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Peter Thiel’s CS183: Startup - Class 5 Notes Essay

106 points by smiler 14y ago

nycruz 14y ago
Thanks for posting the notes. I really appreciate it!
keeptrying 14y ago
Thanks for posting! Appreciate the detail!
draggnar 14y ago
This series has been incredibly informative so far. Thanks for sharing.
- deleted 14y ago
  [deleted]
jfb 14y ago
What in the name of the thousand green hells does this have to do with computer science? EDIT: There is of course a perfectly legitimate interest in teaching this sort of thing; it just has nothing to do with computer science. Doesn't Stanford have a faculty of, I don't know, bubble inflation or whatever?
- cududa 14y ago
  This is a course on starting a software startups. Culture is incredibly important to be successful at that. Max and Stephen are brilliant developers. So it's probably good to take cues from them on making a culture to facilitate great creations of computer science. *spelling.
  - jfb 14y ago
    So ... nothing.
  - aswanson 14y ago
    Queues, hilarious. The funny thing is, even though misspelled, it could be made to work. If levchin is interpteted as a producer and anyone listening a consumer.
- mlinsey 14y ago
  I suppose this class ostensibly belongs in the business school if one's foremost concern is preserving the correctness of the university academic department ontology, but as a matter of practice CS students are the best fit for this course, and Thiel probably worked with professors in the CS department, not the business school, in creating it. Does it really bother you that much? I guarantee you that this course does not take the place of any real CS class in terms of filling the requirements for a Stanford CS degree.
azazo 14y ago
Really enjoy reading these, thanks for posting
mkeblx 14y ago
From the post: "the guy said that he liked to play hoops. That single sentence lost him the job" - Max Levchin I know culture fit is critical but where is the line between between not a fit and just having a hobby not shared by the rest of the team?
- alokv28 14y ago
  It wasn't that he didn't get the job because he played basketball. It was that Max couldn't ever imagine himself or anyone else at PayPal referring to basketball as 'hoops' - this speaks to a greater cultural difference where this candidate might not be a great fit with the nerd / D&D culture that was pervasive in the company at the time.
- DanBC 14y ago
  I thought the context would make that quote sound better, but nope, it makes them sound even worse. > PayPal once rejected a candidate who aced all the engineering tests because for fun, the guy said that he liked to play hoops. That single sentence lost him the job. No PayPal people would ever have used the world “hoops.” Probably no one even knew how to play “hoops.” Basketball would be bad enough. But “hoops?” That guy clearly wouldn’t have fit in. He’d have had to explain to the team why he was going to go play hoops on a Thursday night. And no one would have understood him. > PayPal also had a hard time hiring women. An outsider might think that the PayPal guys bought into the stereotype that women don’t do CS. But that’s not true at all. The truth is that PayPal had trouble hiring women because PayPal was just a bunch of nerds! They never talked to women. So how were they supposed to interact with and hire them?
- aristus 14y ago
  Surprise surprise, the next paragraph: "PayPal also had a hard time hiring women." This kind of thinking is what Mitch Kapor calls a "Mirrortocracy". It can work, in the sense that maybe you can recruit enough people just like you, down to quirks of phrasing, and succeed in your mission. There are advantages to belonging to a cohort. It is the reason why people in the military wear uniforms and go through bootcamp. But categorically stating that diversity is wrong is, well, typical of the provincial attitude that caused Levchin to run his companies the way he did. But just because he's rich doesn't mean he's right.
chubot 14y ago
The bit about respecting your coworkers, rather than simply being nice, really struck a chord. When I think back, the worst working situation I had was the one where I lost respect for my coworkers. I think it's an important question to ask yourself. If the answer is no, it's time to move on.
dirtyaura 14y ago
For me, these class notes are the most thought-provoking stuff that has surfaced HN for a while. The first few lectures took this bird-eye view to entrepreneurship, which was very refreshing. Thiel's view about competition vs monopolies, or as he puts it, globalization vs technology, was a new point of view to me. And this more practical discussion about company culture is quite spot on in my experience: argumentative culture is better than too nice culture.
- tonecluster 14y ago
  It depends about what you're arguing. A "python vs. nodejs" argument carried on for days isn't valuable; other arguments w.r.t. tech/engineering might be. Related: An advantage of a "non-diverse" engineering culture is so the arguments can focus on meaningful topics that push the company forward, and not on topics that arise from basic, core cultural differences
  - dirtyaura 14y ago
    Yes, I agree, what I meant to express is that the discussion between Max, Peter and Thiel captures quite well that you should have arguments about important things and that too nice culture can be also toxic as it leads to these passive-aggressive expressions of frustration. It hurted to read and realize that as I've been personally guilty of latter in certain occasions.
ivanzhao 14y ago
Nothing betters a fresh and profound point of view on the things you think about everyday.
stcredzero 14y ago
PayPal chose C++ early on. It’s kind of crappy language. There’s plenty to complain about. But the founding engineers never argued about it. Anyone that did want to argue about it wouldn’t have fit in. Arguing would have impeded progress. ...if there’s a strong sense of what’s right already, don’t argue about it. I found that interesting. This suggests the team is important, but the language is not.
srconstantin 14y ago
This is very informative. The only thing I'd quibble with is the claim that teams should not be diverse. I think, unless everyone is a generalist, there's no way to start a company without some diversity of skills. The other day, another mathematician told me "We should start a company together," and it sounded like a terrible idea. A mathematician needs to work with a great web developer, or a finance expert, or some other kind of complement.

106 points by smiler 14y ago

nycruz 14y ago

Thanks for posting the notes. I really appreciate it!

keeptrying 14y ago

Thanks for posting! Appreciate the detail!

draggnar 14y ago

This series has been incredibly informative so far. Thanks for sharing.

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]

jfb 14y ago

What in the name of the thousand green hells does this have to do with computer science? EDIT: There is of course a perfectly legitimate interest in teaching this sort of thing; it just has nothing to do with computer science. Doesn't Stanford have a faculty of, I don't know, bubble inflation or whatever?

cududa 14y ago
This is a course on starting a software startups. Culture is incredibly important to be successful at that. Max and Stephen are brilliant developers. So it's probably good to take cues from them on making a culture to facilitate great creations of computer science. *spelling.
- jfb 14y ago
  So ... nothing.
- aswanson 14y ago
  Queues, hilarious. The funny thing is, even though misspelled, it could be made to work. If levchin is interpteted as a producer and anyone listening a consumer.
mlinsey 14y ago
I suppose this class ostensibly belongs in the business school if one's foremost concern is preserving the correctness of the university academic department ontology, but as a matter of practice CS students are the best fit for this course, and Thiel probably worked with professors in the CS department, not the business school, in creating it. Does it really bother you that much? I guarantee you that this course does not take the place of any real CS class in terms of filling the requirements for a Stanford CS degree.

azazo 14y ago

Really enjoy reading these, thanks for posting

mkeblx 14y ago

From the post: "the guy said that he liked to play hoops. That single sentence lost him the job" - Max Levchin I know culture fit is critical but where is the line between between not a fit and just having a hobby not shared by the rest of the team?

alokv28 14y ago
It wasn't that he didn't get the job because he played basketball. It was that Max couldn't ever imagine himself or anyone else at PayPal referring to basketball as 'hoops' - this speaks to a greater cultural difference where this candidate might not be a great fit with the nerd / D&D culture that was pervasive in the company at the time.
DanBC 14y ago
I thought the context would make that quote sound better, but nope, it makes them sound even worse. > PayPal once rejected a candidate who aced all the engineering tests because for fun, the guy said that he liked to play hoops. That single sentence lost him the job. No PayPal people would ever have used the world “hoops.” Probably no one even knew how to play “hoops.” Basketball would be bad enough. But “hoops?” That guy clearly wouldn’t have fit in. He’d have had to explain to the team why he was going to go play hoops on a Thursday night. And no one would have understood him. > PayPal also had a hard time hiring women. An outsider might think that the PayPal guys bought into the stereotype that women don’t do CS. But that’s not true at all. The truth is that PayPal had trouble hiring women because PayPal was just a bunch of nerds! They never talked to women. So how were they supposed to interact with and hire them?
aristus 14y ago
Surprise surprise, the next paragraph: "PayPal also had a hard time hiring women." This kind of thinking is what Mitch Kapor calls a "Mirrortocracy". It can work, in the sense that maybe you can recruit enough people just like you, down to quirks of phrasing, and succeed in your mission. There are advantages to belonging to a cohort. It is the reason why people in the military wear uniforms and go through bootcamp. But categorically stating that diversity is wrong is, well, typical of the provincial attitude that caused Levchin to run his companies the way he did. But just because he's rich doesn't mean he's right.

chubot 14y ago

The bit about respecting your coworkers, rather than simply being nice, really struck a chord. When I think back, the worst working situation I had was the one where I lost respect for my coworkers. I think it's an important question to ask yourself. If the answer is no, it's time to move on.

dirtyaura 14y ago

For me, these class notes are the most thought-provoking stuff that has surfaced HN for a while. The first few lectures took this bird-eye view to entrepreneurship, which was very refreshing. Thiel's view about competition vs monopolies, or as he puts it, globalization vs technology, was a new point of view to me. And this more practical discussion about company culture is quite spot on in my experience: argumentative culture is better than too nice culture.

tonecluster 14y ago
It depends about what you're arguing. A "python vs. nodejs" argument carried on for days isn't valuable; other arguments w.r.t. tech/engineering might be. Related: An advantage of a "non-diverse" engineering culture is so the arguments can focus on meaningful topics that push the company forward, and not on topics that arise from basic, core cultural differences
- dirtyaura 14y ago
  Yes, I agree, what I meant to express is that the discussion between Max, Peter and Thiel captures quite well that you should have arguments about important things and that too nice culture can be also toxic as it leads to these passive-aggressive expressions of frustration. It hurted to read and realize that as I've been personally guilty of latter in certain occasions.

ivanzhao 14y ago

Nothing betters a fresh and profound point of view on the things you think about everyday.

stcredzero 14y ago

PayPal chose C++ early on. It’s kind of crappy language. There’s plenty to complain about. But the founding engineers never argued about it. Anyone that did want to argue about it wouldn’t have fit in. Arguing would have impeded progress. ...if there’s a strong sense of what’s right already, don’t argue about it. I found that interesting. This suggests the team is important, but the language is not.

srconstantin 14y ago

This is very informative. The only thing I'd quibble with is the claim that teams should not be diverse. I think, unless everyone is a generalist, there's no way to start a company without some diversity of skills. The other day, another mathematician told me "We should start a company together," and it sounded like a terrible idea. A mathematician needs to work with a great web developer, or a finance expert, or some other kind of complement.