The Positive Programmer
rdegges.com
rdegges.com
If something isn't broken, okay, great, no need to focus on it. But if something is broken, to a problem solver, this is inexcusable. Things that are wrong need to be fixed. So when you see people complaining about things like startup culture or sexism in tech or whatever else, it's because these people see a problem that can be fixed, so they focus their efforts on fixing it. Most people who comment on these types of things aren't just complaining, they're offering solutions or their thoughts on what the "real problem" is.
Personally, I feel the whole "positive attitude" thing is a detriment. People with "positive attitudes" tend to ignore problems because they don't want to upset others or make waves. These problems tend to fester until people like me (problem solvers) get so tired of it we just leave.
If all you want is to be happy, fine, be happy, do your thing, ignore the problems. But if you want to make an impact, if you want to fix things and make them better for yourself and others, you have to focus on the things that are wrong and you have to complain and offer solutions and build solutions and piss people off until things get better. Making things better is always a fight; it's always a struggle; and you're unlikely to be very happy while trying to improve or fix broken things. Some people think it's worth it, others don't.
Complaining is not focusing your efforts on fixing something. Fixing is fixing. Complaining is complaining. When you complain about a problem instead of helping to build a solution, you become part of the problem.
I don't think this article said anything bad about polite and constructive criticism.
I think that one who focuses on solutions can be positive-focused without ignoring the problem.
Don`t people become problem-solvers because they enjoy solving problems? And if that is a case, than being presented with a host of unsolved, yet potentially solvable problems should make a problem-solver scream with glee, right?
I guess it depends on the depth of your compulsion.
Also, I don't think he talked about moving away from perfectionism. He talked about moving away from "how unfair things were, how I deserved more, how other people were causing problems for me, and how I was vastly superior to everyone else." That isn't being a perfectionist, that's being a prat.
Ignoring the negative aspects of reality is also not compatible with the mindset of a problem solver.
A better alternative would be to have a clear, accurate, and wholly representative understanding of the situation. This means focusing on the good just as equally as the bad.
I understand where you're coming from though. I used to think the same thing about not focusing on good, and only directing attention to the bad. It made me feel like I was selective, like I had good taste, and knew things that other people didn't. I even suspected I was a little like Steve Jobs must've been, because surely he had good taste. I got to the point where I was starting to be known as a grumpy guy, and so I took a step back and realized what the negativity was doing to me, my mood, and to those around me. And thats when I realized a complete picture is better than a purely negative one.
With a complete picture, I'm less negative. When I'm less negative, Im more likely to have positive thoughts running through my brain. When I have positive thoughts running through my brain, I'm happier. When I'm happier I'm more productive, people like me more, I talk more, and all of those things lead to me being more successful. It was an obvious choice for me!
Maybe you aren't there yet, and maybe you won't ever be. However, I imagine a lot of people are somewhere close, and I hope they find this comment useful.
Obviously there are things to be learned from the things that aren't broken (so that you know the difference between what works and what doesn't, and a potential solution when you come across something that IS broken), I just don't see the point of focusing on the good. It's good. Yay. Now move on.
I also find it interesting that both you and OP associate negative outlooks with big egos. You both mention how negative people tend to think of themselves as better or more deserving. I wonder if this is an association that really holds water.
I think I know the kind of people you're talking about, but please don't think all "positive" people are in that same category. I think constructive criticism is great, and in no way do I want to stop giving it or receiving it.
But there's a lot of criticism that goes out of its way to be mean or condescending. And there's a lot of criticism with only one purpose: to make the criticizer look smart. These are not useful and they drown out the constructive feedback.
Sometimes being negative is appropriate! I'm not happy all the time. But it SHOULDN'T be a habit - negativity like that is not helpful to the person doing it and it's not helpful to those around them.
Now, if we planned for things to go wrong (as a negative person would) and things go right, all we lose is a little bit of time that was spent creating backup plans. But if we planned for things to go right, and things do go wrong, we're in a situation where we have to scramble.
That's why I think positive attitudes can be detrimental. If you err, I feel you should err on the side of caution, and that typically requires a negative outlook (because positive people won't waste their time on it).
That's interesting, we seem to have wildly different definitions for these words. I view it like this:
As a programmer, I plan for things to go wrong. As a positive person, I try to express it in a constructive way. Caution and forward thinking is not necessarily tied to being negative!!
Planning for when things go wrong isn't just something a negative person would do, it's also something a cautious or sensible person would do. Or an experienced software developer! If I've learned anything from programming it's that no matter how unlikely an error condition seems, it WILL happen sooner or later.
I HAVE seen the kind of person you are talking about though - there are the people who think that just being positive will make bad things less likely to happen, and then people who are just overly optimistic about everything. Not every person who identifies as positive thinks this way though! :)
Also, nothing makes me happier than improving or fixing broken things.
My observation is that people with highly logical thought processes can often end up developing an outwardly negative approach to most aspects of life. Perhaps it's due to frustrations of dealing with people not as logical as us. Perhaps its a genetic personality defect. While I can't say for certain, I know I'm certainly guilty of it, and though I've made an effort to be better about it (and am), it's still a kind of "default" response I have to the unexpected or things that don't follow the "path" that I imagined. I see a similar pattern amongst many folks in the groups I mentioned.
I will say if anything, the overall demeanor of those groups has become a lot more positive than I remember it being 5-10 (or more) years ago.
This tends to lead to a very negative outlook, but is more a consequence of pragmatic mental habit than anything.
That said, like everyone else I've noticed that pragmatic negativity doesn't translate well to other parts of life. Switching mindsets from "what's wrong and how does it need to be fixed" to "what's enjoyable" can be quite a leap when you're used to thinking a certain way.
Did you notice, however, that the only explanations you went to for these negative approaches were "dealing with people not as logical as us" and "genetic personality defect"? What's the common thread in these answers? They're both examples of blame externalization (and thus perserving cognitive dissonance - you're great the way you are!). If it's other people, you're not in the wrong, you don't need to change. If it's genetic, then it's hard-coded, and try as you might, you're going to have a hell of a time fixing it.
Now maybe you're right, and maybe you're wrong. Who am I to say? Your points aren't invalid, just biased, and it's clear to see where it's coming from. But I think the best way to negate this negativity (ha, ha?) is by having people turn the mirror on themselves, first and foremost, before judging others.
How much of this negativity could be spared to begin with if people just thought about how they would feel in someone else's shoes?
It's awesome that you've seen an upward trend in positivity. You said you've been working on it yourself, you're definitely part of what's making it better!
Indeed. In any disagreement you have, there are two people at fault, but only of those faults is in your power to fix.
I work in social games. Nothing makes me more negative than running a user test and finding out that treating your users as if they were mentally deficient 4 year olds results in more people coming back to play again and more people willing to give us their money.
HN's most attractive feature from day one has always been the positive, intelligent, supportive community. Those are not traits you tend to find in your typical 9-5 programmer (in my experience, at least), and are the exact opposite of what you find in the communities that most of our early adopters fled from (Slashdot was already hopeless by 2007, and programming.reddit.com was already headed that way).
But those other communities are dying, and this place has taken over their role as The Place to Talk About Tech Stuff. So we see a lot of their users coming across, bringing with them the general depressive negativity and inclination to snark and hostility. This behavior sometimes doesn't get swatted down fast enough nor ruthlessly enough and bad comments are left to stand. People see these comments and think they're acceptable. And the standards erode.
There's not much to be done about it, unfortunately. We can't kick everybody out, and it's not yet quite bad enough to form a new community and abandon this place to the rabble.
Still, it's worth at least trying to fight. Flag ruthlessly, downvote comments that don't belong here, based on tone rather than disagreement. Upvote the few good things that do in fact belong here. Write good comments and otherwise behave the way you want to see others behave.
The same has happened with web community after web community I've enjoyed only to see them get popular... slashdot was good once. Heck, there was even a time when you could get a civilized conversation in TechCrunch comment threads.
So, with the obvious caveat of http://www.despair.com/dysfunction.html ...I sincerely hope that HN doesn't end up going down that road too.
Long winded way of saying I like your comment and I'm gonna try to take the advice.
There's a tricky Goldilocks zone when it comes to any forum and the biggest challenge is not treating it as a personal blog. You share ideas, yes, but the very platform demands you give up some control. Of how your ideas are perceived, what feedback you get and even weather those ideas are welcome in the first place. And all communities change... away from a Beowulf cluster of X and into the cloud, I suppose.
Trying too hard to hold new members to the light of older burning candles will cause them to flicker out or if you just let them burn willy-nilly, you risk starting a fire.
I'm hopeful we're not all doomed to walled gardens the likes of Twitter and Facebook just to avoid negativity raining on our parade (of course even they're not devoid of doom and gloom either, but "blocks" do give you an umbrella of sorts).
I stopped going there when it became obvious the the first posts on many topics were no longer genuine. Not only were the subject-matter experts gone, but the 'discussion' was being led by paid reputation managers who had prepared statements on various things.
Slashdot is dead so far as I'm concerned.
I guess this is because HN attracts people that aren't just programmers but also entrepreneurs. A good hacker has to figure out worst-case scenarios. A good entrepreneur, on the other hand, has to look for value in everything to find business opportunities.
>This behavior sometimes doesn't get swatted down fast enough nor ruthlessly enough and bad comments are left to stand. People see these comments and think they're acceptable. And the standards erode.
>Flag ruthlessly, downvote comments that don't belong here, based on tone rather than disagreement.
I'm unsure of what you're advocating for. Are you for expunging the hyper-negative, misogynistic near-spam of Reddit, or for doing away with negativity entirely? (My hunch is latter, as fighting spam is trivially excepted and needn't be argued.) The latter is incredibly dangerous and will work to the detriment of the community inasmuch as HN, as a community of generally-intelligent individuals, is capable of analyzing a story to a greater extend than most news organizations or communities; and some sort of assault on negativity would remove the ability for one to introduce warranted skepticism or to dissent from general discussion. Skepticism, contrarianism, criticism, etc. are incredibly valuable tools and are fundamental to HN and to discourse in general. One should not have the merits of their ideas judged solely on the "tone" articulated by them, and HN should certainly not seek to create institutionalized positivity.
Completely agree with you. I've seen way too many comments that where downvoted only because of the tone (even though the content itself was very relevant), or because it expressed a dissident, politically incorrect idea. When I see such a comment being downvoted, I automatically upvote it, regardless of whether I agree or disagree with the content. I don't hang out here to read opinions I'm already agreeing with. I'm far more interested in intelligently argumented opinions that contradict mine. So, no it's not fun to be bashed by the sarcasms of someone else, but if the opinion contained in the bashing is relevant, then we should just suck it up, and answer to the content.
Some people will understand, rewrite, and become productive members of the community. Others will get offended, write back with an angry rant about censorship or something, and with luck find themselves hellbanned. Those are the people who just aren't ever going to be welcome here. Fortunately, the rest of the internet seems designed for them to fit right in.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5453757
Anger, silly jokes, one-liners and memes are all over that thread. The fact that so much of it will still be there at the end of the day is the problem we're facing.
Compare to the discussion on this item, with people stating real arguments using entire paragraphs. Plenty of disagreement, certainly some negativity, but mostly civil (or greyed out).
So no, we're not trying to get rid of negativity. We're just trying to maintain a place where adults can hold civil conversation.
And given that the first two items you address are code of conduct & sexism, I can't help but think "Of course a white male programmer wouldn't see an issue with that". To be very clear, not because I think all white males are mean-spirited misogynists. Most of them are pretty nice people, in my experience.
But because being part of the majority blinds people to minority issues. And so, while I agree it's important to keep a positive outlook on life, I suggest that especially for issues that don't affect you directly, you take a deep look if this is really just "negativity", or if there's a real issue lurking beyond that.
And then let's fix them. In a positive way :)
I didn't mean in my article that we should all be blind to the bad things going on, I just feel like people quickly jump to negative conclusions and go into pitchfork mode all too quickly. Constantly focusing on the negatives can be a real emotional drain. It's a lot easier to focus on the positives and solving problems. For instance, it's quite great that PyCon this year had over 20% female attendees! That's a big accomplishment compared to previous years' stats. In addition, the code of conduct and public outreach made a lot of people feel welcome and safe attending the event, which is a big win for everyone!
When bad things happen, they must certainly be brought to light -- but discussion around these problems could be far more constructive if people were to focus their efforts and energy on resolving issues and working together rather than blaming one another and becoming defensive or close-minded.
The first step to solving problems is always to identify the problem, but the attitude you take to solving problems can make a huge difference both to yourself and to your peers.
Thank you for the comment, I'm really surprised to see so many interesting viewpoints about this topic.
Oh, I agree with you there.
> but the attitude you take to solving problems can make a huge difference both to yourself and to your peers.
That's an excellent insight, and one that's hard to keep in mind, at times. Especially if most attempts at fixing a problem are greeted by essentially a wave of bile and hate. It's easy to forget that most people are decent, when the Internet makes it easy to only see the loudest ones.
That's where I'd say I disagree with you - it's not easy to focus on the positive. It depends on the reaction of your peers. Yes, we must be the change we wish to see in the world - but emulating Ghandi all the time is something only very few succeed at.
Thank you for the reminder that it's worth trying, though.
I can't help but think "Of course
a white male programmer wouldn't see an issue with that"
But yes, yes I do. All the time. I try to catch myself doing it, and not let myself be influenced by it. Having biases/stereotyping is not the issue - we're predisposed to snap judgments. Recognizing it, and deciding how we act upon it is the issue.
As such, I'm still OK with my statement. (Except that I'd re-edit to "majority often blinds people). I call out a condition that actually exists, and ask to take it into consideration - I don't accuse, or segregate, or treat the other party as lesser.
And had I followed this up with "and so you can't possibly get it, and you're a $INSULT, and you're intentionally suppressing women", then yes, you should call me out on this and tell me that I'm wrong. (And that my manners need fixing)
Being part of a minority does not excuse bad behavior.
1. Drawing the category is in itself an act of segregation.
2. Claiming to know each person in a class of people better than they know themselves is inherently treating them as lesser. It is the definition of claiming superiority.
"Don't worry, silly white males, it's not your fault that you don't know The Truth, because you're silly white males! Here, let me tell you what's up!"
Before responding any further please re-read your message , then read it one more time.
When somebody says the equivalent of "X group of people have Y attribute", they are making a category distinction. This is what the person I originally responded to said. Yet the person explicitly stated that (s)he did not segregate. That is a contradiction.
I get what OP was probably trying to say, but (s)he emphatically did not say that. I see it all the time on HN and elsewhere: trying to fight one form of category-based discrimination (e.g. misogyny) with another form of category-based discrimination (e.g. misandry). As though this leads to some sort of mystic equilibrium where poof! all discrimination disappears. If human history can teach us anything it's that this equilibrium never happens. So maybe instead of allowing sloppy categorization and overlooking it in the name of staying positive, we should admit when we draw faulty distinctions and take pains to not make draw in the future.
So, look, here's the problem: that never happened. I shouldn't have to quote something that's just a few comments up, but here it is: "... I can't help but think "Of course a white male programmer wouldn't see an issue with that". To be very clear, not because I think all white males are mean-spirited misogynists. ... But because being part of the majority blinds people to minority issues."[0]
Mind you, that's not the post you responded to. The post you responded to was a bit of a backpedaling from that utterly inoffensive statement. From that you read, quoting again, "Don't worry, silly white males, it's not your fault that you don't know The Truth, because you're silly white males! Here, let me tell you what's up!"
That sentiment or anything like it exists nowhere in anything that was said. That goes quite a bit farther than simply not assuming good faith. I used the term "extraordinarily abrasive" quite deliberately, since where your parent reads as reasoned and contrite, you come off as slightly psychotic.
If that's the sentiment you intended strongly to convey, you have succeeded.
[0] Neither here nor there, but as a white male I find nothing the least bit challenging in that. It's completely true (if a bit oversimplified).
Yes it did. You quoted the very sentence. Twice. Now try parsing it.
>From that you read...
Because that is what it says. Here, let me break it down.
"Of course": of course
a white male programmer": a person who fits in the categories "white" and "programmer"
"wouldn't see an issue with that" can't see sexism or code of conduct violations.
The category: white male programmers. The attribute: blind to sexism and code of conduct violations. Necessarily.
>The post you responded to was a bit of a backpedaling from that utterly inoffensive statement.
That statement is orders of magnitude more offensive than making a joke about a dongle. Classifying an entire sex and race and telling them (or others) what they see is the road to atrocity. And it wasn't a backpedal, it was a rationalization/justification referring directly to the OP (>I don't accuse, or segregate, or treat the other party as lesser.).
>That sentiment or anything like it exists nowhere in anything that was said
That sentiment is the _basis_ for what was said. OP felt (s)he had superior knowledge and insight to white males and used this position to explain to them how they perceive the world.
I'm not even going to comment on your trivialization of mental health issues. Nice one!
>but as a white male I find nothing the least bit challenging in that
Okay then, enjoy your life. Stay positive!
I'm sorry that you feel I've trivialized mental health issues, but I will say that I've known psychotic people IRL, and again, I used the phrase "slightly psychotic" quite deliberately.
Anyway, get off your high horse. We all stereotype, it's natural, and it's often very useful for seeing patterns in populations and hypothesizing a cause or correlation. There are definite trends that aren't just people stereotyping: men don't generally wear dresses, women don't generally go around topless to the same extent men do. Those are complete stereotypes that're pretty essential for understanding society.
Reminds me a job ad I had seen recently. In first paragraph: "we support equal opportunities for minorities, if you are X,Y,Z or W please apply". Just under it was age limit 45 years. This was desk-based administrator position for major government agency.
> And then let's fix them.
Ok, so stop with your sexists & racist stereotypes.
The manager was very irritated and said something like "We don't tolerate that kind of negativity here". And continued, as if I had said something awful. He said something like "unless you have a solution to a problem" something something in the process of explaining why I shouldn't say that.
So five minutes after the meeting I found out how to disable the slow graphical editor and then the issue tracker became usable for normal people.
Well, I guess I am a negative person then. If it sucks, it sucks.
I will try to take some of this advice constructively though, because I do spend a lot of time focusing on problems that need to be solved. But I can't help but think that the reason a lot of people aren't so critical or 'negative' is that they have just given up on fixing things, or are just so generally ineffective at problem solving that they naturally accept everything as it is.
I would rather be a negative bastard who identifies and solves problems than a happy ineffectual drone who just goes along to get along and accepts the status quo no matter how broken.
I think we tend to be negative, especially wrt software, because we know how it could be. So we apply that filter without also applying the "what did it take to get where it is" filter.
The guy writing it probably knows it has problems. He's probably working really hard on it. Maybe he stayed late at work to try to improve it, instead of seeing his girlfriend. And you come along and just say "sucks". Even if he wasn't there, you're still having a go at him in front of other people.
Being polite, diplomatic, calm and considered is not being an "ineffectual drone". You're falling into that mindset that you have to be a cunt to get stuff done. You don't.
Whoever is recommending this system is likely nervous, and very invested in what people think of it, so you saying "it sucks" will feel like a personal attack. It's completely unnecessary.
When I read this, the first thing I thought of is, "Well that's your problem."
To me, based on my experiences and what I've read and observed from other people, many people find the most happiness from focusing less on oneself, and focusing more on others.
What can I do to enhance the life of someone else? What can I do to make a positive impact on others? What can I do to make a difference on the well being of society?
But instead, it seems like the thought of the quoted sentence is focusing more on benefiting oneself -- make me smarter, make me more successful, make me happier.
Don't get me wrong, I'm talking to myself as well, because I often find myself too focused on me. But I feel that when I instead start to focus on having a positive impact on someone else, that's when I start to experience genuine happiness. That's what I feel makes me a better person.
From my own experience, it is infinitely easier to make me better than to discover what I can do for society. I'd love to make products that help society, but damn it that's hard. Maybe if I just focus on myself I can make me happy.
So far it's worked. I'm still looking for something I can do to help society. Until then, I'm working on things that help me level up to a point where I can execute on grand ideas.
But I'm also talking about being a positive influence on others around you. To your friends, coworkers, family, significant other, etc. These are the people we can feasibly impact. Truly think about and focus on these relationships, and be a "better" person for the benefit of these people.
Money is easy-ish to get, but reach takes time to build.
MOst importantly though, I don't have any ideas I would consider good. Or possibly ideas I would consider myself able to carry out. Probably both.
Once engine is clean - the car can move. Forward (aiming to help others) or backwards (trying to please oneself which cause accumulation of inner garbage again).
But to me, personal "maintenance" has more to do with introspecting on things are stopping you from moving forward as a person.
Intelligence and success, I think these aren't part of that maintenance. For example, I can think of many people that aren't profoundly intelligent and/or successful, but have a great impact on others, even society, and thus are very happy, positive people.
My experience confirms this...
Reference: Wittgenstein, Tractatus 6.43, and below.
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/5740
and some quotes
That is hard to do if you actively dislike the company you work for.
That moment of selfishness, is what helped pull me out of whatever rut I was in. 8 years later, I have a black belt in one martial art, a blue in a second, and I'm offering nutritional tips to friends and family.
Happiness doesn't have to be volunteering at the soup kitchen every week, but the general "Don't be a dick to anyone" can really boost your mood. I'm not saying be a doormat, stand your ground, but don't be a dick about it either.
The main point of my post was a reaction to the point I quoted. Based on that quote, it sounded like the OP was focusing on parts of self that may not result in happiness or becoming a better, positive person -- success and intelligence.
I know many people that are successful and intelligent, but aren't happy or positive -- at all.
I don't doubt your story, but your timeline is off. Arena was introduced with BC, which was Jan 2007 -- 6 years ago, not 9. It would have been impossible to buy arena points 9 years ago because they didn't exist.
That aside, I don't see that as selfishness, just introspection. If selfishness is doing something for your own benefit, then you did an unselfish thing. You made the lives of everyone around you better, and contributed more to your family and society. That isn't selfish!
I've noticed many of the characteristics Randall described about his "old" self, and in the past few months I have made it a goal for myself to be less negative, and make a conscious effort to notice when I am being very negative.
But in all seriousness, I think you do have to take the negative with the positive, so long as both are constructive. It'd be stupid to take something sexist and cast it aside and make jokes about it as if it doesn't matter. Because it does matter. The technical community is negative because it has certain requirements that are not met. The government is doing bad things, as are private corporations. We cannot ignore these things because they are negative. But I agree that we should find positives. The trick is that, in good discussion, positive and negative are unimportant. What matters is constructiveness.
Saying 'This is great!' is just as useless as saying 'This sucks!'. Positive conversation is fine, but it is not necessary in intelligent discussion, because not every topic is inherently positive.
If you could only read one sentence in TFA, this should be it.
To it, I would also just add: "Instead, show others how you would have them behave by behaving that way yourself."
My preference is to be a positive person and focus on making my life (and hopefully other people's lives) happy and reading blog posts by similar minded people only reinforces that.
However, many things were created (or fixed) exactly because of frustration (sometimes it is the best motivation for solving real, burning problems, instead of artificial ones).
Likewise, perfectionism is almost always painful for both the person in charge (as things never get perfect) and co-workers, family, etc. But many times the effort is worth it, and afterwards it is better to look back at a masterpiece born in pain, than a slackly and broken thing created in a laid-back way.
Perhaps it is why many creators (both in tech and arts) were depressive, but still able to accomplish a lot (though, sure, it is not a requirement). And sure, it is a matter of balance - one one hand to be able to spot real problems, on the other - still be motivated enough to finish them (spotting but being not able to fix is the worst state of mind, arguably).
I've found that by setting a positive tone, especially in somewhat negative situations, speaks volumes. Cynicism is easy. Pushing those feelings aside and remaining stoic in tough times helps tremendously.
I just cant put blinders on and focus on myself. Wish I could.
In a more serious manner, drama is one thing that gains attention and strong, opinionated, emotionfull articles are getting attention. Add some mediocrity to the article by choosing a general, unspecialised subject on which everybody is able to express an opinion and that's it, you have a front page article.
I noticed one day in an old job that two distinct things happened when management presented an idea to the engineering teams. Nearly everyone (self included to a greater or lesser extent) would start racking their brains for reasons why this, whatever it is, is a terrible idea that must be argued against, or why it just straight out couldn't work.
All except one guy, a friend and one of the brightest sparks on the team, who would start thinking of how he could implement it and what new, interesting tech he could use to get there. Sometimes he would come to the conclusion it was a bad idea, or impossible, but he didn't look for that first. As a result he did more novel, interesting work than the rest of the team(s) who generally spent their time mumbling and complaining.
That's when I decided to try and be that way too.
http://edu.mkrecny.com/thoughts/be-nice-to-programmers
Both that article and this one resonated with me on a certain level. Software development can be such a hypercritical field, involving so much self-recrimination.
That, in turn, reminds me of Alan Cooper's characterization of Homo Logicus in The Inmates Are Running The Asylum. Programmers are forced to look at all possibilities, and are trained to point out even extremely unlikely cases. This emphasis on edge-cases is confusing and counter-intuitive to non-programmers, who tend to think in terms of probable cases.
Perhaps too much concentrated attention on possible cases is turning us all sour.
That's human. That's culture. The negativity will eventually fade once the general startup mood improves from massive infusions of cheap money again, at which point the same fad cycle will continue to occur, but with a much rosier tint.
Given the current climate I see on HN, this advice is spot on.
Upvotes for scandal outrages don't mean we've all become grumpy.
I've been involved with other sites where the political discussions overwhelmed the core topic, and the audience just collapsed in a tailspin of high emotions.
I hope Hacker News doesn't go that route.
I'm pretty new here, but I enjoy reading about the future of programming languages alongside posts about Marcus Aurelius' writings. It just seems that it's mostly content about being the best you that you can be and having a broad range of knowledge.
I like a good balance of topics, keeps things interesting (and more importantly, continues to get me interested in other subjects / topics).
I worded that carefully. I don't want to draw out sides on that thread topic, just whether it contributed to an educational atmosphere and meaningful discussion on HN.
To me all politics is off-topic - I'm interested in the technology discussions.
Especially you.
Way to get on HN, though. Everything else looks really educational in comparison, so I'm sure the rest of the authors appreciate it.