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I agree about the HN bubble, but not every comment has to reflect the larger market; The comment is about the power users and it reflects the significant portio

I agree about the HN bubble, but not every comment has to reflect the larger market; The comment is about the power users and it reflects the significant portion of HN. Just like content on Computer Science is preferred on HN, it doesn't mean just because not everyone is a CSE/Computer Scientist in the real world, CS content is not valuable.

oblio 6y ago
The problem with this logic is that with millions of people, everything can happen. When someone says "never/no one" in a casual conversation, they don't mean "it's physically and mathematically impossible for this to happen, I'm sure the chance of this is 0%". They mean: "the vast majority of people". Techie communities can be tiresome with all the nitpicking. I swear that if I posted a comment saying "nobody puts their dick in the vacuum cleaner shaft" while discussing the best vacuum cleaner design, somebody would feel the need to object and say they did it. https://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Feb-17.html https://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Feb-17.html
nindalf 6y ago
The issue is not that HN users have different preferences or that they signal those preferences. The issue is when they are surprised and annoyed that the ordinary folks in the real world don't make the same superior choices that they do. Why do they keep buying iPhones instead of Fairphones? Why do they keep using ad supported services instead of paying for it? Why do hundreds of millions of them eat at McDonald's?! This lack of understanding of the general population is the issue.
nl 6y ago
My argument is more subtle than that. I'm arguing that Tasker/Termux users aren't really your normal power users at all. Instead they are hackers, and would be satisfied by any form of stitching bits together to accomplish some task. If Tasker/Termus didn't exist they'd be equally happy accomplishing the same things with custom hardware sensors or carrying a RPi around or whatever. They aren't actually doing anything useful with the software that couldn't be accomplished slightly less conveniently in other ways - the joy of the hack is the accomplishment. When you view it like this, the market satisfaction argument looks different.

oblio 6y ago

The problem with this logic is that with millions of people, everything can happen. When someone says "never/no one" in a casual conversation, they don't mean "it's physically and mathematically impossible for this to happen, I'm sure the chance of this is 0%". They mean: "the vast majority of people". Techie communities can be tiresome with all the nitpicking. I swear that if I posted a comment saying "nobody puts their dick in the vacuum cleaner shaft" while discussing the best vacuum cleaner design, somebody would feel the need to object and say they did it. https://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Feb-17.html https://tirania.org/blog/archive/2011/Feb-17.html

nindalf 6y ago

The issue is not that HN users have different preferences or that they signal those preferences. The issue is when they are surprised and annoyed that the ordinary folks in the real world don't make the same superior choices that they do. Why do they keep buying iPhones instead of Fairphones? Why do they keep using ad supported services instead of paying for it? Why do hundreds of millions of them eat at McDonald's?! This lack of understanding of the general population is the issue.

nl 6y ago

My argument is more subtle than that. I'm arguing that Tasker/Termux users aren't really your normal power users at all. Instead they are hackers, and would be satisfied by any form of stitching bits together to accomplish some task. If Tasker/Termus didn't exist they'd be equally happy accomplishing the same things with custom hardware sensors or carrying a RPi around or whatever. They aren't actually doing anything useful with the software that couldn't be accomplished slightly less conveniently in other ways - the joy of the hack is the accomplishment. When you view it like this, the market satisfaction argument looks different.