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I admire anyone who has the patience to answer questions on places like Stack Overflow or mailing lists. I don't have that particular helping gene. I'll help yo
by sverige 10y ago
I admire anyone who has the patience to answer questions on places like Stack Overflow or mailing lists. I don't have that particular helping gene. I'll help you move, though.
- TeMPOraL 10y agoI had when I was a teenager; I'd spend endless hours explaining C++ to people on Internet forums. It was a kind of pastime for me. Somehow, I've lost most of that "helping gene" over the years. I'll still happily explain things to people, but I don't look for occasions to explain stuff on purpose anymore.
- MaulingMonkey 10y agoFor me it has a few factors: I learn, memorize, and internalize through argument and learning to explain things to others. Eventually my skill ceiling rises in a topic where this no longer applies much. But, if I can spend 5 seconds to save someone 5 hours, I'm likely to help unless I thoroughly dislike the person - it's just too high of a positive impact. With my peers, I'll accept much worse ratios (e.g. spend 1 hour to save you 2) under the vague unstated assumption that you'd do the same for me, or it'll help accomplish our common goal faster. And in the special case of helping people with research and problem solving skills, it'll sometimes make people less annoying :)