

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Re: People who own businesses should not act like assholes

#3

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

To be honest, it was the author who I felt like, while perhaps not an asshole, showed a pretty intense level of oblivious immaturity.

I get it, the other guy was a jerk, especially to someone who was maintaining an add-on for free. But at the point where the author responded with the "Sorry, I don't agree with that," he should have left it at that and moved on. Who cares what some rando on the internet thinks about your product? Instead the author decided to go into vindictive mode and leave the negative review, and then leave this whole blog post, which does the author no favors. To be honest, to me the cringiest part of this article is it feels like the author is trying to project how virtuous he is, when, at least for me, it had the opposite effect.

Re: People who own businesses should not act like assholes

#6

Post by i_dont_know_ »

I've worked on FOSS before and got a handful of messages from people like this. They're very very few and far between, but I always found them fascinating because of how much it broke their worldviews.

They're usually people who control enough money that they can 'throw money at a problem' and it'll largely diminish or go away. They usually find a desperate enough vendor, employee, or subcontractor who will deal with their attitudes for enough cash, or quickly fire them if they can't.

They usually have the inverse attitude towards customers giving them money -- that is, they believe it's also part of their job to take abuse from those willing to buy.

So, most of their business transactions involve them giving or taking abuse with the threat of financial withdrawal if the abuse isn't accepted. It's how they define transactions. "Who's the abuser, who's the abusee?" The answer depends, strictly, on which way the money is flowing.

FOSS breaks their worldview because they're not the customer in the same way. They don't have that leverage. They're just an angry person on the street asking you to help them carry their groceries in, and at some point, if they realize it, it's priceless.

Re: People who own businesses should not act like assholes

#7

Post by everdev »

puranjay wrote: post #4

I mean no one really comes out looking good in this story. You don't trump an asshole by out-assholing him

Yep, it takes two to keep the drama going.

If you want to fight, argue. If you want to end a fight, empathize.

People tend to think there's right/wrong in a fight when it's almost always emotional and can't be proven or justified with logic.

Re: People who own businesses should not act like assholes

#8

Post by quickthrower2 »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #3

To be honest, it was the author who I felt like, while perhaps not an asshole, showed a pretty intense level of oblivious immaturity. I get it, the other guy was a jerk, especially to someone who was maintaining an add-on for free. But at the point where the author responded with the "Sorry, I don't agree with that," he should have left it at that and moved on. Who cares what some rando on the internet thinks about y…

Totally my thoughts. Plus I thought the email asking him to take down the reviews was fair and respectfully written. And leaving reviews for businesses you’ve not been a customer of is in bad faith.

Re: People who own businesses should not act like assholes

#9

Post by chimen »

Only few people can act like Linus and get away with it (and for a good reason). HN is the worst place to brag about stuff like this. I'm a person with limited patience and it's toxic for my business for me to deal with clients that's why only my partner deals with it while I stay on the technical part. It's worked wonders. It's no shame in admitting you're not the guy to do it all.
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