4 ms·

Nvidia CEO got a driver bug fixed in 12 hours

51 points by alecco 3y ago

marpstar 3y ago
Very reminiscent of Jeff Bezos' "question mark email"... https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-ceo-jeff-bezos-explains-212315127.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-ceo-jeff-bezos-explain...
- nkassis 3y ago
  I'm my opinion good CEOs know when to press that emergency button and to use it sparingly. Some CEOs like Musk manage exclusively by it and I don't know that it's the healthiest of long term strategy. He does get away with it for the most part it seems.
- alar44 3y ago
  [dead]
JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago
Hero!
Aulig 3y ago
Feels pushy and disrespectful of his time to me. If everyone emailed the CEO when they have some problem the CEOs wouldn:t be able to get anything done. The email also makes you feel like an asshole if you don't drop whatever you're doing to help him because supposedly it's your fault his company is failing.
- alecco 3y ago
  In the Twitter thread the sender says they exhausted all the support channels. And note they were a corporate customer of an expensive product, not some random guy.
- jrflowers 3y ago
  The CEO didn’t seem to feel that way. Would it have been more respectful of the CEO’s time to wait until your business falls because of an Nvidia driver issue and then write up a postmortem?
- Barrin92 3y ago
  >Feels pushy if you want to get anything done in the world you need to be a little bit pushy. If your company is at the risk of failing because of some critical bug sending someone an email isn't a big deal. Worst case he ignores it, it's not like you called the guy out of bed at 3 in the morning. The biggest mistake people make is simply not asking for help as directly as possible. Especially if they're too intimidated by someone's status.
- hgsgm 3y ago
  Selling a nonfunctional product is disrespectful of the customer's name. Feedback is a gift.
- segmondy 3y ago
  What do you think the CEO's job is? Only to tell people what to do?
nailer 3y ago
This is Hacker News, I'm pretty sure there's no need to rename him from Jensen to 'NVIDIA CEO'. There's only one Carmack, one Linus, one DJB, one Elon and one Jensen.
- tpxl 3y ago
  I've no idea who DJB or Jensen are.
  - nailer 3y ago
    DJB might be more of an privacy/infosec/Unix thing, so if you're a different type of programmer then fair enough. He is famous in crypto (as in cryptography) circles for: - Ed25519 for fast + safe asymmetric crypto - chacha/poly for fast symmetric crypto He is also famous in Unix circles for: - qmail - djbdns - his init system daemontools and a bunch of other bits. He also fought the US government for your right to use encryption when encryption was considered a munition. More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_J._Bernstein https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_J._Bernstein or https://cr.yp.to https://cr.yp.to Jensen is NVIDIA. Left MSI, took on the #1 competitor in the space (3DFX) and dominated them, responsible for things like CUDA and DLSS, now supplies the hardware for most of high end gaming and ML, has a two year advantage over AMD, appeared in his kitchen for an announcement once then a few months later told everyone that the entire scene was done with high quality physics based rendering and nobody knew.
    - ShamelessC 3y ago
      I thought these types of explanations were unnecessary on Hacker News...
      - askin4it 3y ago
        I got scolded on HN today for calling readers of HN "hackers." Too much
      - nullsense 3y ago
        Doesn't mean absolutely everyone knows who absolutely everyone is.
MuffinFlavored 3y ago
"Founder to founder" "Me, founder of a microscopic SaaS image company trying to capitalize on the hype of AI" "You, founder of $960b company with 27,000 employees and generations of market leading advanced technology" Clearly they both speak a special language that only "founders" can understand! /s I "found" my lunch yesterday, does that make me a founder?
- maxverse 3y ago
  Nvidia wasn't founded as a $960b company with 27,000 employees; it was once "microscopic", and if you saw some of Jensen's early emails, you'd probably mock them too. I think Suhail was appealing to Jensen's sense of urgency and responsibility as someone that understands what it's like to grow a small company. The tweet says "30 years after its founding, this guy still acts like a hardcore founder. Jensen is the best tech CEO in the game rn." I read that as Suhail praising Jensen for being so responsive and helpful, not flexing or equating their work. Suhail is also the founder of another "small" company called Mixpanel. No, finding your lunch doesn't make you a founder. Building something and launching it makes you a founder. Ridiculing others who are trying makes you a...?
  - MuffinFlavored 3y ago
    "Dear Tim Cook, I sell t-shirts out of my car, therefore I'm a CEO just like you! My iPhone isn't working, you better help me!!!!"
thatguyknows 3y ago
Does anyone get an unpleasant feeling from these typical "founder" types? Something always just feels deeply off about them. They all seem like carbon copies of each other too. Nice response from Nvidia though.

51 points by alecco 3y ago

Very reminiscent of Jeff Bezos' "question mark email"... https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-ceo-jeff-bezos-explains-212315127.html https://finance.yahoo.com/news/amazon-ceo-jeff-bezos-explain...

nkassis 3y ago
I'm my opinion good CEOs know when to press that emergency button and to use it sparingly. Some CEOs like Musk manage exclusively by it and I don't know that it's the healthiest of long term strategy. He does get away with it for the most part it seems.
alar44 3y ago
[dead]

JumpinJack_Cash 3y ago

Hero!

Aulig 3y ago

Feels pushy and disrespectful of his time to me. If everyone emailed the CEO when they have some problem the CEOs wouldn:t be able to get anything done. The email also makes you feel like an asshole if you don't drop whatever you're doing to help him because supposedly it's your fault his company is failing.

alecco 3y ago
In the Twitter thread the sender says they exhausted all the support channels. And note they were a corporate customer of an expensive product, not some random guy.
jrflowers 3y ago
The CEO didn’t seem to feel that way. Would it have been more respectful of the CEO’s time to wait until your business falls because of an Nvidia driver issue and then write up a postmortem?
Barrin92 3y ago
>Feels pushy if you want to get anything done in the world you need to be a little bit pushy. If your company is at the risk of failing because of some critical bug sending someone an email isn't a big deal. Worst case he ignores it, it's not like you called the guy out of bed at 3 in the morning. The biggest mistake people make is simply not asking for help as directly as possible. Especially if they're too intimidated by someone's status.
hgsgm 3y ago
Selling a nonfunctional product is disrespectful of the customer's name. Feedback is a gift.
segmondy 3y ago
What do you think the CEO's job is? Only to tell people what to do?

nailer 3y ago

This is Hacker News, I'm pretty sure there's no need to rename him from Jensen to 'NVIDIA CEO'. There's only one Carmack, one Linus, one DJB, one Elon and one Jensen.

tpxl 3y ago
I've no idea who DJB or Jensen are.
- nailer 3y ago
  DJB might be more of an privacy/infosec/Unix thing, so if you're a different type of programmer then fair enough. He is famous in crypto (as in cryptography) circles for: - Ed25519 for fast + safe asymmetric crypto - chacha/poly for fast symmetric crypto He is also famous in Unix circles for: - qmail - djbdns - his init system daemontools and a bunch of other bits. He also fought the US government for your right to use encryption when encryption was considered a munition. More at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_J._Bernstein https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_J._Bernstein or https://cr.yp.to https://cr.yp.to Jensen is NVIDIA. Left MSI, took on the #1 competitor in the space (3DFX) and dominated them, responsible for things like CUDA and DLSS, now supplies the hardware for most of high end gaming and ML, has a two year advantage over AMD, appeared in his kitchen for an announcement once then a few months later told everyone that the entire scene was done with high quality physics based rendering and nobody knew.
  - ShamelessC 3y ago
    I thought these types of explanations were unnecessary on Hacker News...
    - askin4it 3y ago
      I got scolded on HN today for calling readers of HN "hackers." Too much
    - nullsense 3y ago
      Doesn't mean absolutely everyone knows who absolutely everyone is.

MuffinFlavored 3y ago

"Founder to founder" "Me, founder of a microscopic SaaS image company trying to capitalize on the hype of AI" "You, founder of $960b company with 27,000 employees and generations of market leading advanced technology" Clearly they both speak a special language that only "founders" can understand! /s I "found" my lunch yesterday, does that make me a founder?

maxverse 3y ago
Nvidia wasn't founded as a $960b company with 27,000 employees; it was once "microscopic", and if you saw some of Jensen's early emails, you'd probably mock them too. I think Suhail was appealing to Jensen's sense of urgency and responsibility as someone that understands what it's like to grow a small company. The tweet says "30 years after its founding, this guy still acts like a hardcore founder. Jensen is the best tech CEO in the game rn." I read that as Suhail praising Jensen for being so responsive and helpful, not flexing or equating their work. Suhail is also the founder of another "small" company called Mixpanel. No, finding your lunch doesn't make you a founder. Building something and launching it makes you a founder. Ridiculing others who are trying makes you a...?
- MuffinFlavored 3y ago
  "Dear Tim Cook, I sell t-shirts out of my car, therefore I'm a CEO just like you! My iPhone isn't working, you better help me!!!!"

thatguyknows 3y ago

Does anyone get an unpleasant feeling from these typical "founder" types? Something always just feels deeply off about them. They all seem like carbon copies of each other too. Nice response from Nvidia though.