Ask HN: I hate startups, I love HN — am I weird?
I love science, especially mathematics and computer science (algorithmics, programming, formal grammars...), and I have an unquenchable thirst for knowledge, so obviously I love HN: for the articles, as well as for the witty community around.
However, I am strongly anti-capitalist, I abhor the eternal meaningless fight for profit... hell, some might even call me a communist! I believe that whenever anyone creates something valuable, that should always belong to humanity as a whole.
In startups, I see brilliant people dedicating 80h/week of their lives to improve the way we comment on funny cat videos; I see startups being sold for millions of dollars while losing crazy amounts of money; I see some guys vaguely listening to a keynote, and signing cheques, and I hear people call them "angels". I see a purely money-driven world, and it sickens me.
I know HN is about startups, so I was wondering: is it so weird that I think like that?
19 comments
[ 3.0 ms ] story [ 57.8 ms ] threadHN is a great news source. I'm definitely anti-communist, but I'm neither skilled nor rich not creative enough to actually found a startup and never intend to. I would theoretically work for one, but first I'd need a large degree of financial stability that is currently missing in my life. I read HN both because I'm interested in how startups function, get funded, get sold and fail,. but also purely as a news source.
If you don't give a f about the money and you sincerely want to change the world and make it a better place, then your startup will succeed, be awesome and in the end make your investors more money back.
However, most entrepreneurs don't get that, which is a shame. The ones that get it are the ones that you want to look out for.
You shouldn't believe that crap. That is simply keyword optimization to attract VCs who "believe in people, not the company".
If you want to make the world a better place, you don't need to profit off of it at the same time.
A rational human being is driven to maximizing his own utility. While he may want to fund a tech school in Ghana when he becomes a millionaire, he will want to do it after he has made 10x the amount he gives away and many will do it openly, because fame is as desired as money (if not more).
The thing that most people don't understand is that if a company isn't profitable, its products will never reach these people.
That's just reality, if you can't pay your employees, they will work for somebody else and all your idealism doesn't help there.
Wikipedia? Mozilla? Ushahidi?
"That's just reality, if you can't pay your employees, they will work for somebody else and all your idealism doesn't help there."
If you can pay them enough to satisfy their utility and basic needs/wants, people will work for you. Again, see the examples above.
You should try contributing open source software to non-profits. Maybe you will see things in a different light and while a cat-photo sharing app worth $50 million may not reach people in Mogadishu (who really don't give a shit about an "angry" cat), your health/water-finder/medicine app will reach the NPO workers who indirectly assist millions.
However, most startups are not really bettering the world and provide rather pretty bad working conditions while the actual job is not all that much more interesting. Half of "need" for dynamism is caused by mismanagement and unmanageable technical debt three months after project started (caused by sleep deprived programmers).
End of rant. Established companies can have pretty bad management too.
The whole making money thing isn't of interest but the creative use of technology is...
By reducing trolling and flaming and snark, HN allows communication about common interests among people with diverse political and social and cultural backgrounds and mores. Shiny play-pretties, flickering lights and abstractions over abstractions attract attention across political the political spectrum.
Besides, as an atheist needs to know more about religion than someone who has found one true one, an informed communist needs to know more about the means of production and mechanisms of capitalism than the bourgeois entrepreneur she hopes to enlighten.
Specifically, not chasing the money, for more reasons than one, is a recurring theme in his essays.
That and the whole thing about hating working a 9-5 just to warm a seat.