Hacker News: khazhou

New comment by khazhou in "Dented Reality: Magic Leap Sees Slow Sales, Steep Losses"

khazhou — Sat, 07 Dec 2019 00:41:51 +0000

Well, I don't have all the data points, but it seems to me that snakeoiler should stand out as an anti-pattern. Maybe VCs see it differently. Maybe they'd inform me that the snakeoil CEOs are sometimes frauds, but the non-snakeoil CEOs always fail (not enough energy, not charismatic enough to attract talent, etc).

("Huckster"... that's the word I was looking for)

New comment by khazhou in "Dented Reality: Magic Leap Sees Slow Sales, Steep Losses"

khazhou — Fri, 06 Dec 2019 23:40:38 +0000

There's a lot of discussion here of how this was predictable given the absence of a visible prototype for so long, and the over-the-top secrecy of the project. However, for me this was a predetermined failure when I first read an interview with the founder. Classic Super-Visionary snake-oil salesman. He could say nothing about the product, except for how it would change the world more than the world had ever been changed in the history of world changes. Sure, ok. I don't remember Larry and Sergey being like that (because they had a real product). Or Bezos, etc.

Frankly, I'm shocked at how the investors couldn't see past this CEO.

New comment by khazhou in "Sacha Baron Cohen Uses ADL Speech to Tear Apart Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook"

khazhou — Fri, 22 Nov 2019 22:03:13 +0000

Ironically, I knew you knew. Does that make me a super-pedant?

New comment by khazhou in "Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis"

khazhou — Fri, 22 Nov 2019 22:02:25 +0000

Did anyone else smell poop while reading this?

(there's gotta be a word for that effect)

New comment by khazhou in "Sacha Baron Cohen Uses ADL Speech to Tear Apart Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook"

khazhou — Fri, 22 Nov 2019 17:00:13 +0000

Pretty sure he knows that.

New comment by khazhou in "Satya Nadella Added $850B to Microsoft"

khazhou — Thu, 21 Nov 2019 16:11:30 +0000

No one is saying a company should operate without a leader. And also, no one is claiming that just anyone can be a good CEO. Some competence in the unique CEO skillset is required. Every CEO is expected to keep their organization from devolving into tribal chaos, for example.

New comment by khazhou in "Heavy-lift ship lifts entire cruise liner out of the water [video]"

khazhou — Tue, 12 Nov 2019 21:51:51 +0000

I don't remember reading anything to that effect.

New comment by khazhou in "Makers, Don't Let Yourself Be Forced into the 'Manager Schedule'"

khazhou — Tue, 12 Nov 2019 01:46:49 +0000

I could easily be wrong but I didn't think he meant the engineer literally worked 48 hours without sleep or rest, then literally slept for 48 hours. I took it as: the engineer regularly shut out everyone for ~2 days straight and did long, extremely focus coding sessions, then shut out all work for a couple of days to decompress. Taken that way, it's not bi-polar or mental-health issue at all. Seems like this engineer just had the guts to stand up to everyone's ordained-from-the-heavens schedule of interruptions: "I'm gonna ignore distractions for two days to work, then ignore distractions for two days to rest."

New comment by khazhou in "Bob Iger Takes the Gloves Off for Disney’s Streaming Debut"

khazhou — Thu, 07 Nov 2019 22:52:29 +0000

All CEO bios like to begin by noting how early they wake up, and how the work out every morning at 6am at the very latest. I used to think this was a form of self-aggrandizement. "I'm a powerful CEO because I have superhuman discipline and stamina that you can't even imagine!"

Now I just wonder: am I lazy?

New comment by khazhou in "Leaving Apple"

khazhou — Fri, 01 Nov 2019 18:32:38 +0000

I can't tell if you mean "part of the furniture" is good or bad.

I've been at several places, usually in the 3-5 year range. But at this exact moment, I'm a bit envious of people who have been at the same company for 8-10 years, and get to enjoy mastery over the system, organization, etc.

Trying new things is fun, but it can be a drag always playing catchup.

New comment by khazhou in "Ask HN: What are some resources to improve speaking skills?"

khazhou — Fri, 01 Nov 2019 17:16:57 +0000

I suspect your starting point was different than OP's. He is describing (I think) a crippling nervousness. This is very different from just tensing or run-of-the-mill nervousness.

All your advice is great, but (from personal experience) it's not enough to overcome phobia-level tension.

I think many people don't understand what phobia-level tension even looks/feels like. My own worst moment: presenting an architectural diagram to a VP, I started panicking, and repeated the phrase "...and we're going to build an abstraction layer..." three or four times in a row, in a slow monotone voice, until someone in the room snapped me out of it. Embarrassing is an understatement.

New comment by khazhou in "Is Death Reversible?"

khazhou — Fri, 01 Nov 2019 06:49:18 +0000

I always say: Analogies are like raccoons.

New comment by khazhou in "Ask HN: What are some resources to improve speaking skills?"

khazhou — Thu, 31 Oct 2019 20:59:53 +0000

I would suggest, if this is at phobia-level for you, it's worth thinking about why you're getting so nervous.

I went from enjoying public speaking to absolutely dreading it (feeling like I'm falling off a cliff, trembling voice, sudden drops in blood pressure leading to complete loss of train-of-thought). This was literally career-limiting, and I could see how I was being excluded from projects that would require presenting to VPs + execs.

I spent a lot of time reflecting on it, and realized what had happened was that I had taken over management of a failing project, and I wasn't turning it around. Our VP was extremely harsh, and drew out everyone's professional failures/limitations. But I realized that my sudden and complete inability to present, was linked to me "knowing" that my work sucked, or knowing that no matter what I said, it was gonna end badly with me looking like an idiot.

So I would suggest you might think about whether the public-speaking nervousness also happens when you're asked to present something you're happy, proud, and knowledgable about, or whether it's connected to insecurity in your work, project, or your own mastery of the material you're presenting.

New comment by khazhou in "The next big thing will start out looking like a toy (2010)"

khazhou — Mon, 21 Oct 2019 23:50:26 +0000

When the first web browser came out, for me (and, I've heard, very many others) it was a "where were you the day of..?" moment. I literally remember the afternoon X-Mosaic came out. Computer lab, 1993, a group of grad students huddled around a SPARCStation, I walked over and tried out this new program. No, I didn't see the huge eventual potential that day (the World Wide Web would remain an ad-free space for a few more years), but it was a definitely a "today everything changed" moment.

New comment by khazhou in "Uber lays off around 350 more across Eats, self-driving and other departments"

khazhou — Mon, 14 Oct 2019 23:45:53 +0000

It is better when you can decide, yourself, to exit to another company, rather than being pushed out and then having to find a new job. Certainly, a competent engineer SV will land on their feet, but you lose significant negotiating power when you're not actively employed.

New comment by khazhou in "Rapatronic Camera"

khazhou — Mon, 14 Oct 2019 23:18:48 +0000

Is this still state of the art for ultra-fast exposures, or is there newer better technology?

New comment by khazhou in "Dear Stack Exchange, Inc."

khazhou — Fri, 11 Oct 2019 21:26:05 +0000

Gender non-conforming is a much wider net. This study you link of 9th and 11th graders, it is not surprising that a large percent (2.7% as you said) reported as trans or GNC.

The original comment above stated "trans", though, not T+GNC.

New comment by khazhou in "New York's Strand bookstore fights back over landmark status"

khazhou — Fri, 11 Oct 2019 21:16:45 +0000

That was me. I am you. I'm welcome.

New comment by khazhou in "Show HN: You will die in X weeks"

khazhou — Fri, 11 Oct 2019 19:53:39 +0000

Yeah, that part kinda frustrated me. The boxes highlight, e.g., that Simone Biles and Michael Phelps has world records in their teens... so what exactly is the takeaway? I'm happy for them, I'm not sad about myself for it -- it's just random trivia.

Unclear message.

New comment by khazhou in "Show HN: You will die in X weeks"

khazhou — Fri, 11 Oct 2019 19:50:51 +0000

A random article from 5 years ago doesn't own this concept.