6 ms·

Huh, Gabe is on that show. How good is that tv show anyways? I've been meaning to binge watch it but it seems like its raison d'être is to take cheap shots at S

Huh, Gabe is on that show. How good is that tv show anyways? I've been meaning to binge watch it but it seems like its raison d'être is to take cheap shots at SV.

ojbyrne 11y ago
SV deserves some satire, and a lot of the shots aren't really that cheap, they're dead on.
throwawayank333 11y ago
It's very, very good. Mike Judge isn't the biggest fan of Silicon Valley, but he knows it well. (See Office Space for another example of that). It might seem like cheap shots if you have only seen short clips of it though.
- mjevans 11y ago
  Office Space should be /required viewing/ in high school. That movie taught me more about what to expect in the typical American office than any other experience in my life.
  - slavik81 11y ago
    There's a brief clip of pornography near the beginning. We watched it on the bus ride for a high school trip. The teachers quickly turned it off upon noticing.
Shengbo 11y ago
I haven't heard any complaints, the humour is on point, the characters are great and it's even more amusing if you have some insight into how ridiculous certain things in real life SV are. This bit is definitely my favorite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJIAOosI6js https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJIAOosI6js
michaelbuckbee 11y ago
My non SV friends think that it's outlandish and unrealistic, my SF friends think it's close to a documentary.
hibikir 11y ago
The show is everything Big Bang Theory isn't. BBT makes fun of stereotypes, in the way only outsiders can make fun of stereotypes: The jokes don't make sense, the writing seems to have no real compassion for the group that they are lampooning at all, and I've never actually seen people behave like the characters do. Instead, SV makes sense for people in startups: It doesn't really spend most of its time making fun of how maladjusted startup workers are, like BBT does, but instead makes fun of the theater we all are surrounded by. By just turning the tech into star trek style technobabble, the show can focus on things that are relatable and real. Take, for instance, a conversation they have, in an early episode of this year, about the problems of high valuations and down rounds. There were articles written about it that hit the very top of HN, because the conversation was so very real. The craziness you see in the GPs video? It seems deranged, but it's said by a character more than loosely based on Mark Cuban, and it's reflecting the values of the time when Cuban made his money! And his story covers a huge issue in entrepreneurship: Does the fact that you managed to get an amazing exit in one company really mean you will be any good later as a venture capitalist? Were you lucky or good? If you take away all the laughs, the series tackles realistic problems all the time. So the series is not about easy laughs at the expense of people: It's a story about a culture, that happens to have laughs to make sure people that aren't interested in the culture are still entertained by it. Just like The Wire, it's not a documentary, but it sure seems to rhyme with reality.

Huh, Gabe is on that show. How good is that tv show anyways? I've been meaning to binge watch it but it seems like its raison d'être is to take cheap shots at SV.

ojbyrne 11y ago

SV deserves some satire, and a lot of the shots aren't really that cheap, they're dead on.

throwawayank333 11y ago

It's very, very good. Mike Judge isn't the biggest fan of Silicon Valley, but he knows it well. (See Office Space for another example of that). It might seem like cheap shots if you have only seen short clips of it though.

mjevans 11y ago
Office Space should be /required viewing/ in high school. That movie taught me more about what to expect in the typical American office than any other experience in my life.
- slavik81 11y ago
  There's a brief clip of pornography near the beginning. We watched it on the bus ride for a high school trip. The teachers quickly turned it off upon noticing.

Shengbo 11y ago

I haven't heard any complaints, the humour is on point, the characters are great and it's even more amusing if you have some insight into how ridiculous certain things in real life SV are. This bit is definitely my favorite: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJIAOosI6js https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJIAOosI6js

michaelbuckbee 11y ago

My non SV friends think that it's outlandish and unrealistic, my SF friends think it's close to a documentary.

hibikir 11y ago

The show is everything Big Bang Theory isn't. BBT makes fun of stereotypes, in the way only outsiders can make fun of stereotypes: The jokes don't make sense, the writing seems to have no real compassion for the group that they are lampooning at all, and I've never actually seen people behave like the characters do. Instead, SV makes sense for people in startups: It doesn't really spend most of its time making fun of how maladjusted startup workers are, like BBT does, but instead makes fun of the theater we all are surrounded by. By just turning the tech into star trek style technobabble, the show can focus on things that are relatable and real. Take, for instance, a conversation they have, in an early episode of this year, about the problems of high valuations and down rounds. There were articles written about it that hit the very top of HN, because the conversation was so very real. The craziness you see in the GPs video? It seems deranged, but it's said by a character more than loosely based on Mark Cuban, and it's reflecting the values of the time when Cuban made his money! And his story covers a huge issue in entrepreneurship: Does the fact that you managed to get an amazing exit in one company really mean you will be any good later as a venture capitalist? Were you lucky or good? If you take away all the laughs, the series tackles realistic problems all the time. So the series is not about easy laughs at the expense of people: It's a story about a culture, that happens to have laughs to make sure people that aren't interested in the culture are still entertained by it. Just like The Wire, it's not a documentary, but it sure seems to rhyme with reality.