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There is something fascinating about this article, and it's not the tips about how to properly work hard, which aren't new or particularly insightful (otherwise

by fchu 5y ago

There is something fascinating about this article, and it's not the tips about how to properly work hard, which aren't new or particularly insightful (otherwise reasonable and well summarized). It's the fact that throughout the article, hard work is an implied imperative in life, the main thing to do (otherwise it brings a "feeling of disgust"), without questioning if that's healthy, right, or so absolute. Maybe instead of the how, I was expecting something about the why, a reflection on the bad aspects of working hard too, and its associated costs on other parts of one's life, whether it's Paul, Patrick or Bill.

pornel 5y ago
pg runs a business that depends on young people wanting to work their asses off for startups. IMHO the real "why" of this article is attracting the right people for Y Combinator.
- dang 5y ago
  pg hasn't been running Y Combinator for over 7 years! You've got your causality reversed. It's not that this essay exists because of YC, it's that YC exists because PG is obsessed with the idea of doing great work. (There are other reasons too, of course, but that was one vector.) He was that way long before YC.
  - eloff 5y ago
    This is clearly true looking from the outside, but people seem so eager to attribute motivations to greed or self interest, and success to luck, inherited wealth, and connections for any famous and successful person. Is it just jealously and pettiness? Do people downplay the achievements of others to make themselves feel better about achieving nothing remarkable? There is a rarely used English word I learned for the first time the other day - compersion - which is the opposite of jealousy. When you take joy in other people's success. Let's do more of that as a community and as human beings.
    - luffapi 5y ago
      It’s not clearly true at all. Please tell me what was “great” about Viaweb (how pg got where he is today). It was literally about being at the right place at the right time. I think you’d also be hard pressed to find someone who would call Arc great. > Is it just jealously and pettiness? It’s neither, it’s people seeing who gets rewarded, how and why.
      - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
        It was great compared to what else was available at the time. Yes, it was about being in the right place at the right time - a place and time where three guys could build something that was better than anything out there, that people actually used.
        luffapi 5y ago
        > a place and time where three guys could build something that was better than anything out there, that people actually used This is being in the right place at the right time. In other words, luck.
        AnimalMuppet 5y ago
        You asked what was great about it. I told you. Yes, there's an element of "the right place at the right time". And there's working very hard to make the most of it. Or look at it this way: That opportunity was there for multiple millions of people who could code at the time. It was Viaweb that took advantage of it, though.
        luffapi 5y ago
        There were not millions of developers back then. According to Wikipedia there were 680k developers in the US in 2000. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering_demographics#Relation_to_IT_demographics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering_demograph... Regardless, the point is that we should not be listening to a guy who got lucky with mediocre software sold to a mediocre (at best) company in the middle of a bubble about how to duplicate his success. Remember this is where Yahoo! was at at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast.com
tyrex2017 5y ago
The question you address is much more difficult to answer, if not impossible. I read the article with the preface: Lets suppose workimg hard is desirable. How to do this? This is the correct reading for me
balfirevic 5y ago
> It's the fact that throughout the article, hard work is an implied imperative in life That would be strange, as PG doesn't seem to believe that: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1404321931491430403 https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1404321931491430403
imgabe 5y ago
You should work hard if there’s something important to you that you want to achieve. If there’s nothing that you particularly want to accomplish then there isn’t much point in working hard.

by fchu 5y ago

pornel 5y ago

pg runs a business that depends on young people wanting to work their asses off for startups. IMHO the real "why" of this article is attracting the right people for Y Combinator.

dang 5y ago
pg hasn't been running Y Combinator for over 7 years! You've got your causality reversed. It's not that this essay exists because of YC, it's that YC exists because PG is obsessed with the idea of doing great work. (There are other reasons too, of course, but that was one vector.) He was that way long before YC.
- eloff 5y ago
  This is clearly true looking from the outside, but people seem so eager to attribute motivations to greed or self interest, and success to luck, inherited wealth, and connections for any famous and successful person. Is it just jealously and pettiness? Do people downplay the achievements of others to make themselves feel better about achieving nothing remarkable? There is a rarely used English word I learned for the first time the other day - compersion - which is the opposite of jealousy. When you take joy in other people's success. Let's do more of that as a community and as human beings.
  - luffapi 5y ago
    It’s not clearly true at all. Please tell me what was “great” about Viaweb (how pg got where he is today). It was literally about being at the right place at the right time. I think you’d also be hard pressed to find someone who would call Arc great. > Is it just jealously and pettiness? It’s neither, it’s people seeing who gets rewarded, how and why.
    - AnimalMuppet 5y ago
      It was great compared to what else was available at the time. Yes, it was about being in the right place at the right time - a place and time where three guys could build something that was better than anything out there, that people actually used.
      - luffapi 5y ago
        > a place and time where three guys could build something that was better than anything out there, that people actually used This is being in the right place at the right time. In other words, luck.
        AnimalMuppet 5y ago
        You asked what was great about it. I told you. Yes, there's an element of "the right place at the right time". And there's working very hard to make the most of it. Or look at it this way: That opportunity was there for multiple millions of people who could code at the time. It was Viaweb that took advantage of it, though.
        luffapi 5y ago
        There were not millions of developers back then. According to Wikipedia there were 680k developers in the US in 2000. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering_demographics#Relation_to_IT_demographics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_engineering_demograph... Regardless, the point is that we should not be listening to a guy who got lucky with mediocre software sold to a mediocre (at best) company in the middle of a bubble about how to duplicate his success. Remember this is where Yahoo! was at at the time: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast.com https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Broadcast.com

tyrex2017 5y ago

The question you address is much more difficult to answer, if not impossible. I read the article with the preface: Lets suppose workimg hard is desirable. How to do this? This is the correct reading for me

balfirevic 5y ago

> It's the fact that throughout the article, hard work is an implied imperative in life That would be strange, as PG doesn't seem to believe that: https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1404321931491430403 https://twitter.com/paulg/status/1404321931491430403

imgabe 5y ago

You should work hard if there’s something important to you that you want to achieve. If there’s nothing that you particularly want to accomplish then there isn’t much point in working hard.