4 ms·

Yep. I'm from the US grew up in the Valley but lived in the UK for a startup for a short while. It's both a byproduct of career hierarchal corporate obedience

Yep. I'm from the US grew up in the Valley but lived in the UK for a startup for a short while. It's both a byproduct of career hierarchal corporate obedience and social success façade (see also: modern campus culture of Ivy Leagues and Pac12s). It's absolutely awful for mental health or getting things done. More practically, it's a problem when people try so hard to be liked that they throw away respect by being too "nice." As such, they're not your friends or anyones friend, they're toxically-positive, inherently dishonest, and cowardly "yes men." It's a dishonest, time-/energy-wasting, and an untrustworthy cultural- and communication-style. People like these are a liability because they won't go anywhere far except to the diplomatic corps parties, UN-sponsored social ventures, and sing Kum ba yah. (Wantreprenuers and dumb money dispensers.) You have to be radically honest with yourself and others before you can attain and grow anything substantial. Besides, VC investment is only essential if it's a capital-intensive venture or velocity-constrained by lack of capital. Having more capital isn't useful in and of itself without a plan and a strategy to deploy it to something that's already established, like water on a seedling. This is why chasing VC is worthless: sales of viable product cures all, including bringing VC interest.

kqvamxurcagg 5y ago
There's a couple of books in this comment.
- apples_oranges 5y ago
  I am interested in those books. Can you list some?
  - therein 5y ago
    I think he meant books to be written on the topic. But yeah, that was one insightful comment.
op03 5y ago
Very nice very nice as borat would say but the big piece missing in the rant is mindless ambition. Thats what keeps the lights on when shit hits the fan. Whether people are superficial corporate robots or without real friends or follow all kinds of meaningless ritual etc doesnt matter if they are driven. Why? Because thats who you end up relying on when competing against other people who are mindlessly driven. How are you going to compete with people who are more driven than you - "the do whatever it takes" brigade? Ranting takes away focus and thought from answering that question honestly to yourself.
- robertlagrant 5y ago
  > thats who you end up relying on when competing against other people who are mindlessly driven Some evidence of this is required.
- bserge 5y ago
  It is possible to be driven without being overly emotional (whether positive or negative emotions). It's probably harder to master, though.
- symkat 5y ago
  > How are you going to compete with people who are more driven than you Stop looking at it as competing with others and compete with yourself instead?
enriquto 5y ago
> toxically-positive This! That term that describes perfectly my impression of many people from the U.S.A. It's maybe just a cultural thing, but I have a lot of trouble working together with people who have this sort of attitude.
- lovetocode 5y ago
  You must have not been to the USA recently. People here are incredibly disagreeable, especially in the last 5-10 years.
  - enriquto 5y ago
    > People here are incredibly disagreeable, especially in the last 5-10 years. Never been to the USA in the last 10 years, but I interact regularly with usians, and this is not my experience at all. All of them have been extremely nice people, without a trace of disagreeableness. What irks me, is that they are constantly giving unwarranted and over the top praise. I find this very disturbing. In France this attitude is invariably interpreted as ironic mockery. And if they spoke French I would be genuinely offended by such attacks.
- biztos 5y ago
  “Hey, meet my good friend Enriquto, the best C hacker in the business! We’ve been working together since April!” I’m American but have mostly lived abroad for decades, and I still find his disorienting for the first few days of any trip back.
graderjs 5y ago
Its effects can't be that disastrous though. The US tech scene is still the best in the world. China is pretty close though.
- jokethrowaway 5y ago
  I think that's caused by the capital available to the US which made people adapt and learn how to use that capital to grow massively (see growth hacking). You also have generations of successful entrepreneurs staying in the US and teaching the next generation. Entrepreneurship in EU is mostly a joke, good entrepreneurs are hard to find. And still, despite of this, people working in Europe seems to be much happier (even if they're poorer) than in the US. My experiences with USA companies haven't been positive (very immature working culture of burning your employees) but I was always impressed at how the founders (some from the US, some immigrating from outside) managed to rake in a casual few millions at demo day just by saying they want to solve problems for a certain audience. My company got 10k€ for 10% after fighting for months (some more money came later thanks to an angel I sourced), which were not even enough money to incorporate a company in the country I was.
  - adwn 5y ago
    > You also have generations of successful entrepreneurs staying in the US and teaching the next generation. Entrepreneurship in EU is mostly a joke, good entrepreneurs are hard to find. Uh, what? Wrong, at least for Germany, which is littered with internationally successful small and medium-sized companies. Compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand . Edit: Unless you were refering to the kind of "entrepreneur" that burns millions of USD in VC money over the span of a couple years, fails to create anything that anyone is willing to actually pay money for, but produces a lot of insightful blog posts in that time. Yes, we don't have a lot of those here yet, but we're working on it.
    - jfengel 5y ago
      They probably did mean that, and believe it or not, Americans are actually OK with that. American entrepreneurial culture includes a strong dose of "It's OK to lose a million dollars a hundred times if the next one makes a billion dollars". Some think that's part of the reason the US is the country that generates the FAANG(M)s. They throw money at the wall and make big wins off of what sticks, if most of it doesn't. It's arguable whether that's actually beneficial for the world (is there any of the MANGAFs you don't feel uncomfortable about?), but it certainly accomplishes something. If only making the US rich.

kqvamxurcagg 5y ago

There's a couple of books in this comment.

apples_oranges 5y ago
I am interested in those books. Can you list some?
- therein 5y ago
  I think he meant books to be written on the topic. But yeah, that was one insightful comment.

op03 5y ago

Very nice very nice as borat would say but the big piece missing in the rant is mindless ambition. Thats what keeps the lights on when shit hits the fan. Whether people are superficial corporate robots or without real friends or follow all kinds of meaningless ritual etc doesnt matter if they are driven. Why? Because thats who you end up relying on when competing against other people who are mindlessly driven. How are you going to compete with people who are more driven than you - "the do whatever it takes" brigade? Ranting takes away focus and thought from answering that question honestly to yourself.

robertlagrant 5y ago
> thats who you end up relying on when competing against other people who are mindlessly driven Some evidence of this is required.
bserge 5y ago
It is possible to be driven without being overly emotional (whether positive or negative emotions). It's probably harder to master, though.
symkat 5y ago
> How are you going to compete with people who are more driven than you Stop looking at it as competing with others and compete with yourself instead?

enriquto 5y ago

> toxically-positive This! That term that describes perfectly my impression of many people from the U.S.A. It's maybe just a cultural thing, but I have a lot of trouble working together with people who have this sort of attitude.

lovetocode 5y ago
You must have not been to the USA recently. People here are incredibly disagreeable, especially in the last 5-10 years.
- enriquto 5y ago
  > People here are incredibly disagreeable, especially in the last 5-10 years. Never been to the USA in the last 10 years, but I interact regularly with usians, and this is not my experience at all. All of them have been extremely nice people, without a trace of disagreeableness. What irks me, is that they are constantly giving unwarranted and over the top praise. I find this very disturbing. In France this attitude is invariably interpreted as ironic mockery. And if they spoke French I would be genuinely offended by such attacks.
biztos 5y ago
“Hey, meet my good friend Enriquto, the best C hacker in the business! We’ve been working together since April!” I’m American but have mostly lived abroad for decades, and I still find his disorienting for the first few days of any trip back.

graderjs 5y ago

Its effects can't be that disastrous though. The US tech scene is still the best in the world. China is pretty close though.

jokethrowaway 5y ago
I think that's caused by the capital available to the US which made people adapt and learn how to use that capital to grow massively (see growth hacking). You also have generations of successful entrepreneurs staying in the US and teaching the next generation. Entrepreneurship in EU is mostly a joke, good entrepreneurs are hard to find. And still, despite of this, people working in Europe seems to be much happier (even if they're poorer) than in the US. My experiences with USA companies haven't been positive (very immature working culture of burning your employees) but I was always impressed at how the founders (some from the US, some immigrating from outside) managed to rake in a casual few millions at demo day just by saying they want to solve problems for a certain audience. My company got 10k€ for 10% after fighting for months (some more money came later thanks to an angel I sourced), which were not even enough money to incorporate a company in the country I was.
- adwn 5y ago
  > You also have generations of successful entrepreneurs staying in the US and teaching the next generation. Entrepreneurship in EU is mostly a joke, good entrepreneurs are hard to find. Uh, what? Wrong, at least for Germany, which is littered with internationally successful small and medium-sized companies. Compare https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mittelstand . Edit: Unless you were refering to the kind of "entrepreneur" that burns millions of USD in VC money over the span of a couple years, fails to create anything that anyone is willing to actually pay money for, but produces a lot of insightful blog posts in that time. Yes, we don't have a lot of those here yet, but we're working on it.
  - jfengel 5y ago
    They probably did mean that, and believe it or not, Americans are actually OK with that. American entrepreneurial culture includes a strong dose of "It's OK to lose a million dollars a hundred times if the next one makes a billion dollars". Some think that's part of the reason the US is the country that generates the FAANG(M)s. They throw money at the wall and make big wins off of what sticks, if most of it doesn't. It's arguable whether that's actually beneficial for the world (is there any of the MANGAFs you don't feel uncomfortable about?), but it certainly accomplishes something. If only making the US rich.