6 ms·

Lots of overnight tragedies, no overnight miracles

90 points by magnifique 6y ago

foobaw 6y ago
Thought this had to do with their recent controversy..
- stanrivers 6y ago
  For the ignorant, what was that?
  - carlineng 6y ago
    The CEO of CircleUp stepped down and published an email he sent to a former board member accusing said board member of poor/damaging behavior. The board member is suspected to be from Collaborative Fund: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24793170 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24793170
ButWhatFor 6y ago
Isn’t this related to Pareto Distributions? Once you lose, you generally have lost some resources or access to resources, so now you have less resources. Having less resources, you are less likely to be able to take some resources and try to win again? Winning means you have more resources or greater access to resources, meaning you can try again. The unfortunate part is in the losing cycle, you can get stuck at zero... you lost and hit zero... now you have no resources and no way to get out of your situation.
ggm 6y ago
The obvious thing to say is "climate" But I guess that would be seen as 'inflammatory' -when in fact it goes to exactly the same disjoin between statistics, and experiental sense. Nobody who doubts in AGW thinks the changes represent systemic, across the board, movement in time. They just think "its always been this variable" and miss the year on year accumulating effect.
- projektfu 6y ago
  "Watch Out for that Glacier!" -- Blake Snyder crystallized the difficulty in getting an audience to care about danger that is approaching too slowly.
- aaronbrethorst 6y ago
  Saying ‘we are utterly fucked in the medium term’ is what more folks need to do. Too many people have their heads in the sand even now.
slfnflctd 6y ago
This really is a good thing to keep in mind when it seems like the bad news keeps coming every day-- whether it be on the global/national stage, in your business or in your personal life. Overall, things in general are still slowly getting better for everyone on average. Of course, knowing this doesn't help much when you're facing catastrophe that damages your own well being, and past performance is an unreliable predictor of future results. It's even possible we could see a reversal of many (or all) of these generally progressive trends if there is an unprecedented, massive collapse in the global economy. But when the noise in your head of 'all the terrible things happening' is getting too loud, it can ease the stress a bit to remember that the trend is still upward in a lot of really amazing ways. When the chips are down, there's always tomorrow, and your odds of bouncing back better than before usually aren't as poor as it feels like in those moments of loss. And while it may not work for everyone, I personally take some comfort when I'm down thinking about all those out there who've been working a long time for a big win and finally got one today.
- aaronbrethorst 6y ago
  Overall, things in general are still slowly getting better for everyone on average. Overall, global temperatures are still slowly getting higher for everyone on average, too.
  - marcus_holmes 6y ago
    So, why bring this up? Why must everything be headed to disaster? Why is all good news always countered with a negative forecast of doom? I seek to understand.
    - Uupis 6y ago
      > I seek to understand. I can't speak for the parent poster, but I find that "things are getting better" and other forms of 'incessantly positive' narrative give me some degree of dissonance. The bad things don't cancel out the good, but the good things don't make up for the bad. The times I find myself talking about it are when things seem especially bleak, and a given positive spin just turns out to be that last straw of annoyance. Pointing it out just seems to bring back some sense of reality, sort of bracing for when the next awful thing inevitably comes up. Personally, I try to keep it in my private notes, but sometimes things spill out. It's not an attempt to bring others down. Of course, this is comment is just as moot.
whathappenedto 6y ago
Wasn't this the unprofessional fund on the board of CircleUp that tormented the founder so much that he wrote a long critique? (but not this VC partner specifically) https://docs.google.com/document/d/17tEc9ETL4tjfTmNbpwJJ5OSx1c4j10ZBgeYXWGzO30Y/edit https://docs.google.com/document/d/17tEc9ETL4tjfTmNbpwJJ5OSx... If so, I'm not sure I want to be listening to advice from them...
- alexpetralia 6y ago
  Agreed, my opinion of them (which admittedly doesn't matter) dropped dramatically after reading some of the alleged behavior of the partner.
malux85 6y ago
I think we should setup the conditions for miracles so they are more likely to occur. Just like the Battersea power station was once the beating heart of London - delivering energy to industry and the people the UK government should build a giant datacenter and push out cheap (or free) vms to anyone who wants them. Push out computational ability to everyone. Same with Raspberry Pis - send one to every student in the country, the economic benefit from the 8-10 genius level kids getting that R-Pi and being inspired into programming will pay for the few million other devices. I also really like the arm of the German government that port-scans companies and contacts them if they have vulnerable services running, it is the duty of the government to protect its industry and citizens and this kind of preemptive public good is innovative and shows long term thinking without a desire for immediate, transactional payoffs. These things raise the bar and make miracles more likely to occur by “gardening” them into existence
dylan604 6y ago
I guess this depends on your definition of a miracle. In a previous job, I had only been there a few weeks after moving across country to take this job. It was a large enough company that I still didn't know what the entire company did but recognized a few people from different departments just from water cooler chats. I had been becoming familiar with some new software and was staying late as I didn't really have anything else to do. Taking a stroll through the building partly out of curiosity to see who else was still in the building I found a group that was staying late because of a next day deadline. Curiosity got me involved in what they were struggling to do. It just so happened that the software I had been playing with was the perfect solve to this groups problem. Ultimately, the deadline was met at the bottom of the 9th with 2 outs and no runners on the bases. Sometimes, things just work out where the right info is available and the people that can use that info all come together to pull off what looks like a miracle when it was just damn good luck of very fortunate timing. We didn't save any lives that day. We didn't change the direction of medical advice. However, face was saved and the people that were dreading having to tell the client the deadline was not going to be met would call it a miracle. And since it happened after hours while we worked deep into the night, would that not also qualify as an overnight miracle?
refurb 6y ago
Reminds me of a chart I saw on the incremental gain of various therapies for colorectal cancer. You’d see a lot of discussion around “this drug increased median overall survival by 4 months, is that really a worthwhile advancement?”. But you track it over 15 years, median overall survival had gone from 6 months to 10 years. All small incremental gains. That’s the difference between a death sentence and manageable disease.
aphextron 6y ago
This is just the law of entropy. All of our existence is a constant struggle to create order in a universe that trends toward total chaos and thermodynamic equilibrium.

90 points by magnifique 6y ago

foobaw 6y ago

Thought this had to do with their recent controversy..

stanrivers 6y ago
For the ignorant, what was that?
- carlineng 6y ago
  The CEO of CircleUp stepped down and published an email he sent to a former board member accusing said board member of poor/damaging behavior. The board member is suspected to be from Collaborative Fund: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24793170 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24793170

ButWhatFor 6y ago

Isn’t this related to Pareto Distributions? Once you lose, you generally have lost some resources or access to resources, so now you have less resources. Having less resources, you are less likely to be able to take some resources and try to win again? Winning means you have more resources or greater access to resources, meaning you can try again. The unfortunate part is in the losing cycle, you can get stuck at zero... you lost and hit zero... now you have no resources and no way to get out of your situation.

ggm 6y ago

The obvious thing to say is "climate" But I guess that would be seen as 'inflammatory' -when in fact it goes to exactly the same disjoin between statistics, and experiental sense. Nobody who doubts in AGW thinks the changes represent systemic, across the board, movement in time. They just think "its always been this variable" and miss the year on year accumulating effect.

projektfu 6y ago
"Watch Out for that Glacier!" -- Blake Snyder crystallized the difficulty in getting an audience to care about danger that is approaching too slowly.
aaronbrethorst 6y ago
Saying ‘we are utterly fucked in the medium term’ is what more folks need to do. Too many people have their heads in the sand even now.

slfnflctd 6y ago

This really is a good thing to keep in mind when it seems like the bad news keeps coming every day-- whether it be on the global/national stage, in your business or in your personal life. Overall, things in general are still slowly getting better for everyone on average. Of course, knowing this doesn't help much when you're facing catastrophe that damages your own well being, and past performance is an unreliable predictor of future results. It's even possible we could see a reversal of many (or all) of these generally progressive trends if there is an unprecedented, massive collapse in the global economy. But when the noise in your head of 'all the terrible things happening' is getting too loud, it can ease the stress a bit to remember that the trend is still upward in a lot of really amazing ways. When the chips are down, there's always tomorrow, and your odds of bouncing back better than before usually aren't as poor as it feels like in those moments of loss. And while it may not work for everyone, I personally take some comfort when I'm down thinking about all those out there who've been working a long time for a big win and finally got one today.

aaronbrethorst 6y ago
Overall, things in general are still slowly getting better for everyone on average. Overall, global temperatures are still slowly getting higher for everyone on average, too.
- marcus_holmes 6y ago
  So, why bring this up? Why must everything be headed to disaster? Why is all good news always countered with a negative forecast of doom? I seek to understand.
  - Uupis 6y ago
    > I seek to understand. I can't speak for the parent poster, but I find that "things are getting better" and other forms of 'incessantly positive' narrative give me some degree of dissonance. The bad things don't cancel out the good, but the good things don't make up for the bad. The times I find myself talking about it are when things seem especially bleak, and a given positive spin just turns out to be that last straw of annoyance. Pointing it out just seems to bring back some sense of reality, sort of bracing for when the next awful thing inevitably comes up. Personally, I try to keep it in my private notes, but sometimes things spill out. It's not an attempt to bring others down. Of course, this is comment is just as moot.

whathappenedto 6y ago

Wasn't this the unprofessional fund on the board of CircleUp that tormented the founder so much that he wrote a long critique? (but not this VC partner specifically) https://docs.google.com/document/d/17tEc9ETL4tjfTmNbpwJJ5OSx1c4j10ZBgeYXWGzO30Y/edit https://docs.google.com/document/d/17tEc9ETL4tjfTmNbpwJJ5OSx... If so, I'm not sure I want to be listening to advice from them...

alexpetralia 6y ago
Agreed, my opinion of them (which admittedly doesn't matter) dropped dramatically after reading some of the alleged behavior of the partner.

malux85 6y ago

I think we should setup the conditions for miracles so they are more likely to occur. Just like the Battersea power station was once the beating heart of London - delivering energy to industry and the people the UK government should build a giant datacenter and push out cheap (or free) vms to anyone who wants them. Push out computational ability to everyone. Same with Raspberry Pis - send one to every student in the country, the economic benefit from the 8-10 genius level kids getting that R-Pi and being inspired into programming will pay for the few million other devices. I also really like the arm of the German government that port-scans companies and contacts them if they have vulnerable services running, it is the duty of the government to protect its industry and citizens and this kind of preemptive public good is innovative and shows long term thinking without a desire for immediate, transactional payoffs. These things raise the bar and make miracles more likely to occur by “gardening” them into existence

dylan604 6y ago

I guess this depends on your definition of a miracle. In a previous job, I had only been there a few weeks after moving across country to take this job. It was a large enough company that I still didn't know what the entire company did but recognized a few people from different departments just from water cooler chats. I had been becoming familiar with some new software and was staying late as I didn't really have anything else to do. Taking a stroll through the building partly out of curiosity to see who else was still in the building I found a group that was staying late because of a next day deadline. Curiosity got me involved in what they were struggling to do. It just so happened that the software I had been playing with was the perfect solve to this groups problem. Ultimately, the deadline was met at the bottom of the 9th with 2 outs and no runners on the bases. Sometimes, things just work out where the right info is available and the people that can use that info all come together to pull off what looks like a miracle when it was just damn good luck of very fortunate timing. We didn't save any lives that day. We didn't change the direction of medical advice. However, face was saved and the people that were dreading having to tell the client the deadline was not going to be met would call it a miracle. And since it happened after hours while we worked deep into the night, would that not also qualify as an overnight miracle?

refurb 6y ago

Reminds me of a chart I saw on the incremental gain of various therapies for colorectal cancer. You’d see a lot of discussion around “this drug increased median overall survival by 4 months, is that really a worthwhile advancement?”. But you track it over 15 years, median overall survival had gone from 6 months to 10 years. All small incremental gains. That’s the difference between a death sentence and manageable disease.

aphextron 6y ago

This is just the law of entropy. All of our existence is a constant struggle to create order in a universe that trends toward total chaos and thermodynamic equilibrium.