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My first non tech related startup. After a year of work we just launched last week.

It’s been surprising how much overlap there is between software product development and ‘real’ building. Also how different they are.

Anyway, I’ve never launched anything without announcing it here first. Would love to hear your impressions.

Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

You are very welcome. Thank you for the kind words.

Thanks for the kind words.

Hey, what you're saying about me is not true. Please don't do that. Seriously, it hurts.

Here's the thread that started it all: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3267133

It's interesting that they offer people to take 0.1% more equity for a 5k reduction in salary.

https://github.com/clef/handbook/blob/master/Employment%20Po...

With a 6 year vesting schedule a new employee is 'buying' 0.1% worth of shares for 30k in salary. A 30MM valuation, or 5X the 6MM cap on the convertible note.

I don't know how Github runs, but it sounds nothing like Holacracy. The author is confused (as are many people on this thread).

Six months ago, I switched my company (over 50 full time employees in 3 cities) to Holacracy.

I'm here to tell you that I'm 100% convinced that it's a huge step forward in terms of any organizational system I've come across.

There's nothing 'flat' or 'manager-less' about it. It's a complex and intricate system that leads to greater clarity, less politics, and better distributed decision making.

Accountabilities are clearer, meetings are more efficient, and more voices are heard. Holacracy explicitly avoids design/decide by committee.

If you're running a company with more than 10 employees, I highly recommend you take a serious look at Holacracy. It's the best decision I've made by far, and I'm never going to work for, or start another company without running it this way.

If you're earnestly curious, drop me a note and I'll be happy to talk about it more with you.

Yes.

I have been very surprised at the discrepancy between the level of dialogue.

When the discussion on HN is around almost anything, I find myself often learning, and surrounded by comments that are smarter, and more informed than any I would find in the real world.

When it comes to gender issues though, I think we as a community in general tend to be pretty behind.

I truly love HN. More than any other place on the interweb, this one has impacted my life in very real ways. I do however, cringe when the topic veers towards sexism. I think we can do better.

Someone who is feeling generous should write a bot that warns these people once their card numbers become public.

I'm impressed by this statement.

Regardless of what you think of Adria's actions, it's not hard to imagine that the last two weeks must have been hellish for her.

I think it's brave and noble for her to make (what seems to me) to be an attempt at civil dialogue.

In effect she's saying: I want to keep talking about this, and including everyone in the conversation. After all she's been through. That's an impressive thing to say. Regardless of how many lawyers it got filtered through.

These women just spent 3 months of technical training, and the comment started by remarking on their attractiveness and goes on to call them girls.

Not sure if they attached it 'easily', but that comment was squarely sexist in my book. Even if it was well intentioned.

What do you mean? Writing style? It's my run on sentences isn't it.

If you are a man reading this, I invite you to:

a. Resist the urge to pick apart the OP's life and criticize how/what she said.

b. Honestly reflect, without shame or blame, about what you know of sexism. What do you understand of it? What do you understand it's roots are, and how it works? What do you think your responsibility is, as a man, and as a member of this community?

I invite you to do this, because it's a charged topic, but an important one. See if you can look past the hurt feelings and accusations, and sincerely reflect on what you can do to understand how sexism works a little better, and address it.

EDIT: I am by no means an expert on the topic, but I've spent the past few years earnestly looking at how oppression works and keeping an open mind. I was truly astounded by the magnitude and difficulty of the problem.

For the record. Devbootcamp would not have been possible without HN.

Just over a year ago I posted this: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3267133

And this community's response is what convinced me to ditch my startup and start devbootcamp.

I only know very few of you people in person, but I'm sincerely grateful for the impact you've had on my life. Thank you!

Almost every higher ed institution has scholarships for under-represented populations.

If you can think of better ways to encourage more balance in our industry I am sincerely open to suggestions.

Why, oh why, do you have to pit Dev Bootcamp against a CS degree? Nobody is saying that algorithms and compilers should be dismissed, or that CS degrees should be abolished. That's certainly not our position.

Education is a nuanced and rich topic, and shouldn't be reduced to "CS GOOD. DEV BOOTCAMP BAD" or the other way around.

We're in a market right now where companies are willing to take on total beginners who show potential, and pay them to continue learning our craft. What the hell is wrong with that? And are you suggesting that we stop teaching new developers in order to protect people's salaries?

As far as I can tell, there will be high demand for good engineers for the foreseeable future.

And please don't reduce our work to "can build a Web app from following tutorials on RoR". You clearly haven't met any of our graduates. It pisses me off that you dismiss everyone's hard work without knowing anything about us.

<general plea>

Will everybody please get off their fucking high horse (Yes. I realize I'm on one too). Our industry is young, and we're all just figuring this out together. Nobody has all the answers and few things are black and white. Especially when it comes to the mess that is education and vocational training in this country.

</general plea>

Just came across this article on three vanguard index funds to own for a 'diversified' portfolio

http://www.forbes.com/sites/thebogleheadsview/2011/01/28/thr...

> Other professions require social skills in addition to the skills dedicated to the profession. IT does not.

I would argue that more software projects fail because of lack of social skills than lack of hard skills. IT absolutely requires social skills.

The recent rash of articles on HN re: sexism leaves me feeling hopeful that our industry is inching closer to being a place were women feel welcome.

I would love to see men handing out these cards too.

Agreed it's a douche with a hard-on. Doesn't mean it's not sexist. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_objectification

Absolutely!

We just graduated our first cohort, and after 8 weeks, they've learned enough to get entry-level ruby jobs techcrunch.com/2012/05/10/dev-boot-camp-is-a-ruby-success/

There are also less intense courses out there like bloc.io

I appreciate the question. I like your naming better. Will change it.

My biggest constraint was talented, and heart-ful teachers.

And, like Andrew said, I put a lot of weight into students' attitude.

Scaling is over rated.

Thanks Jared.

While we're at it, if anybody can't come to SF for dev bootcamp, and/or can't afford it, I highly recommend Jared's http://www.bloc.io/

There are couple of inaccuracies in this article:

First, I only had 200 applicants, and they were all a result of this post about 6 months ago: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3267133

Second, the article seems to give me and dev bootcamp all the credit. In truth, the spring cohort was a collection of some INCREDIBLY motivated people. I had all these ideas about how I was going to keep people motivated, and by day 3 it was clear that I wouldn't need any of them. Instead, I started worrying about how I can get them to go home and get some sleep every now and then.

I am committed to making any and all of our numbers public. Ask me anything and you'll get the straight facts (as long as it doesn't violate any of my students' privacy).

I just taught 20 people ror. It took 8 weeks. They worked their butts off, and now two thirds of them have entry level dev jobs.

The talent gap is big enough now that it doesn't take much for someone who is talented and motivated to get to a point where they are getting paid to continue to learn.

He suggests "managing humans" as a good book for managers to read. Just started reading it, and it seems decent. Anybody have other good resources?