anondon

The videos you linked were so hard to watch.

> India is a land of lawlessness and that's a reality.

It's a little more subtle : well connected people to whatever they want and get away with no consequences. People who dare to oppose these powerful people discover the true meaning of hell. It's true practically everywhere in the world including the US.

IMO for all the shit that social networks receive (for good reasons), one of the side effects is that it's a lot easier to share such gross violations of law an example of which are the above videos. In a way social networks give people power.

> in order to justify and perpetuate his own wealth.

Where does he try to do this?

> 1. Introversion

There is an implicit assumption in his definition of an introvert that is introvert == cut off from society. This is just plain wrong. An introvert is a a shy, reticent person and this does not imply that he is cut off from society or does not understand social interactions. I would argue that it's the exact opposite. Introverts understand social relationships and the "real world" very, very well. They just don't actively take part in social interactions much.

> The first is the idea that measurement of things like quality and success can be objective, perfect and fair. These are not objective facts, they are highly contextual and can be manipulated by power struggles, charisma, clever marketing, or outright fraud.

The article is concerned with startups with a very small team working on it. Measurement is easier than in large teams of people. I don't see OP disputing this directly. The question of power struggles, charisma etc does not arise in startups with a small team.

> A second critical assumption being posited in Graham’s essay is that one person’s direct contribution can be disentangled from that of others.

No, it's easier to have a better idea of what people in a small team contribute than in a large team.

> Although he never says this payoff is guaranteed, he doesn’t deny it either

First valid criticism.

> Here is the crux of Graham’s assumption that programmers are the real engine of the value chain. He ignores the fact that without the infrastructure and ancillary components of the business, it isn’t so easy to simply translate that new piece of software into pure profit.

That's exactly what small startups do, where the founders manage everything from code to sales to legal work (in the initial stages of a startup).

> Graham so desperately wants to justify his own wealth as the righteous product of his own personal labor without acknowledging the effects of either luck or power

Uncalled for personal attack, but yes, luck plays a major role.

> “Smallness = Measurement”. Here, he uses the analogy of the “ten best rowers” who, if you take them out of a large system and put them together with a shared goal, will necessarily be superior.

In comparison to large teams, measurement is easier in small teams. Team dynamics are still important, whether the team is small or large.

> It is amazing how well this piece serves as marketing fodder for Graham’s venture capital arm, Y Combinator.

Looking at it from a cynical perspective, yes. Nothing stops people from questioning or rejecting (or dismissing) his work publicly as lots of people on HN and twitter do.

> Libertarianism != Meritocracy

This section has some valid criticisms of libertarianism and PG's implicit bias towards it.

Facebook provides an option to download an archive of your data, you should have downloaded it before deleting your account. Apart from having all your data, it would have been the final nail in your Facebook coffin. To say the least, the data scared the f*ck out of me : they knew me better than any of my family or friends. The ad tracking data was...bang on target, they had facial recognition data, all the locations I signed in from. I sometimes joke that Fb knows more about people than the Government of the user. It's true!

Genuine question : do you think a privacy oriented social network where users pay a small annual fee (around $5) would work? Think Whatsapp (use phone number as an id, no native discovery, only connect through phone contacts, encrypted user data only to prevent database leaks from causing damage) + Facebook (feed like feature, share photos, videos, direct messaging, group messaging). No user tracking, no ads, just a no bullshit social network where the average Joe would feel right at home and also one which the HN crowd would use, assuming social networks have a place in their lives.

You are not missing out on much.

The only productive use of Facebook is to keep in touch with people. If you do this using alternative methods (Whatsapp, email or direct phone calls) then you save yourself from the continuous stream of garbage that is the news feed.

Regarding gitlab, they have decided against moving to bare metal for now. (Can't find the HN comment from the gitlab ceo to link here)

If a story was posted earlier and got significant attention (comments and upvotes) and the same story is posted again, it would be considered a duplicate or [dupe] the second time around. The timeframe to repost a story that got significant attention is one year i.e you can repost a story one year after it got significant attention and it won't be considered a dupe.

That story had no comments, so this would not be considered a duplicate.

> It's very disappointing to see the level of vitriol directed towards people who are just trying to build a better life in this country, especially here on HN.

This line along with the rest of the comment is completely written out of context. I have no idea how your reply is relevant.

I get the impression that this new bill is like putting lipstick on a pig which is the current system. I was hoping the amendments to the H1-B bill would be one of the silver linings of a Trump presidency, but I guess not anymore.

> Based on Telegram app, most secured and fastest messenger in the world.

Red flag right there.

Maybe stop spamming?

(Serious question) Where do you hang out to come across such sites? IRC channels, specific onion sites?

The way Signal handles key changes is a not very user friendly for non-tech users. When the user's key changes, Signal does not automatically resend dropped messages like Whatsapp does. Curious whether the Signal users in the Government are aware of this.