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8 years ago, HN was a place full of optimism and excitement. I've noticed a marked increase in cynicism in this place. Like most of the world, it suffers from

8 years ago, HN was a place full of optimism and excitement. I've noticed a marked increase in cynicism in this place. Like most of the world, it suffers from extreme tribalism and group think. I miss the former positive HN. And the positive world. sigh

throwawaysleep 3y ago
> And the positive world. sigh It turned out to be a lie and a scam, so now people are more skeptical.
- Gud 3y ago
  No it didn’t. The world is an amazing place. I am thankful to be alive.
  - throw9away6 3y ago
    Must be nice to be a 1% er
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - Gud 3y ago
      I'm not rich, I'm broke af. Doesn't stop me from choosing happiness. What's the alternative? Spend my life in misery? I tried that for a decade, didn't work out well for me. Now I choose to be happy. I choose to be the best I can be. Moping around sure as shit didn't fix my problems
jackmott42 3y ago
The cynicism for me at least is a result of reality actually getting markedly worse (at least in the USA) over the last 10 years. However, none of that has anything to do with fusion tech, so I remain hopeful about that!
- SeanAnderson 3y ago
  It's admittedly a 12 year old YouTube, but I always liked watching this when I was feeling especially cynical about the overall trajectory of the world: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo
  - nindalf 3y ago
    Before clicking that link I wondered what I would recommend to people who were feeling cynical about the world. It's a book by Hans Rosling - Factfulness, and it turns out that's the guy in your video.
    - jackmott42 3y ago
      Sadly he is no longer with us to let us know how things have gone the last 10 years :(
- haswell 3y ago
  I think it’s worth examining what we believe to be “reality”. If your reality is the Internet, the apocalypse is upon us. I’ve spent the past year reducing Internet one and increasing immersion in my local community and the world looks like a very different (better) place.
rf15 3y ago
Maybe we just grew up? There is still plenty we are enthusiastic and positive about here, but discussion sure has become more nuanced.
- piloto_ciego 3y ago
  Getting older is no excuse for cynicism.
- sebzim4500 3y ago
  Cynicism has nothing to do with nuance.
  - DubiousPusher 3y ago
    Nor does unbounded positivity and optimism.
    - switchbak 3y ago
      Honestly I think in this case the subject is so complex you'd have to be an expert to separate the wheat from the chaff. The techno optimists really do a lot of grifting these days (especially on YouTube), and the knee-jerk cynics are predictably annoying as well. The fact that a knowledgeable fusion insider is criticizing this speaks volumes to me, and his criticisms seem on point. I'm a lay person so my take on it is effectively of zero value. And I don't think I'm the only one in this thread in that position :)
    - sebzim4500 3y ago
      I agree. I have nothing against the people sharing actual technical critisisms of the approach.
casey2 3y ago
It's pretty easy to find comments of people complaining about cynicism 11+ years ago.
piloto_ciego 3y ago
The cynicism is an op, or something - because I don’t have the evidence to say it’s definitively an “op” - as the kids say. But legitimately, there is a strong cynical bubble in the zeitgeist now, and it’s dangerous. There are a few things this cynicism says. 1. “People suck and are terrible.” 2. “People are stupid.” 3. “We can’t change anything.” 4. “Great calamity is going to happen and we are powerless to stop it.” This is a lie. The world doesn’t suck, it’s much better than it used to be, people aren’t terrible - if people were more bad than good on average we’d still be hitting each other with clubs and going Conan on people. We aren’t stupid - it’s just that the stupid people are louder. And while the possibilities for great calamity exist, they are not guaranteed. This may be more emergent than anything else, but trust your neighbors, treat people nicely, and you - yes individually each of you - need to start trying to make the world better. Nobody is going to do it for us. I know what it’s like to feel bleak, trust me I do - but that’s just a call to action. It’s not “techno optimism” we need - it’s optimism, there are radical solutions that don’t use a single transistor.
- hutzlibu 3y ago
  "The world doesn’t suck, it’s much better than it used to be" Better then when and by what meassure? It is quite subjective I think. One satirical person offered this quote: We optimized for the minimum of individual luck, to get the maximum of people. I am not fully behind this quote, it is satirical, but I think there is too much truth behind it. Ecologically things look bad. Geopolitical the same. But yes, the sun is still shining and spring is nice and we do are progressing to new technological heights every day. It is just how this awesome tech is used overwhelmingly, that is a bummer.
  - SeasonalEnnui 3y ago
    "Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World" is a book that makes an excellent attempt to answer this.
    - moron4hire 3y ago
      Isn't this book about the low-hanging fruit stuff like universal access to healthy drinking water? And isn't it about basically the course of history through the 20th century compared to the previous millennium? That's much more macro, world-wide kind of stuff than whether or not startups in developed countries nowadays feel almost exclusively exploitative versus how they felt innovative 15, 20 years ago.
ohgodplsno 3y ago
Because the world has gotten markedly more shit for the vast majority of people, and YC is directly one of the reasons. Most of us have seen our disposable income drop, seen bullshit companies making connected dog feeders get funded dozens of millions by money-centralizing VCs, and overall have seen the world get more and more unfair, unbalanced and unjust. Major climate disruption is underway, wars are hitting all over the globe and governments are all getting more and more undemocratic. Needless to say, the world doesn't exactly lend itself to positivity about yet another fucking startup promising you fusion powered dog feeders.
haarts 3y ago
Is that feeling of yours actually founded in reality? You can have a look! https://hackermoods.com/ https://hackermoods.com/ (I only did a quick search)
- deweller 3y ago
  This is a very interesting site. I'd love to see the analysis extend beyond 2016.
matrix_overload 3y ago
Startups used to be a way to create your own solution to a non-trivial problem, and make money off selling it to people that will benefit from it and enjoy it. It was a highly rewarding experience for those who didn't want to play corporate politics (or at least, play it to a lesser extent). But then it attracted too many people that would just emulate the KPI in order to get funded, and instead of letting it crash and rise from the ashes, we lowered the interest rates and bailed out a bunch of "too big to fail" banks in 2008, pretty much guaranteeing viability of shitty investments. Oh, and when people started calling it out in 2012 with Occupy Wall Street, they were redirected using the centuries-old divide-and-conquer techniques. So now it's a shell of former self. Founders try to create something that looks like a great company. VCs pour money in, hoping to resell to the next fool. Founders are now more like figureheads than idea-driven people. Most big successes (Uber, AirBnb) could be attributed more to regulatory capture than a revolutional way of doing something. Smart people understand it very well and it doesn't make you very optimistic. You can pretend well enough to convince an average layperson, but deep inside you know the game is fake, and it kinda builds up. Notably, game-changers that are appreciated by users (rather than speculative investors) now mostly come from China (e.g. TikTok), because the vibe there (with all the downsides) is now closer to the "good old SV" than the current SV.
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  To be fair to Uber and AirBnB, they did introduce some genuinely novel innovations. But the business model does heavily rely on the non-technological aspects for their competitive advantage.
  - tokai 3y ago
    Non-technological aspects is an interesting euphemism for breaking the law.
    - MichaelZuo 3y ago
      Not in all jurisdictions. But granted in quite a few there are violations of the spirit of the law.
skrebbel 3y ago
Fwiw to my memory, 8 years ago people complained about cynicism and negativism on HN just as much. Eg people never stopped quoting that famous top comment on Dropbox's HN launch (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863#9224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863#9224). I strongly doubt this attitude ever changed. It's always been - first comments are dismissive gut reactions - a bit later some nuanced/positive comments arrive - depending on mood and luck, one or the other kind floats to the top I mean how often have you read a super positive top comment that starts out complaining about all the negativism in the thread? It's super commonplace! HN is still full of optimism and excitement, and also middlebrow dismissal. Just give it a few hours for every topic.
- soco 3y ago
  I can confirm this. If I happen to contradict some cynical comment, 5 minutes and I'm at minus-something. Then the positives start to build back up. Always. There could be some psychological explanation to this, why the quick reaction is negative and the better thought-of positive?
creato 3y ago
I genuinely think HN has been overrun by influence operations designed to make people resigned to the world being terrible. It sounds stupid and paranoid, but I can’t explain the patterns I observe any other way. I think the way HN is operated makes it impossible to avoid: no real authentication other than an email address. It is (or at least was) a juicy target due to the concentration of influential people in an influential industry. I’m specifically not going to post examples because that will invite the same old conversations to be rehashed, and any one example is useless anyways. People will claim confirmation bias and they may even be right.
- adampk 3y ago
  I agree with you. A "everything is terrible" campaign. But who stands to gain?
healthysurf 3y ago
I'll be updating this in the coming weeks, and one of the features is going to be a toggle switch to "Make HN Happy" where it detects negative sentiments and rewords the comment into something constructive: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/healthy-surf/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/healthy-surf/
throwaway81523 3y ago
Look for the article "Geeks, mops, and sociopaths" which has been posted here a few times. We are currently in the sociopath part of the cycle, and people recognize that.
adamdennis 3y ago
There’s still time to turn this thread/site around! Let’s keep it positive! “I’m looking forward to having reached the bottom; only up from here!”

throwawaysleep 3y ago

> And the positive world. sigh It turned out to be a lie and a scam, so now people are more skeptical.

Gud 3y ago
No it didn’t. The world is an amazing place. I am thankful to be alive.
- throw9away6 3y ago
  Must be nice to be a 1% er
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - Gud 3y ago
    I'm not rich, I'm broke af. Doesn't stop me from choosing happiness. What's the alternative? Spend my life in misery? I tried that for a decade, didn't work out well for me. Now I choose to be happy. I choose to be the best I can be. Moping around sure as shit didn't fix my problems

jackmott42 3y ago

The cynicism for me at least is a result of reality actually getting markedly worse (at least in the USA) over the last 10 years. However, none of that has anything to do with fusion tech, so I remain hopeful about that!

SeanAnderson 3y ago
It's admittedly a 12 year old YouTube, but I always liked watching this when I was feeling especially cynical about the overall trajectory of the world: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo
- nindalf 3y ago
  Before clicking that link I wondered what I would recommend to people who were feeling cynical about the world. It's a book by Hans Rosling - Factfulness, and it turns out that's the guy in your video.
  - jackmott42 3y ago
    Sadly he is no longer with us to let us know how things have gone the last 10 years :(
haswell 3y ago
I think it’s worth examining what we believe to be “reality”. If your reality is the Internet, the apocalypse is upon us. I’ve spent the past year reducing Internet one and increasing immersion in my local community and the world looks like a very different (better) place.

rf15 3y ago

Maybe we just grew up? There is still plenty we are enthusiastic and positive about here, but discussion sure has become more nuanced.

piloto_ciego 3y ago
Getting older is no excuse for cynicism.
sebzim4500 3y ago
Cynicism has nothing to do with nuance.
- DubiousPusher 3y ago
  Nor does unbounded positivity and optimism.
  - switchbak 3y ago
    Honestly I think in this case the subject is so complex you'd have to be an expert to separate the wheat from the chaff. The techno optimists really do a lot of grifting these days (especially on YouTube), and the knee-jerk cynics are predictably annoying as well. The fact that a knowledgeable fusion insider is criticizing this speaks volumes to me, and his criticisms seem on point. I'm a lay person so my take on it is effectively of zero value. And I don't think I'm the only one in this thread in that position :)
  - sebzim4500 3y ago
    I agree. I have nothing against the people sharing actual technical critisisms of the approach.

casey2 3y ago

It's pretty easy to find comments of people complaining about cynicism 11+ years ago.

piloto_ciego 3y ago

The cynicism is an op, or something - because I don’t have the evidence to say it’s definitively an “op” - as the kids say. But legitimately, there is a strong cynical bubble in the zeitgeist now, and it’s dangerous. There are a few things this cynicism says. 1. “People suck and are terrible.” 2. “People are stupid.” 3. “We can’t change anything.” 4. “Great calamity is going to happen and we are powerless to stop it.” This is a lie. The world doesn’t suck, it’s much better than it used to be, people aren’t terrible - if people were more bad than good on average we’d still be hitting each other with clubs and going Conan on people. We aren’t stupid - it’s just that the stupid people are louder. And while the possibilities for great calamity exist, they are not guaranteed. This may be more emergent than anything else, but trust your neighbors, treat people nicely, and you - yes individually each of you - need to start trying to make the world better. Nobody is going to do it for us. I know what it’s like to feel bleak, trust me I do - but that’s just a call to action. It’s not “techno optimism” we need - it’s optimism, there are radical solutions that don’t use a single transistor.

hutzlibu 3y ago
"The world doesn’t suck, it’s much better than it used to be" Better then when and by what meassure? It is quite subjective I think. One satirical person offered this quote: We optimized for the minimum of individual luck, to get the maximum of people. I am not fully behind this quote, it is satirical, but I think there is too much truth behind it. Ecologically things look bad. Geopolitical the same. But yes, the sun is still shining and spring is nice and we do are progressing to new technological heights every day. It is just how this awesome tech is used overwhelmingly, that is a bummer.
- SeasonalEnnui 3y ago
  "Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World" is a book that makes an excellent attempt to answer this.
  - moron4hire 3y ago
    Isn't this book about the low-hanging fruit stuff like universal access to healthy drinking water? And isn't it about basically the course of history through the 20th century compared to the previous millennium? That's much more macro, world-wide kind of stuff than whether or not startups in developed countries nowadays feel almost exclusively exploitative versus how they felt innovative 15, 20 years ago.

ohgodplsno 3y ago

Because the world has gotten markedly more shit for the vast majority of people, and YC is directly one of the reasons. Most of us have seen our disposable income drop, seen bullshit companies making connected dog feeders get funded dozens of millions by money-centralizing VCs, and overall have seen the world get more and more unfair, unbalanced and unjust. Major climate disruption is underway, wars are hitting all over the globe and governments are all getting more and more undemocratic. Needless to say, the world doesn't exactly lend itself to positivity about yet another fucking startup promising you fusion powered dog feeders.

haarts 3y ago

Is that feeling of yours actually founded in reality? You can have a look! https://hackermoods.com/ https://hackermoods.com/ (I only did a quick search)

deweller 3y ago
This is a very interesting site. I'd love to see the analysis extend beyond 2016.

matrix_overload 3y ago

Startups used to be a way to create your own solution to a non-trivial problem, and make money off selling it to people that will benefit from it and enjoy it. It was a highly rewarding experience for those who didn't want to play corporate politics (or at least, play it to a lesser extent). But then it attracted too many people that would just emulate the KPI in order to get funded, and instead of letting it crash and rise from the ashes, we lowered the interest rates and bailed out a bunch of "too big to fail" banks in 2008, pretty much guaranteeing viability of shitty investments. Oh, and when people started calling it out in 2012 with Occupy Wall Street, they were redirected using the centuries-old divide-and-conquer techniques. So now it's a shell of former self. Founders try to create something that looks like a great company. VCs pour money in, hoping to resell to the next fool. Founders are now more like figureheads than idea-driven people. Most big successes (Uber, AirBnb) could be attributed more to regulatory capture than a revolutional way of doing something. Smart people understand it very well and it doesn't make you very optimistic. You can pretend well enough to convince an average layperson, but deep inside you know the game is fake, and it kinda builds up. Notably, game-changers that are appreciated by users (rather than speculative investors) now mostly come from China (e.g. TikTok), because the vibe there (with all the downsides) is now closer to the "good old SV" than the current SV.

MichaelZuo 3y ago
To be fair to Uber and AirBnB, they did introduce some genuinely novel innovations. But the business model does heavily rely on the non-technological aspects for their competitive advantage.
- tokai 3y ago
  Non-technological aspects is an interesting euphemism for breaking the law.
  - MichaelZuo 3y ago
    Not in all jurisdictions. But granted in quite a few there are violations of the spirit of the law.

skrebbel 3y ago

Fwiw to my memory, 8 years ago people complained about cynicism and negativism on HN just as much. Eg people never stopped quoting that famous top comment on Dropbox's HN launch (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863#9224 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863#9224). I strongly doubt this attitude ever changed. It's always been - first comments are dismissive gut reactions - a bit later some nuanced/positive comments arrive - depending on mood and luck, one or the other kind floats to the top I mean how often have you read a super positive top comment that starts out complaining about all the negativism in the thread? It's super commonplace! HN is still full of optimism and excitement, and also middlebrow dismissal. Just give it a few hours for every topic.

soco 3y ago
I can confirm this. If I happen to contradict some cynical comment, 5 minutes and I'm at minus-something. Then the positives start to build back up. Always. There could be some psychological explanation to this, why the quick reaction is negative and the better thought-of positive?

creato 3y ago

I genuinely think HN has been overrun by influence operations designed to make people resigned to the world being terrible. It sounds stupid and paranoid, but I can’t explain the patterns I observe any other way. I think the way HN is operated makes it impossible to avoid: no real authentication other than an email address. It is (or at least was) a juicy target due to the concentration of influential people in an influential industry. I’m specifically not going to post examples because that will invite the same old conversations to be rehashed, and any one example is useless anyways. People will claim confirmation bias and they may even be right.

adampk 3y ago
I agree with you. A "everything is terrible" campaign. But who stands to gain?

healthysurf 3y ago

I'll be updating this in the coming weeks, and one of the features is going to be a toggle switch to "Make HN Happy" where it detects negative sentiments and rewords the comment into something constructive: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/healthy-surf/ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/healthy-surf/

throwaway81523 3y ago

Look for the article "Geeks, mops, and sociopaths" which has been posted here a few times. We are currently in the sociopath part of the cycle, and people recognize that.

adamdennis 3y ago

There’s still time to turn this thread/site around! Let’s keep it positive! “I’m looking forward to having reached the bottom; only up from here!”