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Maybe I understood wrong then, and I'm not in the target market for this? I'm not really interested in having "serious" conversations except with people who pa

Maybe I understood wrong then, and I'm not in the target market for this? I'm not really interested in having "serious" conversations except with people who pay me to solve their problems. I was much more interested in the brainstorming or "fresh pair of eyes" aspect. (My day job is an iOS developer) I'm more than happy to give some advice on somebody's iOS app / idea / Apple / app review / APIs when there's a lull in the day. I do really enjoy helping people out. But the minute I need to start "reserving" time and "scheduling" for this, it starts sounding billable to me. That's the sort of thing I get paid to do. Put another way, think of the analogy to open source. I am more than happy to field a few e-mails a day doing support for my OSS projects. But I'm not going to reserve time in my day for it unless I've got a support contract in place.

rguzman 16y ago
Think of this is as "networking". You have to allocate time beforehand to do that: meetups, coffee, etc. This is no different. The only difference is that instead of expecting to make small-talk the expectation is technical talk. Further, I think it is good to be able to make yourself available quickly on a whim "mark me as available now" like you described. Now, your time may be more valuable than "technical networking" with this crowd. Sure. In that case, you're not in the target demographic, like you concluded.
- drewcrawford 16y ago
  It's my observation (there are exceptions, but in general) that the awesome people are busy doing awesome things, not idling somewhere. So I would optimize for the busy person, not the person who can set aside 8 regular hours every week. Set a low commitment barrier, and attract great minds. For me personally, there's a list of people 3 feet long on HN that I'd love to pick their brains about something. But I feel like a bother. (In a couple of instances, I've even been told I'm a bother. Sorry guys.) Don't optimize it for me. Optimize it for the people way busier than I am. If pg (or grellas, or patio11, or ...) start using the service, it will both be unimaginably useful and also gain traction.
  - sandipagr 16y ago
    I totally agree that fixed schedule limits the benefits of this activity. As you put it, the barrier should be as low as possible if we want greater participation. Having said that, I am happy that someone is trying to do somehthing good for the HN community. .
  - eru 16y ago
    Sounds like an interesting idea. Perhaps you should even focus explicitly on pleasing, say, patio11 (if he agrees to give you feedback). Stuff that's optimized for on specific person (or a very small group) often also gets better responses from the a much wider audience, then if you went for a `generic' person in the first place. (I can go and find the sources for this.)

rguzman 16y ago

Think of this is as "networking". You have to allocate time beforehand to do that: meetups, coffee, etc. This is no different. The only difference is that instead of expecting to make small-talk the expectation is technical talk. Further, I think it is good to be able to make yourself available quickly on a whim "mark me as available now" like you described. Now, your time may be more valuable than "technical networking" with this crowd. Sure. In that case, you're not in the target demographic, like you concluded.

drewcrawford 16y ago
It's my observation (there are exceptions, but in general) that the awesome people are busy doing awesome things, not idling somewhere. So I would optimize for the busy person, not the person who can set aside 8 regular hours every week. Set a low commitment barrier, and attract great minds. For me personally, there's a list of people 3 feet long on HN that I'd love to pick their brains about something. But I feel like a bother. (In a couple of instances, I've even been told I'm a bother. Sorry guys.) Don't optimize it for me. Optimize it for the people way busier than I am. If pg (or grellas, or patio11, or ...) start using the service, it will both be unimaginably useful and also gain traction.
- sandipagr 16y ago
  I totally agree that fixed schedule limits the benefits of this activity. As you put it, the barrier should be as low as possible if we want greater participation. Having said that, I am happy that someone is trying to do somehthing good for the HN community. .
- eru 16y ago
  Sounds like an interesting idea. Perhaps you should even focus explicitly on pleasing, say, patio11 (if he agrees to give you feedback). Stuff that's optimized for on specific person (or a very small group) often also gets better responses from the a much wider audience, then if you went for a `generic' person in the first place. (I can go and find the sources for this.)