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How is it at all pretentious. It’s a statement of fact. Most people are not interested in innovating. Most entrepreneurs in the US are merely operating a small

How is it at all pretentious. It’s a statement of fact. Most people are not interested in innovating. Most entrepreneurs in the US are merely operating a small business in a well-defined market (restaurants, construction , car repair etc). There is a very small group of people that are thinking about these ideas at a higher level with enough conviction that they will act on it.

sanderjd 7y ago
It is pretentious because being an entrepreneur who is interested in innovation is not the only way to be interested in ideas and making new things. It is placing this one kind of human endeavor on a pedestal above the myriad others. Which is pretentious!
- hombre_fatal 7y ago
  Meh, people who create things are always going to be a subset of the population because it just takes more effort than the ring below it. And in my experience, it's definitely a thin stream. For all sorts of reasons, no doubt, but that's what it is. I didn't even meet another developer in the wild who actually liked building things on his own until I was in my late 20s and we became co-founders. And I went to a large public university with a good comp sci department. Not everyone is going to be a creator. Not sure what is so controversial about this. Getting hostile over the word "thin" seems a bit silly since it's also completely unquantified. And I wonder what your life circumstance is if you're encountering more of a "thick" stream. Are you a hackathon event planner or something?
  - sanderjd 7y ago
    Is it hostile to call an attitude pretentious? I don't think it is... Some attitudes are pretentious. What is pretentious about the quote that started this thread is the apparent belief that the kinds of people that do the things we talk about and admire on this site - building new kinds of software, starting growth-focused companies - are the only people "that are interested in ideas and making new stuff". I agree that there is a fairly thin stream of the building-software / starting-companies hackers that you're thinking of, but I see huge numbers of people from all walks of life being interested in ideas and creating things. Artists, writers, journalists, directors, bureaucrats, other types of business people, on and on and on. I think it is pretentious to look down our noses at pursuits that are not our own, that's all. Your comment about hackathon event planning is illustrative: hackathons are honestly not at all where I would go to find the highest concentration of people creating interesting new things.
- vixen99 7y ago
  Angels on a pinhead, anyone?
kbutler 7y ago
It is pretentious because it asserts that PG's chosen method of creatig (startups) is not only better than any other equally creative, beneficial endeavors, like science, math, medicine, engineering, art, philosophy, teaching, ..., but is in fact the only path of innovation and making new things.

sanderjd 7y ago

It is pretentious because being an entrepreneur who is interested in innovation is not the only way to be interested in ideas and making new things. It is placing this one kind of human endeavor on a pedestal above the myriad others. Which is pretentious!

hombre_fatal 7y ago
Meh, people who create things are always going to be a subset of the population because it just takes more effort than the ring below it. And in my experience, it's definitely a thin stream. For all sorts of reasons, no doubt, but that's what it is. I didn't even meet another developer in the wild who actually liked building things on his own until I was in my late 20s and we became co-founders. And I went to a large public university with a good comp sci department. Not everyone is going to be a creator. Not sure what is so controversial about this. Getting hostile over the word "thin" seems a bit silly since it's also completely unquantified. And I wonder what your life circumstance is if you're encountering more of a "thick" stream. Are you a hackathon event planner or something?
- sanderjd 7y ago
  Is it hostile to call an attitude pretentious? I don't think it is... Some attitudes are pretentious. What is pretentious about the quote that started this thread is the apparent belief that the kinds of people that do the things we talk about and admire on this site - building new kinds of software, starting growth-focused companies - are the only people "that are interested in ideas and making new stuff". I agree that there is a fairly thin stream of the building-software / starting-companies hackers that you're thinking of, but I see huge numbers of people from all walks of life being interested in ideas and creating things. Artists, writers, journalists, directors, bureaucrats, other types of business people, on and on and on. I think it is pretentious to look down our noses at pursuits that are not our own, that's all. Your comment about hackathon event planning is illustrative: hackathons are honestly not at all where I would go to find the highest concentration of people creating interesting new things.
vixen99 7y ago
Angels on a pinhead, anyone?

kbutler 7y ago

It is pretentious because it asserts that PG's chosen method of creatig (startups) is not only better than any other equally creative, beneficial endeavors, like science, math, medicine, engineering, art, philosophy, teaching, ..., but is in fact the only path of innovation and making new things.