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> I hope for a new wave of optimistic idealism to swallow up tech again, bringing about a new era of amateurism. But with the professionalisation of even the fr

by Swizec 6y ago

> I hope for a new wave of optimistic idealism to swallow up tech again, bringing about a new era of amateurism. But with the professionalisation of even the free software community I have, I must admit, all but given up hope. This wave exists, we’re just old. Go talk to 16 year olds who are building virtual reality machine learning apps in their bedroom. Web is no longer the frontier. We’re old and out of touch. The kids no longer hang out with us. Hence you see a lack of youthful idealism.

joeryscript 6y ago
The web is still the frontier, we're just interacting with it in new ways. Those VR meeting apps still need to connect to other computers, and if you get serious about machine learning the cloud is invaluable. Phone apps are also usually less local-friendly than desktop apps. Just because kids aren't using email or websites as much doesn't mean that they aren't using the internet more. Although personally, I wouldn't cry if the internet matured into a sort of academic database. Mass-scale social connectivity should probably move to local intranets, like airdrop and local-area IM platforms.
- Swizec 6y ago
  > Just because kids aren't using email or websites as much doesn't mean that they aren't using the internet more. For sure, everything uses the internet. But not the web. Point is most of us aren’t hanging out where the kids are hanging out. And we don’t have as much time to just hang out either.
Spinnaker_ 6y ago
You're probably right. I've been reading HN for 10+ years now and just assume it's still the best location for hackers. So what's the newer, cooler, current version of what HN was in 2010?
- jackcosgrove 6y ago
  I've heard the community at Indie Hackers is more supportive and less jaded.
  - ayewo 6y ago
    The similarity between the HN & IH communities only runs skin deep with the use of ‘Hacker’ in their names. Is IH are more supportive crowd? A resounding yes, but that’s because as a group it was designed as a support mechanism for people looking to earn a salary by working solo. HN is like the opposite of IH with respect to salary: it’s maintained by a VC entity and many hackers here draw high salaries working for trillion-dollar, billion-dollar and upstart tech companies. HN was designed to be a water cooler for stating & demolishing arguments, with the occasional cheer to YC-funded startups, so it’s not surprising there’s a lot of healthy skepticism which often comes across as cynicism.

by Swizec 6y ago

joeryscript 6y ago

The web is still the frontier, we're just interacting with it in new ways. Those VR meeting apps still need to connect to other computers, and if you get serious about machine learning the cloud is invaluable. Phone apps are also usually less local-friendly than desktop apps. Just because kids aren't using email or websites as much doesn't mean that they aren't using the internet more. Although personally, I wouldn't cry if the internet matured into a sort of academic database. Mass-scale social connectivity should probably move to local intranets, like airdrop and local-area IM platforms.

Swizec 6y ago
> Just because kids aren't using email or websites as much doesn't mean that they aren't using the internet more. For sure, everything uses the internet. But not the web. Point is most of us aren’t hanging out where the kids are hanging out. And we don’t have as much time to just hang out either.

Spinnaker_ 6y ago

You're probably right. I've been reading HN for 10+ years now and just assume it's still the best location for hackers. So what's the newer, cooler, current version of what HN was in 2010?

jackcosgrove 6y ago
I've heard the community at Indie Hackers is more supportive and less jaded.
- ayewo 6y ago
  The similarity between the HN & IH communities only runs skin deep with the use of ‘Hacker’ in their names. Is IH are more supportive crowd? A resounding yes, but that’s because as a group it was designed as a support mechanism for people looking to earn a salary by working solo. HN is like the opposite of IH with respect to salary: it’s maintained by a VC entity and many hackers here draw high salaries working for trillion-dollar, billion-dollar and upstart tech companies. HN was designed to be a water cooler for stating & demolishing arguments, with the occasional cheer to YC-funded startups, so it’s not surprising there’s a lot of healthy skepticism which often comes across as cynicism.