Hacker News Reader

HNHacker News

Top New Best Ask Show Jobs

Comment by saycheese | Hacker News Reader

Full thread

saycheese·

For anyone that doesn't know how Instacart got into YC... "How Instacart Hacked YC":

https://techcrunch.com/2012/08/18/how-instacart-hacked-yc/

View on HN

Takeaway: Every "no" in tech can be solved with a 6 pack of beer and lots of persistence

...and by being male and speaking English well. :)

I get that what you're saying is tongue-in-cheek, but yes, when you're usually trying to persuade anyone --person, organization, business, etc., having a grasp in the local language is almost always a requirement.

In this particular example, however, those points are completely irrelevant as he just used his app to show off Instacart's delivery feature.

What I was saying (on International Women's Day) is that many opportunities are still afforded to people based on group identity that are denied to others, and that "all problems" can be solved trivially... for some people because of their inborn traits. It was a rejection of the "all problems can be overcome with sufficient gumption" theme of this thread.

Beer, Maleness, being physically present in the USA, English - all of these are group signifiers.

It saddens me to see HN users rejecting this on a day designed to highlight this inequality.

Well, yes, you have to relate to the person you're trying to persuade. If I have a thick latino accent it's hard to persuade someone if they can't understand me.

It's not an earth-shattering thing but 'latino' is not an accent. Just thought I'd point that out.

Haha, it totally is. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIwSgv0Yr8g

My takeaway that in all of the initial "no"s, no one had actually looked at what they were saying no to. He had to be told "maybe" before he was even allowed to explain what the product was.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com