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"The people that are using digital innovations to solve real world problems like energy, health care, agriculture, and transportation are ahead of the curve."

by awt 15y ago

"The people that are using digital innovations to solve real world problems like energy, health care, agriculture, and transportation are ahead of the curve." Those are all capital intensive. Most 20 year olds don't have that much capital. It would be great to see more investment in this space, though. I'm sure someone straight out of school could write software to improve healthcare records management, but the cost of maneuvering through healthcare regulations would be higher than most could afford. My point is that people fresh out of school who want to be independent are tackling the biggest problems they can on a budget of $1-2000/month.

m311ton 15y ago
You're exactly right. The barriers to entry are significantly higher when trying to innovate in "real world" problems (vs entertainment based ventures). Hopefully incentives, incubators, and resources will come into play to help navigate those challenges. Some are there already but don't really receive the media coverage to inspire others to follow suit.
hvs 15y ago
That's assuming that you can even break into the industry. Beyond regulations, most healthcare companies and hospitals have contracts with companies that basically prevent any sort of real competition. Much like the health insurance industry, health technology is in dire need of a revamping.
nlawalker 15y ago
Maybe that's the real lament then - that so many people fresh out of school have such a strong desire to be independent that they don't contribute to efforts to solve the problems you listed in your quote. I'm not saying people aren't justified in wanting to not "work for the man". I'm just saying that maybe the fact that working for the man is perceived as such a bad thing (or is such a bad thing) is a bit closer to a root cause of America's problems than the idea that making people click ads is the best way to make a buck today.
- jshen 15y ago
  true, but why is working for the man perceived as a bad thing? Could it be "the man's" fault? I happen to work for the man and here are some issues. I can't release code as open source, I get paid the same regardless of whether I work my ass off or just do enough to be ahead of the curve, I have virtually no say in our products because I'm just an engineer (we have product people for product design), I have to get an act of congress passed to setup a server in a non company standard configuration, etc, etc, etc. There are some up sides, one is that I get to focus and think deeply about my specific problem space which at one time was search relevance, and is now data mining. I don't have to do sys admin work, even though sometimes I'd rather do it, I have access to a very large hadoop grid that non startup would have built prior to success, there are a lot of really smart people with diverse backgrounds to bounce ideas off of, etc, etc. Oh, but this man I work on is focused on ad clicks :)
  - thorwed123 15y ago
    You're ideal man is a university professor, he gets funding from NSF and NIH, and if you do work your ass off, Yes you do get significant share of the credit. Go to a CS PhD program if you really want to innovate, forget all the crap that is spread on HN if you do get into top 5 or top 10 school, you will have equal amount of resources and at University even though they do have their own interests, they still want to see you succeed. This is main difference between working and PhD, at a job you are a replaceable number at university depending on your advisor they are more concerned about your success and theirs as well.
    - jshen 15y ago
      There are a few assumptions I'd like to question in your comment. First, innovation is not limited to what is of interest to a CS PhD program. Second, I'm not interested in "innovating" per se, I'm interesting in creating things that add value to peoples lives and not being pigeonholed as either an engineer or a product person. I don't care if the ideas I'm using are new or not, only if what I'm building is enriching someones life and that my product has users. Third, I've never been a replaceable number at a company, even large companies. If you work on hard problems, and are good at it, you aren't easily replaceable. People realize this, even when you're working for the man. Finally, at university you often don't have access to real world data to do research. I know some big universities like epfl do partnerships where they work with researchers and engineers at companies in exchange for access to that companies data for research and publication.
JDulin 15y ago
"My point is that people fresh out of school who want to be independent are tackling the biggest problems they can on a budget of $1-2000/month." As a teenager, I agree here. I know that I can build a trendy little web app for relatively nothing if it has the possibility of making me rich. However, any ideas I have for robotics, healthcare, and energy are going to require me working in a job at a large company (which I wouldn't like) or getting an unusually large amount of VC investment (which would be unlikely.) I think the problem could be experience. For a recent graduate, it's hard to acquire the amount of VC funding you need for a hardware-based, regulated field when you can't say you have any entrepreneurial experience. For conservative VCs, there's a big difference between giving $20,000 to a college-age kid and giving $100,000 to a college-age kid.

by awt 15y ago

m311ton 15y ago

You're exactly right. The barriers to entry are significantly higher when trying to innovate in "real world" problems (vs entertainment based ventures). Hopefully incentives, incubators, and resources will come into play to help navigate those challenges. Some are there already but don't really receive the media coverage to inspire others to follow suit.

hvs 15y ago

That's assuming that you can even break into the industry. Beyond regulations, most healthcare companies and hospitals have contracts with companies that basically prevent any sort of real competition. Much like the health insurance industry, health technology is in dire need of a revamping.

nlawalker 15y ago

Maybe that's the real lament then - that so many people fresh out of school have such a strong desire to be independent that they don't contribute to efforts to solve the problems you listed in your quote. I'm not saying people aren't justified in wanting to not "work for the man". I'm just saying that maybe the fact that working for the man is perceived as such a bad thing (or is such a bad thing) is a bit closer to a root cause of America's problems than the idea that making people click ads is the best way to make a buck today.

jshen 15y ago
true, but why is working for the man perceived as a bad thing? Could it be "the man's" fault? I happen to work for the man and here are some issues. I can't release code as open source, I get paid the same regardless of whether I work my ass off or just do enough to be ahead of the curve, I have virtually no say in our products because I'm just an engineer (we have product people for product design), I have to get an act of congress passed to setup a server in a non company standard configuration, etc, etc, etc. There are some up sides, one is that I get to focus and think deeply about my specific problem space which at one time was search relevance, and is now data mining. I don't have to do sys admin work, even though sometimes I'd rather do it, I have access to a very large hadoop grid that non startup would have built prior to success, there are a lot of really smart people with diverse backgrounds to bounce ideas off of, etc, etc. Oh, but this man I work on is focused on ad clicks :)
- thorwed123 15y ago
  You're ideal man is a university professor, he gets funding from NSF and NIH, and if you do work your ass off, Yes you do get significant share of the credit. Go to a CS PhD program if you really want to innovate, forget all the crap that is spread on HN if you do get into top 5 or top 10 school, you will have equal amount of resources and at University even though they do have their own interests, they still want to see you succeed. This is main difference between working and PhD, at a job you are a replaceable number at university depending on your advisor they are more concerned about your success and theirs as well.
  - jshen 15y ago
    There are a few assumptions I'd like to question in your comment. First, innovation is not limited to what is of interest to a CS PhD program. Second, I'm not interested in "innovating" per se, I'm interesting in creating things that add value to peoples lives and not being pigeonholed as either an engineer or a product person. I don't care if the ideas I'm using are new or not, only if what I'm building is enriching someones life and that my product has users. Third, I've never been a replaceable number at a company, even large companies. If you work on hard problems, and are good at it, you aren't easily replaceable. People realize this, even when you're working for the man. Finally, at university you often don't have access to real world data to do research. I know some big universities like epfl do partnerships where they work with researchers and engineers at companies in exchange for access to that companies data for research and publication.

JDulin 15y ago

"My point is that people fresh out of school who want to be independent are tackling the biggest problems they can on a budget of $1-2000/month." As a teenager, I agree here. I know that I can build a trendy little web app for relatively nothing if it has the possibility of making me rich. However, any ideas I have for robotics, healthcare, and energy are going to require me working in a job at a large company (which I wouldn't like) or getting an unusually large amount of VC investment (which would be unlikely.) I think the problem could be experience. For a recent graduate, it's hard to acquire the amount of VC funding you need for a hardware-based, regulated field when you can't say you have any entrepreneurial experience. For conservative VCs, there's a big difference between giving $20,000 to a college-age kid and giving $100,000 to a college-age kid.