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Adtech pays better than every single thing you're talking about here, except for the instances where you talk about adtech players like Apple. Your whataboutis

Adtech pays better than every single thing you're talking about here, except for the instances where you talk about adtech players like Apple. Your whataboutism doesn't change the basic premise, which is that adtech comes with stronger incentives than other fields. Of the much-vaunted FAANG companies, only Netflix doesn't run its own adtech platform (they stuck with good old-fashioned product placement). What you've done is read too much into an aphorism that is phrased in reference to a well-known poem. It's implied to focus on the information technology sector because it was originally said by a Facebook engineer and quoted in an article about tech bubbles. It's a concise way of expressing disagreement with the priorities of our industry, and nothing more than that.

adventured 7y ago
> Adtech pays better than every single thing you're talking about here Which doesn't matter at all in regards to attracting the best minds. That's an entirely bogus premise. What you're stating is core to what leads people to incorrectly conclude the best minds must surely be working on ad clicks. It's the difference between attracting highly accomplished, top 5% minds (great income, went to a top school, great education results; surely must be among the best minds; but isn't), and attracting the actual best minds. Conceptually if you were right, someone like Feng Zhang would have been working for Google or Facebook on ad clicks, rather than at Broad on changing the world of biotech via CRISPR. JB Straubel would have been at Twitter trying to figure out how to improve their ad system. Craig Venter would have been starting an ad network instead of cracking the human genome at Celera. Rodney Brooks would be working on mobile ads instead of robotics. Gwynne Shotwell would be running some ad division within Snap or Google. And so on. The best minds are more often capable of both making enough money and pursuing what they want to do - pursing what they're most interested in. Many of them throughout history have chosen to nearly entirely neglect the money aspect in fact. Maximizing for money (and not life satisfaction) via eg working in adtech, is precisely what a best mind would not commonly do, and exactly what a highly accomplished top 5% type mind would do (something you see routinely, eg the mid or mid-upper management corporate types; highly accomplished, top schools, high incomes; also not the best minds). > Your whataboutism doesn't change the basic premise, which is that adtech comes with stronger incentives than other fields Please point out the whataboutism in what I said. I've pointed out an obvious flaw in the common claim about what the best minds are focused on. > What you've done is read too much into an aphorism that is phrased in reference to a well-known poem. I disagree. It's floated persistently and has been for many years as a serious generalized statement - a lament - about what the best minds are working on (ad clicks, not flying cars).
- stonogo 7y ago
  > Which doesn't matter at all in regards to attracting the best minds. The idea that genius is unaffected by money is wonderfully principled but completely indefensible, especially since all of your examples gained significant material wealth in the process of winning your approval. Again I'll note your apparent unwillingness to factor in the context of the quote, which specifically is from and about the information technology sector anyway. Finally your anecdotal approach to demonstrating via example suffers from a massive contamination by confirmation bias -- e.g. for all you know the finest minds ARE working on adtech, but nobody's made a Wikipedia page about the fineness of their minds. In other words, your argument restricts itself to the set of people who employ public relations staff. > Please point out the whataboutism in what I said. Your entire post was whataboutism. I don't know how to teach you to see that. I apologize. > It's floated persistently and has been for many years as a serious generalized statement - a lament - about what the best minds are working on (ad clicks, not flying cars). It is a lament, and taken in its original context if you please, you might even notice it's true. A "ha ha only serious" joke in computer science research goes something like "if you want to get funding, look at what the field was researching twenty years ago, and put that in a grant proposal." Progress in the fundamentals of computer science has slowed to a crawl, and the incentives appear to be set to ensure the status remains firmly quo for some time to come.

adventured 7y ago

> Adtech pays better than every single thing you're talking about here Which doesn't matter at all in regards to attracting the best minds. That's an entirely bogus premise. What you're stating is core to what leads people to incorrectly conclude the best minds must surely be working on ad clicks. It's the difference between attracting highly accomplished, top 5% minds (great income, went to a top school, great education results; surely must be among the best minds; but isn't), and attracting the actual best minds. Conceptually if you were right, someone like Feng Zhang would have been working for Google or Facebook on ad clicks, rather than at Broad on changing the world of biotech via CRISPR. JB Straubel would have been at Twitter trying to figure out how to improve their ad system. Craig Venter would have been starting an ad network instead of cracking the human genome at Celera. Rodney Brooks would be working on mobile ads instead of robotics. Gwynne Shotwell would be running some ad division within Snap or Google. And so on. The best minds are more often capable of both making enough money and pursuing what they want to do - pursing what they're most interested in. Many of them throughout history have chosen to nearly entirely neglect the money aspect in fact. Maximizing for money (and not life satisfaction) via eg working in adtech, is precisely what a best mind would not commonly do, and exactly what a highly accomplished top 5% type mind would do (something you see routinely, eg the mid or mid-upper management corporate types; highly accomplished, top schools, high incomes; also not the best minds). > Your whataboutism doesn't change the basic premise, which is that adtech comes with stronger incentives than other fields Please point out the whataboutism in what I said. I've pointed out an obvious flaw in the common claim about what the best minds are focused on. > What you've done is read too much into an aphorism that is phrased in reference to a well-known poem. I disagree. It's floated persistently and has been for many years as a serious generalized statement - a lament - about what the best minds are working on (ad clicks, not flying cars).

stonogo 7y ago
> Which doesn't matter at all in regards to attracting the best minds. The idea that genius is unaffected by money is wonderfully principled but completely indefensible, especially since all of your examples gained significant material wealth in the process of winning your approval. Again I'll note your apparent unwillingness to factor in the context of the quote, which specifically is from and about the information technology sector anyway. Finally your anecdotal approach to demonstrating via example suffers from a massive contamination by confirmation bias -- e.g. for all you know the finest minds ARE working on adtech, but nobody's made a Wikipedia page about the fineness of their minds. In other words, your argument restricts itself to the set of people who employ public relations staff. > Please point out the whataboutism in what I said. Your entire post was whataboutism. I don't know how to teach you to see that. I apologize. > It's floated persistently and has been for many years as a serious generalized statement - a lament - about what the best minds are working on (ad clicks, not flying cars). It is a lament, and taken in its original context if you please, you might even notice it's true. A "ha ha only serious" joke in computer science research goes something like "if you want to get funding, look at what the field was researching twenty years ago, and put that in a grant proposal." Progress in the fundamentals of computer science has slowed to a crawl, and the incentives appear to be set to ensure the status remains firmly quo for some time to come.