Hacker News Reader

Comment by philwelch | Hacker News Reader

mikeash understood what I was getting at. You're acting like an eighth grader who just discovered logical fallacies on Friday.

In case you didn't know, Jean-Louis Gassée was, along with John Sculley, one of the principal figures who ran Apple into the ground after Jobs left. I find this adds an interesting subtext to his commentary on Apple now. He may very well be right, but it's amusing that he writes publicly about the subject at all.

A good comparison is this letter from Richard Nixon to Ronald Reagan about his handling of the Iran-Contra scandal: http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/09/let-stillborn-midget-re... Nixon was probably right, but it's amusing that he of all people chose to give unsolicited advice about handling presidential scandals.

View on HN

JLG was implicit in the (precipitous) decline of Apple after Jobs was fired, but because there was a serious power vacuum. Sculley did not step up and lead the company, and the senior management fragmented, each trying to point the company in a different direction. JLG eventually was also forced out and went and started Be.

It looks like Tim Cook isn't repeating that mistake - he forced out Scott Forstall to remove a potential challenger (or loose cannon, depending on who you ask). I see the current blandness by Apple as both a consequence of that (necessary, IMO) action, as well as having a missing visionary.

> You're acting like an eighth grader who just discovered logical fallacies on Friday.

Your defense of your first ad hominem is an ad hominem against the HN poster who called you out for it?

sigh...

An ad hominem is a fallacious argument that someone's thesis is wrong because of some particular bad thing one can say about that person. I never questioned anyone's thesis, let alone on the grounds of an ad hominem argument. Please learn what logical fallacies actually are before running around accusing people of them.

> Please learn what logical fallacies actually are

Ad hominems all the way...

It's ad-hominems all the way down. He may be going for irony, but that snarky "In case you didn't know..." line kills it and veers back to targeting the person. (I know who JLG is. I just don't care.)

I never said JLG was wrong, either. Please read for comprehension.

I know what you said. You didn't say word one about him being wrong .. or right either. You just laughed. IMHO That is a strongly implied negative statement on his accuracy.

I found the article to be a quite interesting look at the way that these companies are doing business with and against each other, and how the media makes narratives out of it. There seems to be a lot of truth in it. What JLG uses to good effect in the article is insider anecdotes.

I'm not that close to Apple or JLG that I have strong feelings about either one's point of view, I'm more interested in how the same driving forces will affect everyone.

Do you agree or disagree with the substance here? Try engaging with that.

I know what you said. You didn't say word one about him being wrong .. or right either. You just laughed. IMHO That is a strongly implied negative statement on his accuracy.

Bingo. Just because someone maybe didn't mean to imply something doesn't mean they didn't imply it.

I think Nixon's letter to Reagan was interesting and had a lot of truth as well, but that didn't stop me from laughing. I can't say I've seen any insight in what you've had to say, however.

This letter?

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2009/09/let-stillborn-midget-re...

I didn't know I could find something stated so seriously to also be funny and insightful. Thanks for mentioning it, and here's to Tricky Dick.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com