8 ms·
What is PG? What is Jessica? If one isn't already immersed in the VC mindset that dominates (and is apparently a significant dynamic of) YC, how is one suppose
by branon 6y ago
What is PG? What is Jessica?
If one isn't already immersed in the VC mindset that dominates (and is apparently a significant dynamic of) YC, how is one supposed to parse these articles?
- notadog 6y agoPG = Paul Graham Jessica = Jessica Livingston
- qorrect 6y agoHow anyone thinks its acceptable to reference initials/acronyms before first defining them is beyond me.
- cblconfederate 6y agothis website belongs to YC. its kind of faux pas to not know them
- mturmon 6y agoI disagree. This is actually kind of a sweet gesture and convention. Like recognizing a friend’s Unix login at 3am when you type “who” from the command prompt. There are a few people who get known that way in some contexts: rms, jwz, esr. They’re controversial, but that has become their shorthand within some context.
- kthxbye123 6y agoIt’s just social play and backslapping among the oligarchs, don’t pay any attention to it.
- zepto 6y agoWhat is YC?
- floatingatoll 6y agoYCombinator, as in this site's domain name.
- k3liutZu 6y agoWhat 'is'?
- Macha 6y agoCheck the URL of this website. Y Combinator is a VC firm that specializes in investing in early stage/new tech companies and one of the first to do it on such a public scale. Their most significant successful investment is likely Stripe. Dropbox and Airbnb are other companies which had a lot of initial funding from YC
- croes 6y agoWhat if you reached the linked page via another source? It is bad style and disrespect to the reader to use abbreviations without explaining at least once their meaning.
- Macha 6y agoThere comes a point where you need to decide are you writing a targeted article or a beginner's introduction. If you can't assume any knowledge and you make articles for a more advanced audience so bloating and winding that whatever point you were making gets lost. Not every article has to target the "everyone" audience. What if we applied the standard to programming article? What if an article on rendering issues in mass effect and a patch in directx for the same had to include explanations for variables and for loops? It clearly weakens the article as there is value in getting to the point.
- croes 6y agoThe problem is that the article doesn't put things into context but only uses abbreviations. I had rather the suspicion that it is again a nonsense text from GPT-3. When writing a programming article, it should at least be clearly mentioned somewhere, e.g. in the title. Or do you often see articles where you can only see some code without explaining which software it is about
- blocked_again 6y agoWell the likelyhood of someone who come across Sam Altman's blog and don't know who is PG and Jessica is very low. You can't write a blog post for everyone in the world. Then you would have to explain what is YC, what is a founder, what is a VC etc. Would be pretty boring blog post to be honest. Oh wait, and let me introduce you to Google. https://www.google.com/search?q=pg+and+jessica&oq=pg+and+jessica https://www.google.com/search?q=pg+and+jessica&oq=pg+and+jes...
- Macha 6y agoAlso the blog post is explicitly targeted at people wanting to replicate YC's model. I think it's fair to expect that audience to know what YC is, who PG and Jessica are
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- gus_massa 6y agoPG is the founder of HN and was the mod for the first ¿10? years, until he "retired" and gave the position to dang. He is in the 3rd position in the karma list. He is not very active here in the last few years. (But I guess he is still lurking. Hi!) https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=pg https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=pg The original community here was the readers of the pg articles, so the oldtimers know who pg is. Jessica is the wife of pg, she comes here from time to time, but no too much. https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jl https://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=jl Both of them are part of the four founders of YC. She was the less technical of the cofounders but from a pg article: http://www.paulgraham.com/jessica.html http://www.paulgraham.com/jessica.html > [...] One of the things she's best at is judging people. She's one of those rare individuals with x-ray vision for character. She can see through any kind of faker almost immediately. Her nickname within YC was the Social Radar, and this special power of hers was critical in making YC what it is. [...] > During interviews, Robert and Trevor and I would pepper the applicants with technical questions. Jessica would mostly watch. A lot of the applicants probably read her as some kind of secretary, especially early on, because she was the one who'd go out and get each new group and she didn't ask many questions. She was ok with that. It was easier for her to watch people if they didn't notice her. But after the interview, the three of us would turn to Jessica and ask "What does the Social Radar say?"
- cblconfederate 6y agothere is an idea of a PG, some kind of abstraction, but there is no real PG, only an entity, something illusory. And though he can hide his cold gaze and you can shake his hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense your lifestyles are probably comparable: He simply is not there
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- renewiltord 6y agoWell, if this isn't a harbinger for where this community currently falls on the geek-mop spectrum...
- lc9er 6y agoA cult of personality. https://mobile.twitter.com/MJB_SF/status/1298113027737231360 https://mobile.twitter.com/MJB_SF/status/1298113027737231360
- erik_landerholm 6y agoSeriously, you can't google? And what does Paul or Jessica have to do with the 'VC mindset'?