Comment by cauch | Hacker News Reader

Comment by cauch | Hacker News Reader

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I'm not saying they are more scammy, I'm saying that the reputation score is computed differently in US and in Europe, and having a scammy aspect is penalizing the startups more in Europe than in US.

You can start from exactly the same facts: - X% are scammy - Y% are bringing something great - Z% are bringing yet another useless junk in shiny paper that pollute and had bad side effect - W% are making new discoveries - ...

In Europe, the first item will bring you -20 points, the second, +5 points, the third, -10 points, the fourth, +10 points, ...

In US, the first item will bring you -1 point, the second, +20 points, the third, -5 points, the fourth, +5 points, ...

So, at the end, the "goodness" of entrepreneurship is seen differently in the two sides.

I don't think institutions or other business are less scammy, or even that they are seen as better in Europe. Simply, if you score different paths, in Europe, the "entrepreneurship" path does not look that better than any other path, so why would you choose it.

I think you're probably just categorizing something as "scammy" when it's more about being unrealistically ambitious.

You are the one who started talking about "scammy".

Look at what I've said, I've JUST said that US is more tolerant with con artist and bullshitters. I did NOT say "start-ups are con artist and/or bullshitter". What I mean is that US is less concerned to dodgy things, the more extreme being scam, the more benign being, for example, unrealistic claims. I'm just saying that the two are from the same mentality.

In other words: people in US and in Europe are not judging positively the scammers, and people in Europe are not judging positively people that are being unrealistically ambitious, while in US, they tend to be way more forgiving. People in Europe are not judging positively people that are being unrealistically ambitious not because they think they are scammers, but because, culturally, it is not seen as something positive for the society.

It's just cultural. The same way Europeans in US find it unpleasant when Americans are forcing themselves to smile at their customers when they obviously don't even know them and don't have a good reason to smile. And Americans are finding Europeans too cold when they are not smiling all the time even if they don't have a good reason to do it.

> You are the one who started talking about "scammy".

Not really? You said "con artist", did you not? "Scammer" is a near one-for-one replacement, I said "scammy" because "conny" isn't a word.

> I did NOT say "start-ups are con artist and/or bullshitter".

This is absolutely the implication of what you said.

If I say, "I don't know how I feel about Ted Cruz, I don't like voting for rapists", then I didn't explicitly say that Ted Cruz is a rapist, but that's the obvious implication. If you start talking about how Americans are more accepting of con artists while in the middle of an explanation of why Americans are more positive towards start-ups, it doesn't take a genius to connect the dots in what you're trying to say.

If your point was more broadly about dubious/unreliable claims, that's fair, but "con artists" is a lot more specific and critical than that, and that's what I was responding to.

Anyway, you're probably right that Americans are more tolerant of dubious/overambitious claims from a cultural perspective. I'm not sure if they're more tolerant of outright lies though, I think most draw a line between stretching the truth vs breaking it in half.

> Not really

And again, "con artist" was not talking about start-up.

> This is absolutely the implication of what you said.

That is incorrect. I can see why you can interpret it like that, and indeed I should have been more clear, but it's just incorrect to pretend that there is a logical implication.

It's more like saying "I don't know how I feel about Ted Cruz, but then again, once, I voted for a rapist". In this case, it does not mean that I imply that Ted Cruz is a rapist, it just mean that my bar is as low as voting for a rapist. It does not mean I'm saying Ted Cruz is a rapist, it can totally mean that Ted Cruz is probably therefore above the bar. This is way more what I've said in the previous comment: "US people are less uncomfortable with start-up that will have unrealistically ambitious claims, but then again, US people are less unforgiving with con artists, so it's not surprising".

> but "con artists" is a lot more specific and critical than that, and that's what I was responding to.

And again, even if we go to the "start-up / scam" discussion, none of that is saying that all start-up are scam or that none of the non-start-up are not scam, but again, some start-ups are scam, this is just a fact. You seem to react like if saying that some start-ups are scam is going to far.

But that's kind of the point - in your culture apparently there is a difference between making unrealistically ambitious claims and being scammy, and in my culture there is not. If someone tries to get investor's money by making unrealistic claims, they may be above the line legally, but in my culture they're clearly behaving morally unacceptably, demonstrating that they are a fraudster, someone who can't be trusted or respected by others in the community, "not one of us", and deserve to be shunned even if they were my friend or relative.

In my mind there is a strong ethical duty to ensure that your claims are realistic, and it's a severe breach of ethics to be irresponsible with unrealistic claims, triply so when others' money is on the line. As far as I understand, in USA being a bullshitter is treated as somewhat acceptable, to me being a bullshitter means you're scum that I'd need to warn others in the community so that they wouldn't work for you or with you. So while in every country there definitely are some "hustler-type" people who do try to initiate startups, they also have issues hiring and local B2B sales if word gets around that they are the type of person who routinely make unrealistically ambitious claims; the world is small, most industries even smaller and people do try to check references of potential partners through friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend channels - so while a failed startup won't necessarily be held against you, the factors of why and how it failed (and how it affected others) definitely can be.

I think a key aspect of US culture is that when you make absurdly ambitious claims, they will generally give you some space to prove yourself. That doesn’t imply they are naive. They may be skeptical but there isn’t a prejudice. They allow that something might be possible even if they don’t see it.

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