10 ms·

I am surprised people reduced this article as just another pet rock. Dude's journey has some interesting nuggets. He knows how to time box himself and build th

by didip 3y ago

I am surprised people reduced this article as just another pet rock. Dude's journey has some interesting nuggets. He knows how to time box himself and build the smallest MVP that will actually make money. And his journey is not an overnight success either, it took him years to build everything including his social presence. Compare that to a W-2 job where you just have to show up 9am-5pm. HN is showing its overly critical self again, just like when Dropbox first appeared on HN.

mt_ 3y ago
He's a good marketeer, I'll give you that. Just this week I've seen one of his tweets being promoted on X and now he's top of hacker news on my feed. Not particularly interested in his tools but congratulations on his way to achieve engagement.
- Existenceblinks 3y ago
  I mute all of these guys who have posted 10 times+ a day. If everyone doing this, there will be lots of garbage.
nomilk 3y ago
> HN is showing its overly critical self again, just like when Dropbox first appeared on HN Was HN overly critical of Dropbox? If so, how so? (genuinely curious) I did some digging and found some interesting sources but didn't come across anything overly critical of Dropbox in its early years (yet): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=dhouston https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=dhouston https://hn.algolia.com/?dateEnd=1253750400&dateRange=custom&dateStart=337996800&page=0&prefix=false&query=dropbox&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateEnd=1253750400&dateRange=custom&... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR7tJ8wAI3M&t=27s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR7tJ8wAI3M&t=27s
- satvikpendem 3y ago
  When someone mentions HN and Dropbox, they are usually mentioning the infamous comment by BrandonM which is the top comment in your first link.
  - nomilk 3y ago
    Hmm.. that seemed like perfectly reasonable criticism to me, the kind that informed the founder of the gulf between users' current understanding and the level they'd need to see the value in the product (i.e. very useful to a founder). But I guess looking back now it's easy to view it with levity; it could have felt extremely harsh at the time (although Drew does manage a few smiley emojis throughout his answer so he seemed to have taken it well).
    - ferfumarma 3y ago
      It's not infamous because the skepticism of dropbox was wrong (though it obviously was...) It's infamous because Drew made a point of coming back as a billionaire to call out and shame brandonm; something that seemed unnecessarily petty when you're holding a billion dollars. https://zedshaw.com/blog/2018-03-25-the-billionaires-vs-brandonm/ https://zedshaw.com/blog/2018-03-25-the-billionaires-vs-bran...
      - satvikpendem 3y ago
        No, it is infamous precisely because people, especially developers, on HN discount the value of good user experience. No one but the most technical will set up their own FTP server to rsync files back and forth, but they will drag and drop files into a folder that "magically" syncs. To say it more flippantly, this is why Drew is a billionaire and BrandonM is not.
        ForHackernews 3y ago
        IMHO this is the difference between real innovation and productization. The invention of the transistor is a real innovation, the transistor radio is a mere product. That's not to say products don't have value, but they're just... not as impressive to me. Nothing that Dropbox does (or did? is it still around?) is technically innovative. I guess it's nice for that rich guy that he identified a user-friendly box that people would pay for.
shrimpx 3y ago
I think the guy’s aesthetic just turns people off here. He seems intensely invested in how to make virality happen in any way possible, and building simplistic stuff that’s not advancing the state of tech. People here want to see technical contributions and organic success. It’s kind of ironic since this is a forum made by a VC company, but I doubt the Tony guy could get into YC with his ideas, despite his 70k followers and 40k mrr.
- noident 3y ago
  Why would Tony want to get into YC? He's already making enough money that he "hit the brakes" while answering to no one. Sounds like a better deal to me than being some tech gazillionaire's sharecropper.
  - shrimpx 3y ago
    Was just talking myself through why this forum would be unfriendly to this guy Tony. A forum that is run by YCombinator, a company that presumably values entrepreneurship. And my take is that both this forum and YC are fairly aligned on "high impact" ideas and don't value people like Tony, monetizing basic ideas using social media influence.
    - manicennui 3y ago
      Really? Most YC startups do not seem to be high impact.
    - kyawzazaw 3y ago
      YC == high impact? Have you seen the cohorts of startups YC has funded?
      - shrimpx 3y ago
        Point taken. I think they strive for high impact, at least high market impact, in the application phase. What they end up with doesn't reflect what they want, kind of by definition. The extreme majority of YC startups fail.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

by didip 3y ago

mt_ 3y ago

He's a good marketeer, I'll give you that. Just this week I've seen one of his tweets being promoted on X and now he's top of hacker news on my feed. Not particularly interested in his tools but congratulations on his way to achieve engagement.

Existenceblinks 3y ago
I mute all of these guys who have posted 10 times+ a day. If everyone doing this, there will be lots of garbage.

nomilk 3y ago

> HN is showing its overly critical self again, just like when Dropbox first appeared on HN Was HN overly critical of Dropbox? If so, how so? (genuinely curious) I did some digging and found some interesting sources but didn't come across anything overly critical of Dropbox in its early years (yet): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=dhouston https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=dhouston https://hn.algolia.com/?dateEnd=1253750400&dateRange=custom&dateStart=337996800&page=0&prefix=false&query=dropbox&sort=byPopularity&type=story https://hn.algolia.com/?dateEnd=1253750400&dateRange=custom&... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR7tJ8wAI3M&t=27s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dR7tJ8wAI3M&t=27s

satvikpendem 3y ago
When someone mentions HN and Dropbox, they are usually mentioning the infamous comment by BrandonM which is the top comment in your first link.
- nomilk 3y ago
  Hmm.. that seemed like perfectly reasonable criticism to me, the kind that informed the founder of the gulf between users' current understanding and the level they'd need to see the value in the product (i.e. very useful to a founder). But I guess looking back now it's easy to view it with levity; it could have felt extremely harsh at the time (although Drew does manage a few smiley emojis throughout his answer so he seemed to have taken it well).
  - ferfumarma 3y ago
    It's not infamous because the skepticism of dropbox was wrong (though it obviously was...) It's infamous because Drew made a point of coming back as a billionaire to call out and shame brandonm; something that seemed unnecessarily petty when you're holding a billion dollars. https://zedshaw.com/blog/2018-03-25-the-billionaires-vs-brandonm/ https://zedshaw.com/blog/2018-03-25-the-billionaires-vs-bran...
    - satvikpendem 3y ago
      No, it is infamous precisely because people, especially developers, on HN discount the value of good user experience. No one but the most technical will set up their own FTP server to rsync files back and forth, but they will drag and drop files into a folder that "magically" syncs. To say it more flippantly, this is why Drew is a billionaire and BrandonM is not.
      - ForHackernews 3y ago
        IMHO this is the difference between real innovation and productization. The invention of the transistor is a real innovation, the transistor radio is a mere product. That's not to say products don't have value, but they're just... not as impressive to me. Nothing that Dropbox does (or did? is it still around?) is technically innovative. I guess it's nice for that rich guy that he identified a user-friendly box that people would pay for.

shrimpx 3y ago

I think the guy’s aesthetic just turns people off here. He seems intensely invested in how to make virality happen in any way possible, and building simplistic stuff that’s not advancing the state of tech. People here want to see technical contributions and organic success. It’s kind of ironic since this is a forum made by a VC company, but I doubt the Tony guy could get into YC with his ideas, despite his 70k followers and 40k mrr.

noident 3y ago
Why would Tony want to get into YC? He's already making enough money that he "hit the brakes" while answering to no one. Sounds like a better deal to me than being some tech gazillionaire's sharecropper.
- shrimpx 3y ago
  Was just talking myself through why this forum would be unfriendly to this guy Tony. A forum that is run by YCombinator, a company that presumably values entrepreneurship. And my take is that both this forum and YC are fairly aligned on "high impact" ideas and don't value people like Tony, monetizing basic ideas using social media influence.
  - manicennui 3y ago
    Really? Most YC startups do not seem to be high impact.
  - kyawzazaw 3y ago
    YC == high impact? Have you seen the cohorts of startups YC has funded?
    - shrimpx 3y ago
      Point taken. I think they strive for high impact, at least high market impact, in the application phase. What they end up with doesn't reflect what they want, kind of by definition. The extreme majority of YC startups fail.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]