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One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvote

One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. The actual critiques are personalized to the content and, to one extent or another, valid, but the social purpose of the critiques is universal which is that I felt uncomfortable that reading this might mean I have to re-evaluate my worldview and I'm going to dive into the comment section and upvote all the people telling me actually, I don't have to do that. I actually spent over an hour writing 750+ words of my takeaways reading this document and shared it privately with a few founder friends of mine and I briefly considered also posting to share with the community but I took a look at the comments and took a look at what I wrote and decided I didn't have the energy to face the endless onslaught of nitpicks and misunderstandings that are driven, at the end of the day, not by a genuine intellectual desire to reach an understanding, but by the need to prove emotionally that others are not taking this seriously so I don't have to either. All I can do is be vague and say I think this was an enormously valuable piece of writing that is worth engaging seriously for what it is as it might change your worldview in several important ways. But also my larger meta-point is that there's a now near ubiquitous "sour grapes" attitude that's pervaded HN that makes it an extremely unpleasant place to hold a conversation and people reading should be aware of this systematic bias when reading comments here.

wetpaws 2y ago
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Karrot_Kream 2y ago
The "sour grapes" attitude has IMO really started crowding out other content. Pretty much any popular content here just has a flood of social signaling content all about how morally wrong, bad, evil, etc the content is. And if you don't want to pile on the commentary, which is all pretty much the same thing regurgitated in different ways, then your content just kinda languishes at the bottom of the page. I don't really know why this kind of content is so engaging but I guess it is. Kinda like a sports match where everyone just shouts at how bad the other team is or something. EDIT: My pet theory is that it has to do with the general aging of the users here. There's a kind of well-to-do, Western, mid-40s (usually male) social opinion I see upvoted a lot here that I feel like hits the sweet spot of the folks who still read this site regularly. But it's just a theory really.
- __loam 2y ago
  It would help if half the content on this site wasn't highly unethical lol. It feels like the tech industry is having a moment where a lot of us are looking critically at the work we're doing and the effects it has on the society we live in. Sometimes that's not fun but it is important. Sorry if that checks the vibes too much for you.
  - Karrot_Kream 2y ago
    Okay so now what effect are you having by making this ethical criticism? Are you changing the ethical outlook of the industry? Are you making a positive ethical impact? > It feels like the tech industry is having a moment where a lot of us are looking critically at the work we're doing and the effects it has on the society we live in. I think you grossly overestimate HN's prominence in the tech industry. It was where all the founders hung out 15 years ago. It's now just a place where IT workers talk. > Sometimes that's not fun but it is important. Sorry if that checks the vibes too much for you. No I just do what everyone else does which is talk about tech elsewhere. I spent a lot of time over the last 15 years here so I'm sad that the place has changed, but at the end of the day I have several alternatives. Moreover there's plenty of problems in the world out there. A few wars in progress, a genocide or two. My relatives spent the last few weeks in hiding because a government failed. MrBeast's engagement practices are probably the very lowest of my worries. If only HN comments could change the world...
    - __loam 2y ago
      > Are you changing the ethical outlook of the industry? Are you making a positive ethical impact? I try pretty hard to only work on companies that have at least a neutral impact on society. Many of them have had an actively positive one. > I think you grossly overestimate HN's prominence in the tech industry. It's a good thing I wasn't talking solely about hackernews then.
    - GlacierFox 2y ago
      Hey everyone, let's take a leaf out of this guys book and only mention ethical concerns if he deems them worthy - like wars for example. Anything lower than that isn't worth mentioning because it kills the vibes. Wonder if he'll see this as he doesn't use this site anymore and talks with the intellectual founder-boys elsewhere...
paulryanrogers 2y ago
Most of it strikes me as toxic, largely only applicable to YT, with a few soiled gems mixed in there. What are your takeaways? Thoughts on Tate's Hustlers' University?
a_victorp 2y ago
[flagged]
__loam 2y ago
You really are condescending to us over Mr.Beast's management style right now. Hackernews is beyond parody.
- mondobe 2y ago
  One of the biggest (and most imitated) channels... on the biggest video-on-demand platform to ever exist... Yeah, not worth being "condescending" over.
  - __loam 2y ago
    Maybe as a case study for the structural failures of algorithmic feeds. Should founders really be looking at what looks like a toxic micromanagment culture for pearls of wisdom? Maybe I'm just a type C employee who needs to be excised rather than a type A who will pretend they're an owner.
- Der_Einzige 2y ago
  N-gate died FAR too soon.
aliasxneo 2y ago
You're not alone. Lately, I've found myself skimming towards the middle/bottom of comments due to this observation. I suppose the more normalized it becomes, the more people feel encouraged to continue writing with this attitude.
121789 2y ago
What changed your worldview? It was a fine read but it mostly boiled down to project management basics, some format optimizations, and some storytelling basics. I thought it was an interesting behind the scenes look at how seriously they take their “art” but nothing world changing. Which part of the article did that for you?
- paulcole 2y ago
  > What changed your worldview They’re not saying it changed their worldview. Their point is that if a person is just immediately nitpicking it and dismissing it, then there’s probably something in it that can change their worldview. That person’s project management and storytelling skills probably suck (because most people’s project management and storytelling skills suck).
mattmanser 2y ago
It's the weekend on HN, different crowd, often very negative and comments that imho are more akin to reddit quality. I try and remember to not HN at the weekend, obviously forget sometimes. I tend to find sticking to Ask HN is better at the weekend.
LeroyRaz 2y ago
Please do share your thoughts. It seems a shame to let nitpickers ruin the community for others.
cyanydeez 2y ago
One thing that woud help real people deal with internet comments and content is switching from a binary "true" vs "false" dichotomy, eg "this is good", "this is false", etc. That is, everything must be stamped with some version of a binary label. Instead, a trinary should be used, so among true and false, you can have undefined. Or, more importantly for value judgements, "it doesnt matter". And of course, like things in javasvript, everything should probably just live as undefined, and there should be plenty of guardrails before choosing the other states.
mihaic 2y ago
Have you considered that the sour grapes attitude actually comes from an understanding of the world, and how everything has been turned only into profit maximization? And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more? I think I'm one of the sour grapes commenters often, and I've very often tried to have patience to explain in depth where my opinions come from. My greatest frustration is trying to describe for instance why someone like Mr Beast is antisocial (as I actually did a long time ago), and then being met by responses like "he's obviously doing something right to get all those views and he's promoting altruism", responses that obviously never bother to understand what my point was. If think if we really are supposed to improve the quality of discussions, asking more questions should be common when we fundamentally disagree so much. On fundamental disagreements, either the other party is stupid/naive/uninformed or they have fundamentally different principles that we might not understand, and without which a response is just flaming. Later edit: I actually think the document by Mr Beast is exceptionally well written, and most startups could apply the main lessons from it. I still think his output is extremely antisocial.
- aaron695 2y ago
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- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  > And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more? I agree with you on this but I don't think it's a failure. I think people just get tired after a while. They get tired, and then they start displaying their disapproval in ways that require less work. It's just easier than typing out all those words and being ignored. > My greatest frustration is trying to describe for instance why someone like Mr Beast is antisocial and then being met by responses that obviously never bother to understand what my point was It's really tiresome. At some point you start to realize that you have fundamentally different values than the people you're trying to discuss things with, that these values are irreconcilable and that further argument will just make people hate you instead of convincing them. This isn't really about "sour grapes", we have moral objections to what others are doing, and there's no point in trying to have those arguments with people who do those things for a paycheck.
mentos 2y ago
.
- evertedsphere 2y ago
  "my summary"
Waterluvian 2y ago
I kind of agree. “sour grapes” is usually correct. But it’s also usually the least productive when we’re here just talking, not doing.
DaoVeles 2y ago
Absolutely, some days I could be convinced that people would fight back with me saying "water is wet". When you see those really great things here it does restore some faith in the place but they are getting further apart all the time. A real shame.
peterweyand38 2y ago
[flagged]
MuffinFlavored 2y ago
> excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. Not being funny, how often is this the answer: I didn't have one prior, I'm being told what to think by "smart people" online and I make my identity alignment with them. I'm empty and can't think of anything on my own, so when I read something, I add it to a memory bank to bring up later in life in conversation with others to come across as "knowing a little bit about everything"
calmbonsai 2y ago
Um well, Mr. Beast IS a fraud (do a casual search), the content is crass, exploitative, and it's perfectly reasonable to critique a person when they have a personalized brand. This is no different than what's done in ANY entertainment media contract negotiation that takes place with "on-air talent".
- guywithahat 2y ago
  I realize this is semantics but he’s not a fraud, because he delivers on the things he says. If he didn’t spend 48 hours (or however long) underground that would make him a fraud, but he did. The content might be of dubious quality, but it’s not fraudulent
  - blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
    See https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I It alleges that many of the “contests” are staged and artificially manipulated and potentially violate laws around such games. I think to many that might feel like fraud.
  - calmbonsai 2y ago
    I see you haven't done even a casual search.
    - guywithahat 2y ago
      Here's a video titled "$1 vs $10,000,000 Job!" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdjh81uH6FU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdjh81uH6FU). He then proceeds to look at a number of jobs, with a job that make basically no money ranging to an NFL player. It's clickbaity, there are a lot of easy jokes in the episode, but there's nothing fraudulent. He's not lying about anyone's salary, he pays people out in shows where they make money, and nobody is being scammed. All of his videos are like this. I'm not saying you have to like him, but fraud describes something very specific which he is not doing. I'm sure there's some disgruntled employee complaining somewhere, but I have not seen any legitimate complaints about him. All those "Mr Beast is a fraud!?!" videos have no substance, and are just people using his name for views.
GlacierFox 2y ago
Is it just me or is the way you construct sentences jarring and hard to read? Not sure if it's my dyslexia but I had trouble deciphering the first couple of paragraphs/word jumbles.
- usefulcat 2y ago
  Is this meta-meta commentary? I genuinely don’t know but if so I salute you.
  - GlacierFox 2y ago
    Haha yeah. I just found those no-period, scattered paragraphs personally hard to read and take in.
    - cdchn 2y ago
      You're spot on; every paragraph is one sentence, except for one paragraph that is two sentences.
- windowshopping 2y ago
  No you're not alone but I didn't realize it until you said it. And I am not dyslexic.
- gk1 2y ago
  +1 I read the whole comment and still have no idea what point they’re making or even what side they’re on. To the grandparent: if you put in the effort to make yourself more clear, you might get the quality responses you wish for.
- antegamisou 2y ago
  No, this person/LLM model indeed writes way too long sentences.
- TeaBrain 2y ago
  It's not you. The entire comment is a disorganized mess of poorly thought out and non-cohesive grammar. In the section quoted below for example, he starts off by writing about critiques, in which he appears to have immediately grasped for words that aren't suited for the purpose, such as how the nonsensical "personalized to" should have been "focused on". He add the completely unnecessary pseudointellectual "to one extent or another", to make it seem like he is intensely judging ideas. He then says the "social purpose" is "universal" which I'm not following the meaning of at all. I doubt many others are either, but it just seems like another pseudointellectual throwaway. He then follows that with "which is that I felt uncomfortable that reading this might mean I have to re-evaluate my worldview", which is perhaps the most atrociously nonsensical and poorly laid out sentence fragment I've read in a long time. In the part following that, he needed a period before "actually" for it to make sense as he likely intended. Honestly, it seems like he's just trying to write words as they come to him as if in a heated and rash spoken conversation, in which he has a elevated personal impression of erudition, compared to the people he believes he communicating down to. "The actual critiques are personalized to the content and, to one extent or another, valid, but the social purpose of the critiques is universal which is that I felt uncomfortable that reading this might mean I have to re-evaluate my worldview and I'm going to dive into the comment section and upvote all the people telling me actually, I don't have to do that."
xwolfi 2y ago
You are wrong to think public debates are here to reach an understanding between the debaters. Whining that nobody submits to you in a fight is ridiculous: fight, show us your genius, and don't come crying to mommy if we fight back. Your goal is to convince the audience, not your opponents.
- pasquinelli 2y ago
  nobody's actually paying attention, so your goal is really to fight with people online because that's what it takes to get your blood pumping.
bwy 2y ago
I wonder how many of those "sour grapes" commenters have actually read the thing–my guess, not many. Then on the first page of the "silly little book," where I already have the question: "why should I read this? Why would an employee spend time reading this?" Immediately he addresses that: "if you read this book and pass a quiz I’ll give you $1,000." And if you've seen MrBeast videos, it's not inconceivable that everyone who's read the manual has actually received $1,000. Corporate leaders would do well to learn from just this. What are you saying in the all-hands meeting that takes 1,000 SWE-hours that's actually worth that much? What value does your employee handbook/documentation provide (in my experience, a lot of documentation provides negative value by virtue of being so out-of-date, confusing, or just wrong). Jimmy has probably done the math (in a intuitive sense; I don't think he has strong math skills), and it's worth the employee-hours for him to pay them $1,000 to read this PDF to avoid having them waste time or make mistakes they've already made. It's probably worth a lot more than $1,000.
- Timber-6539 2y ago
  Basically treats his own employees like his subscribers. "Stay tuned for the $1000 giveaway!". Have you never watched any of Mr Beast's videos? The fact that you made it to his company is enough incentive for you to go through the onboarding document.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - matthewowen 2y ago
    IME people are actually quite bad at thoroughly reading and absorbing onboarding material. Adding incentives so that they actually do it is probably pretty valuable.
- qwertytyyuu 2y ago
  Heck I’m not a subscriber to him and I read the whole document
- jdgoesmarching 2y ago
Pannoniae 2y ago
I'd personally love to hear your views and thoughts. Either about this subject or in general. You seem very thoughtful and self-aware, which is always a positive thing. Don't let the naysayers get to ya....^^
analog31 2y ago
I have a hypothesis, that once a thread has more than N comments, a sub-comment under the top comment is more likely to stay close to the top of the page, than the same thought expressed in its own top comment. And certainly more likely to be seen than any new thread. Or, people are just more likely to see something closer to the top, that inspires them to comment. Therefore, the top comment in a top page thread is itself a natural comment magnet. I don't know of an antidote to this, except that I try not to do it myself. And wary of the possibility of a pot-kettle situation here.
- matheusmoreira 2y ago
  > I don't know of an antidote to this Display comments in random order. Then it becomes possible to add a top level comment and have it not disappear forever into the bottom of the page, forever unseen. Alternatively, comment as quickly as possible. Ideally, be the first person to comment. Just comment your general thoughts and then fill in everything you wanted to say over a series of edits while simultaneously improving the comment's logic, grammar and spelling. This one goes all the way back to stackoverflow. It's a habit I have never been able to shake to this day because of how active I used to be on that site. Probably contributed to my account getting rate limited here.
zulban 2y ago
"and decided I didn't have the energy to face the endless onslaught of nitpicks and misunderstandings" Meh, just write it well and share, then ignore the feedback. You should really only listen to feedback from smart people that you trust anyway. But I understand your position.
Dig1t 2y ago
So true man, the best part of this site are the positive and thoughtful folks. It's pretty easy to be negative and find flaws in things, it's more difficult and constructive to find the positive and try to learn.
- lxgr 2y ago
  There's positive thoughtfulness, critical thoughtfulness, and knee-jerk reactions of both kind as well. At least personally I appreciate both kinds of thoughtful comments, and it's what's keeping me coming back here. Equating valid criticism with "negativity" on the other hand honestly seems pretty toxic/cultish to me.
ipv6ipv4 2y ago
> But also my larger meta-point is that there's a now near ubiquitous "sour grapes" attitude that's pervaded HN I’ve recently noticed it everywhere. Not just on HN.
danpalmer 2y ago
I really enjoyed the book "The Smartest Guys in the Room" about the Enron scandal for two reasons. The first and more obvious was that it was a deeper look into the systemic issues that led to the failures, which meant it was less "they did a fraud" and more about the way culture evolves at a company to the point that they did it. Perhaps more importantly though, was my takeaway that it mostly wasn't fraud, it was truly innovative accounting that with hindsight was the wrong idea, but if the world worked out just a bit differently, could have led to them winning the market and taking the financial world in a new direction. It's not obvious to me that the fraud timeline is the only one or even the most likely one, we'll never know. "History is written by the victors" is what comes to mind here. Or in another way, it's survivorship bias. I haven't read the Mr Beast document yet but I can imagine what's in it because my previous company had similar material (although likely far less controversial), and I'd bet many commenters here have similar culture documents, handbooks, mission statements, and so on, which when read out of context or through the lens of a future scandal could appear far more incriminating than otherwise. We need to get better at distilling what it is in material like this that is a contributor to the success/failure/scandal, and what... just is... doesn't have an impact, or could have been another way. We need to be better at actually learning from these things in a nuanced way.
- MrVandemar 2y ago
  > mostly wasn't fraud, it was truly innovative accounting that with hindsight was the wrong idea When your "innovative accounting" makes you feel, at some point, that you should be shredding important documents, I think it mostly was actual fraud. You know, criminal behavior. Let's call it like it is: a bunch of rich, extremely entitled people who decided they should, you know, be more rich by abusing their privilage and positions, and who helped nobody except themselves. There's nothing admirable there, just another of those lessons that we ignore continually: cockroaches wear suits, and often expensive ones too.
  - danpalmer 2y ago
    This is the point of the original comment, you have failed to engage in the actual material and have instead just concluded a binary position of "bad". Read the book. I came in thinking "Enron bad" at the beginning, but left the opinion I stated above, that they did clearly commit fraud, but that it wasn't just a bunch of bad people deciding to do fraud one day, that it was a slow transformation from things that were obviously legal, to things that were obviously illegal, where it's actually surprisingly hard to draw a line separating the two. Mark to market accounting for energy businesses doesn't work (in this way at least). We know that now because Enron tried it, legally, and it didn't work, somewhat spectacularly.
the_gorilla 2y ago
I can tell everyone here has something in mind that they're all talking about, but don't want to say specifically what it is. I definitely agree that if you make any sort of substantial post, you're going to get a million low effort replies nitpicking small details. If you try to respond to all of them, you'll either run out of posts or lose your mind. Most of the time people just pick one small detail, post something completely incorrect or unrelated, and move onto the next headline post to respond to.
deleted 2y ago
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snowwrestler 2y ago
You’re not engaging with the linked content either, you just picked this thread to pose a general complaint about conversations on HN. Be the change you want to see! Post your thoughts on the Mr Beast doc as a reply to your first comment and see how it goes.
rtpg 2y ago
Well instead of posting what you wrote you posted this complaint, which just contributes to this vibe. You have the right to vent of course. If you post something interesting people will read it! Sour grapes comments are kinda boring, and complaints about sour grape comments are also kinda boring. If you don’t want certain kinds of conversations in a community, one of the best things to do is to “crowd that out” by just offering positive alternatives, with interesting posts. I have a lot of social complaints about finance, but still love reading about it. Cuz it’s interesting in the abstract!
ants_everywhere 2y ago
What concepts did you feel were new here that aren't beaten to death in standard entrepreneur/hustle porn?
- cdchn 2y ago
  I tried scouring this document for anything novel or insightful and couldn't find anything. Just a lot of spelling errors and run on paragraphs.
kentbrokeman 2y ago
[dead]
troad 2y ago
> One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. In as far as this is a document that says 'do your best, give 110% 25/8, sacrifice everything for the company', most of what I'm seeing here is the same general approval that latter-day HN gives all impractical advice that a very young person might come up with. ('Just do gooderer, all the time!') I don't think the change is that people now are now closed-minded, I think it's more that something like Mr Beast's PDF of peppy twenty-something bromides simply wouldn't have made the front page at all in 2014. This would be over on Digg with the other pop-Internet stories. More broadly, given that the comment section appears around 60-70% positive for Mr Beast, I'm unsure what it is you're actually after. Would you prefer it be 100% positive? Wouldn't that be a huge loss for the intellectual diversity that this site has to offer? Aren't there other, better places for hive takes (e.g. Reddit)? Respectfully, I think the takes you're taking issue with are precisely the remnants of the old, diverse HN, and the takes you're tacitly encouraging are the monoculture that's taken over the rest of the Internet.
rexpop 2y ago
What I find even more tedious is the viewpoint that imagines itself "confronting to a consensus worldview" while echoing mainline meritocratic commercialism. Shades of "What You Can't Say"[0]. 0. https://www.paulgraham.com/say.html https://www.paulgraham.com/say.html
mrmetanoia 2y ago
I agree. We have to raise our personal standards to raise our community standards. The nihilism here is a self fulfilling prophecy and sad to see.
whall6 2y ago
I’m fairly certain most of the “sour grapes” comments are AI generated
johnfn 2y ago
I think this style of meta commentary is more damaging to any discourse than the behavior that you're saying you've identified. Looking over the top comments, other than yours, I see a good majority of people honestly trying to engage with the content. I'm not exactly sure where you're seeing a "ubiquitous "sour grapes" attitude", but it seems to me that your own post typifies such a description more than the rest of the discussion here.
- hnthrowasjkdasd 2y ago
  [flagged]
- rsoto2 2y ago
  I would refute this point but my opinion is actually too based and even scares me.
ghiculescu 2y ago
Please share what you wrote, lots of people might value it despite all the naysayers.
tptacek 2y ago
I've never seen a Mr. Beast video prior to reading this. I thought there was some interesting stuff in it (I have a recent professional interest in video stuff, though let me reassure everyone I don't plan to show up in any), some standard-issue "trying to keep a founding team culture going" stuff, and some stuff that read like self-gratification. I didn't write the PDF off. It's worth filing away. I'd be interested in your takeaways. I did go watch a couple Mr. Beast videos. I can see why people knee-jerk about them here. They are just not my cup of tea, and they're not in a way that really rubs me the wrong way. That's OK! I can be convinced that's just a "me" thing! It doesn't matter; I'm not building too much of "don't like Mr. Beast" into my identity. I take your point, but also get why people might have viscerally negative opinions about this particular subject? I get the frustration with superficial negativity crowding out discussions though.
- weaksauce 2y ago
  > I take your point, but also get why people might have viscerally negative opinions about this particular subject? I don't think it's just the fact that his videos are expensive click bait where he throws money around... it's the fact that he has some very shady, borderline illegal(maybe actually illegal?) practices. the livestream marketing the chocolate to children to win entries into giveaways that he then scrubs from the internet are probably not legal is one example. there are a few videos on how scummy he is. I think the visceral reaction to him as some kind of genius is warranted. that said the pdf has some nuggets of wisdom even if it's from a tainted source.
  - YZF 2y ago
    I'm sure there are management lessons to be learnt from the Mafia ;) There are other tech companies the skirt things like regulatory and other borders. I'm not a fan of Mr. Beast but it's quite a phenomena and human nature being something universal I'm sure there are some interesting nuggets from how that business is run. I also don't get or watch reality shows from more traditional media.
h0l0cube 2y ago
> confronting to a consensus worldview There's a bit of missed irony here that you decrying the 'sour grapes' crowd with 'sour grapes' of your own, and yourself have been upvoted to the top. I do agree this culture of indulged victimhood is really dragging internet discourse down, but you surely can see your own complicity in it?
totetsu 2y ago
It’s just system justification bias
gmd63 2y ago
Hating on "nitpicking" is the funniest thing to me. It's a bold admission that one has abandoned attention to detail. Huge red flag.
- enugu 2y ago
  Yes, correction of a detail is good and not a problem. But using that to mock the central point is a popular strategy in discourse. In the disagreement hierarchy(https://paulgraham.com/disagree.html https://paulgraham.com/disagree.html) this is level 4 or 5, but pretending to be level 6. Like using a bug to say that the software lacks basic value.
- the_gorilla 2y ago
  I wonder if this is meant to be ironic because this behavior is exactly what was being criticized. You just picked one specific detail to focus on and ignored everything else.
  - mydogcanpurr 2y ago
    No, a lot of people on this website value very highly their completely irrelevant nitpicks. I’m starting to think it’s just the kind of mind the tech industry attracts, because I’ve noticed it in some coworkers as well.
  - gmd63 2y ago
    The anti nitpicking attitude is the core point of the parent commenter's post. I agree with sensible prioritization as exemplified in the linked article, as should everyone. But the author of the comment I'm responding to is expressing discomfort with a culture that identifies holes in their reasoning. They're so uncomfortable with having details of their arguments challenged that they aren't saying what they really want to say. I know an "anti nitpicker" who is entirely opposite to that attitude when it comes to their social appearance and perception. One hair on their tie is catastrophic. One publicly searchable webpage that shows a decades old picture of them is an extreme problem that warrants hiring a company to clean up. It's interesting how, in matters that are important to some of these people, seemingly inconsequential and irrelevant details suddenly matter to an extraordinary degree. The anti nitpicking stance is a byproduct of the extreme overvaluation of social perception. Often these people do not like to look like they have made a mistake. And thus they avoid conflict or paint it as irrelevant in belief that it will save their appearance.
sashank_1509 2y ago
The way I understand this is that now HN commentators are filled with what Nietzche would call the “last-men” who have “last-men” values while in the past it was not as widespread. Another site filled with such people is Reddit, where I stopped bothering to comment anymore as it is far more dominated by people in this category than HN. Yes, it is exhausting to read through those comments, more exhausting to argue against them. Not sure if it is worth it anymore, this is probably not a tide that can be stopped. But HN is still one of the few sites that is not wholly dominated by last men, and you can find thoughtful comments that broaden your perspective occasionally. Enjoy it while it lasts!
- Der_Einzige 2y ago
  What a stupid meme. "The last men" is most closely seen in that movie Wall-E, with the humans who are on that spaceship. HNs userbase builds far too much for that. Nietzsche was so garbage, he was just buttmad that Philipp Mainlander and Schopenhauer were 1. much more correct and 2. more famous than he ever was in their own eras. It's also telling that Nietzsche is the foundation behind all of the garbage from the french post-modern neomarxist/critical theorist/situational international folks. You are the thing you hate.
blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
In case people aren’t aware of the “fraud” accusations mentioned in this comment, here’s a video: https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I There are many more discussing all that has come out recently about that channel.
rsoto2 2y ago
He constantly runs illegal lotteries and lies to kids. What is so complex and insightful about your understanding of this situation that you have to hide it in the group chat? Companies like uber and lyft constantly ride the line of illegality and that's how they're able to turn profits. tldr it's not that deep bro, business people are shady and draw ire mostly thanks to decades of business people being shady and drawing ire.
langsoul-com 2y ago
Let's not indite just HN here. It's more the world is the same and this is just an extension of the internet norms. Think toxic game forums. They used to be nice and a good place, but now? It's a hot mess and everyone who wants proper discourse already self selected out.
RobLach 2y ago
Is this linked pdf an example of something “confronting the worldview consensus”? Or the comments here? Not a rhetorical question; confused.
golemotron 2y ago
Nietzsche called it 'Ressentiment'
klik99 2y ago
I think there's plenty to learn from it, but there's two big problems when applying his approach in a more generalized way: a) The youtube market is not like other markets, his strategy is successful because (among many things) the youtube algorithm promotes frequent posting. He knows youtube very well, but it's clear from his other business ventures that he's not good in other markets. I don't think you can translate ALL the stuff there into other markets. b) There's a lot of unhealthy stuff mixed in with the parts that seem like they drive his success. If somebody does X, Y and Z and gets insane levels of success, they may not realize that it's X and Y driving the success, and Z is actively harmful. But I guess it depends on what you consider "harmful" - some might think "harmful" means "hurts the bottom line" and some might think "hurts those lowest on the rung". Either one of those might be true. It's like people who think being an asshole like early Steve Jobs is the way to be a successful leader, when he arguably achieved more lasting impact when he mellowed out. With that context, I think some of the critiques you mention have substance. "He's making low value content" -> I think this is true, because he's optimized for the market he's in. I think it's a legit critique that this strategies may not be sustainable or applicable to "high value content". He even expressly says this: "Not the highest quality videos.. It’s to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible." "the culture of the company is horrible" -> I absolutely think this is worth talking about, and I find it hard to see building a long term company on his approach. The myth that you need to push people to breaking points to be successful is poison. "he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill" -> Well anyone saying that is just wrong. He obviously is very good at what he does. Personally, I don't think it's a good long term business strategy to depend so much on a single larger company, one who has a history of changing the algorithm without warning or explanation. But it's a good, but painful, short term strategy, and he will come out of it perfectly fine whenever he suddenly becomes irrelevant. But there are others who won't/haven't come out with much, and I think it's good to have a discussion if this is right or not. But there are good things there, the critical components, the importance of communication. The direct feedback of "You are my bottleneck" is good, but it easily could turn into passive aggression and ways to pass the buck. I'm sure there's plenty of low quality comments here, but don't just write off all criticism as virtue signalling or whatever. There are def lessons in here, but that doesn't mean it's all above questioning.
- 2y ago
krick 2y ago
> 750+ words of my takeaways <...> I briefly considered also posting to share with the community I'm not going to beg you to share it after all, but just letting you know: if you would, I'd read it.
- grecy 2y ago
  Same
Der_Einzige 2y ago
No one is going to be happy about what I'm about to point out, but reap what you sow HN. This is directly and fully as a result of 1. the current (terrible) set of rules and 2. Dang being a moderator (and this communities unending fawning over his moderation) Fix both of these, and HN would have far fewer issues related to what you are describing. All other explanations of this phenomenon which don't talk about the above two are not even close to on point.
- dredmorbius 2y ago
  Which HN discussion guidelines would you change (add, remove, modify), and what about dang's moderation gives you concern?
screye 2y ago
Could you elaborate on the takeaways that challenge existing priors ? The points in the OP boil down to: * Focus on your product * Hire well * Be extra diligent towards bottlenecks * State your metrics clearly * Communicate often and immediately ________ These are standard guidelines for running businesses. HN commenters are unimpressed because there are no novel generalizable takeaways from his document. For a few years, Adam Sandler was producing low-brow schlock that made 100s of millions in the box office. It was effective. It's not clear if there was a takeaway ________ There is 1 takeaway from Mr. Beast that appears generalizable. Sometimes, for a short duration, you hit gold. During that time, obsessively extract all value you can. Merch, videos, exploitation, what have you. For a solid minute, you're Midas. So touch as many things as you can. Be shameless beyond recognition. Too often, businesses see their hockey-stick moment as a sign of long term sustainable growth. That's a lie (in expectation). A moment is all it is. Wring out your business for every dollar you can extract, liquidate as much as you can, and bail before you're past the crest of the wave. I'm confident that Mr. Beast's Youtube stardom will die in a few years. But, he will leave behind a legacy of obsessive extraction that is unlikely to be matched for quite some time.
bsder 2y ago
> He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. Does this guy know his business? Oh, hell, yes. He clearly knows his business cold. Success always has a significant chunk of luck, but skill is a part of luck, and he clearly demonstrates that skill. However, just because someone really knows their business and does well at it does not mean we simply give them a complete pass. For example, payday lenders know their business very well yet we still consider them to be exploitative and parasitic. This guy is super-specializing in explicitly targeting pretty much mostly teenaged males with purely dopamine hit content with very little benefit (if any and possibly a negative effect) to the audience. He is pushing the video equivalent of junk food to an audience with weak, underdeveloped impulse control. This is going to get pushback, and it absolutely deserves that pushback. > excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. Which priors should I reexamine? The fact that he is effectively targeting adolescent males? The fact that YouTube is all consumed with feeding the ad machine and should be forced out of Google? The fact that social media has turned out to be a pox upon our society?
aaronbrethorst 2y ago
One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. I genuinely do not know what you're trying to say here. For funsies, I tossed this into Claude 3.5 Sonnet with the prompt "Translate this into 7th grade English" (which is roughly Mr Beast's core audience?). Here was its response: I've seen something happening more and more on HN that bothers me. When someone writes something that goes against what most people think, the comments section gets filled with popular replies. These replies are basically just reasons why you don't need to think about changing your mind on this topic. Assuming this is a reasonable analog to your original point, I would say that this definitionally what a mainstream response to contrarianism looks like.
- killthebuddha 2y ago
  I think it’s basically “HN is extremely hostile to iconoclastic ideas”
  - santoshalper 2y ago
    How about even more basic "HN is arrogant."
    - nmz 2y ago
      Reminder to look at the twitter user "shithnsays"
    - nine_k 2y ago
      Bonus points for a self-referential comment! :-]
- johnfn 2y ago
  I think OP is saying: * He thinks most people dislike Mr. Beast, his company, and think he's popular only due to luck. * He thinks this document makes good points, but that most people won't be able to see them due to what they believe about Mr. Beast prior to reading it.
testfrequency 2y ago
I credit HN for being the unofficial hangout for nerd snipers
daedrdev 2y ago
People on HN need to think about how wrong others can be about topics they are knowledgable about, then consider that they might be that person in topics they don't know much about
ajkjk 2y ago
Strongly agree.
sanderjd 2y ago
I think I've been reading this same kind of critique of HN for over 10 years now. And I'm hedging here, I originally wrote over 15 years, but realized that my memory of 2009 might not be that good. But either way, a long time! That doesn't mean the criticism is false. But it's always weird to me when I see it put forward as a new thing.
xkcd1963 2y ago
Stop reading crp on the internet and get back to work, "founder"
homefree 2y ago
HN comment quality has been degrading for a while, I’m no longer that active here because of it (unfortunately). X is a better source in most cases now (if you choose well and only use the following tab).
utfhsess 2y ago
[flagged]
barrkel 2y ago
You are absolutely right that a large % of people, when confronted with evidence of the kind of obsessive focus required for unusual success, have mental antibodies activated which reject the message, to preserve their ego and sense of self-worth. Don't dismiss the entire community because of the loud people and their upvoters though. There are other people here, and they don't necessarily browse HN at a high enough frequency to outvote or outcomment the majority. (I personally think the document is very good, on-point, and great advice for ambitious young people. I'm no longer that young any more, and I'm also aware of a different side: when you push really hard, you can end up burning out. That's the other side of the intensity the document advocates. You can burn out. It's the single biggest reason I don't push so hard these days.)
glmbk 2y ago
For the "sour grapes" metaphor to work the grapes need to be desired at first. This isn't the case here. Most people do not want to be rich at any cost. I might feel some jealousy about Microsoft or wolfram.com, but not about a YouTuber whose massive team produces bland addictive videos, especially if YouTube is full of good videos if you know where to look.
infecto 2y ago
I’ve noticed this a lot too. It happens across multiple topics, and if you present a well-thought-out counterpoint or idea, it often gets dismissed. As for his content, I don’t watch it and don’t have an opinion on it, but the document itself was engaging and well-written. It’s unfortunate that the focus has shifted entirely to the content he produces.
emchammer 2y ago
If you write everything as if you must put your name to it, and then do put your name to it, your writing becomes stronger, and those kind of contrarian-neuroses go away. This account name is not my real name, but I have thought about making an HN account with my real name. Mostly I just try to spend less time on HN these days.
im3w1l 2y ago
Well I spent an entire week writing a 75000 word essay refuting his document that I shared with some select heads of state. No you can't see it, because of your attitude. Your attitude is really very bad. It's bad. Not good.

wetpaws 2y ago

[dead]

Karrot_Kream 2y ago

The "sour grapes" attitude has IMO really started crowding out other content. Pretty much any popular content here just has a flood of social signaling content all about how morally wrong, bad, evil, etc the content is. And if you don't want to pile on the commentary, which is all pretty much the same thing regurgitated in different ways, then your content just kinda languishes at the bottom of the page. I don't really know why this kind of content is so engaging but I guess it is. Kinda like a sports match where everyone just shouts at how bad the other team is or something. EDIT: My pet theory is that it has to do with the general aging of the users here. There's a kind of well-to-do, Western, mid-40s (usually male) social opinion I see upvoted a lot here that I feel like hits the sweet spot of the folks who still read this site regularly. But it's just a theory really.

__loam 2y ago
It would help if half the content on this site wasn't highly unethical lol. It feels like the tech industry is having a moment where a lot of us are looking critically at the work we're doing and the effects it has on the society we live in. Sometimes that's not fun but it is important. Sorry if that checks the vibes too much for you.
- Karrot_Kream 2y ago
  Okay so now what effect are you having by making this ethical criticism? Are you changing the ethical outlook of the industry? Are you making a positive ethical impact? > It feels like the tech industry is having a moment where a lot of us are looking critically at the work we're doing and the effects it has on the society we live in. I think you grossly overestimate HN's prominence in the tech industry. It was where all the founders hung out 15 years ago. It's now just a place where IT workers talk. > Sometimes that's not fun but it is important. Sorry if that checks the vibes too much for you. No I just do what everyone else does which is talk about tech elsewhere. I spent a lot of time over the last 15 years here so I'm sad that the place has changed, but at the end of the day I have several alternatives. Moreover there's plenty of problems in the world out there. A few wars in progress, a genocide or two. My relatives spent the last few weeks in hiding because a government failed. MrBeast's engagement practices are probably the very lowest of my worries. If only HN comments could change the world...
  - __loam 2y ago
    > Are you changing the ethical outlook of the industry? Are you making a positive ethical impact? I try pretty hard to only work on companies that have at least a neutral impact on society. Many of them have had an actively positive one. > I think you grossly overestimate HN's prominence in the tech industry. It's a good thing I wasn't talking solely about hackernews then.
  - GlacierFox 2y ago
    Hey everyone, let's take a leaf out of this guys book and only mention ethical concerns if he deems them worthy - like wars for example. Anything lower than that isn't worth mentioning because it kills the vibes. Wonder if he'll see this as he doesn't use this site anymore and talks with the intellectual founder-boys elsewhere...

paulryanrogers 2y ago

Most of it strikes me as toxic, largely only applicable to YT, with a few soiled gems mixed in there. What are your takeaways? Thoughts on Tate's Hustlers' University?

a_victorp 2y ago

[flagged]

__loam 2y ago

You really are condescending to us over Mr.Beast's management style right now. Hackernews is beyond parody.

mondobe 2y ago
One of the biggest (and most imitated) channels... on the biggest video-on-demand platform to ever exist... Yeah, not worth being "condescending" over.
- __loam 2y ago
  Maybe as a case study for the structural failures of algorithmic feeds. Should founders really be looking at what looks like a toxic micromanagment culture for pearls of wisdom? Maybe I'm just a type C employee who needs to be excised rather than a type A who will pretend they're an owner.
Der_Einzige 2y ago
N-gate died FAR too soon.

aliasxneo 2y ago

You're not alone. Lately, I've found myself skimming towards the middle/bottom of comments due to this observation. I suppose the more normalized it becomes, the more people feel encouraged to continue writing with this attitude.

121789 2y ago

What changed your worldview? It was a fine read but it mostly boiled down to project management basics, some format optimizations, and some storytelling basics. I thought it was an interesting behind the scenes look at how seriously they take their “art” but nothing world changing. Which part of the article did that for you?

paulcole 2y ago
> What changed your worldview They’re not saying it changed their worldview. Their point is that if a person is just immediately nitpicking it and dismissing it, then there’s probably something in it that can change their worldview. That person’s project management and storytelling skills probably suck (because most people’s project management and storytelling skills suck).

mattmanser 2y ago

It's the weekend on HN, different crowd, often very negative and comments that imho are more akin to reddit quality. I try and remember to not HN at the weekend, obviously forget sometimes. I tend to find sticking to Ask HN is better at the weekend.

LeroyRaz 2y ago

Please do share your thoughts. It seems a shame to let nitpickers ruin the community for others.

cyanydeez 2y ago

One thing that woud help real people deal with internet comments and content is switching from a binary "true" vs "false" dichotomy, eg "this is good", "this is false", etc. That is, everything must be stamped with some version of a binary label. Instead, a trinary should be used, so among true and false, you can have undefined. Or, more importantly for value judgements, "it doesnt matter". And of course, like things in javasvript, everything should probably just live as undefined, and there should be plenty of guardrails before choosing the other states.

mihaic 2y ago

Have you considered that the sour grapes attitude actually comes from an understanding of the world, and how everything has been turned only into profit maximization? And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more? I think I'm one of the sour grapes commenters often, and I've very often tried to have patience to explain in depth where my opinions come from. My greatest frustration is trying to describe for instance why someone like Mr Beast is antisocial (as I actually did a long time ago), and then being met by responses like "he's obviously doing something right to get all those views and he's promoting altruism", responses that obviously never bother to understand what my point was. If think if we really are supposed to improve the quality of discussions, asking more questions should be common when we fundamentally disagree so much. On fundamental disagreements, either the other party is stupid/naive/uninformed or they have fundamentally different principles that we might not understand, and without which a response is just flaming. Later edit: I actually think the document by Mr Beast is exceptionally well written, and most startups could apply the main lessons from it. I still think his output is extremely antisocial.

aaron695 2y ago
[dead]
matheusmoreira 2y ago
> And that the nitpicking is merely a failure to express that understanding of the world, especially since it seems like pro-status quo commenters don't care to learn more? I agree with you on this but I don't think it's a failure. I think people just get tired after a while. They get tired, and then they start displaying their disapproval in ways that require less work. It's just easier than typing out all those words and being ignored. > My greatest frustration is trying to describe for instance why someone like Mr Beast is antisocial and then being met by responses that obviously never bother to understand what my point was It's really tiresome. At some point you start to realize that you have fundamentally different values than the people you're trying to discuss things with, that these values are irreconcilable and that further argument will just make people hate you instead of convincing them. This isn't really about "sour grapes", we have moral objections to what others are doing, and there's no point in trying to have those arguments with people who do those things for a paycheck.

mentos 2y ago

evertedsphere 2y ago
"my summary"

Waterluvian 2y ago

I kind of agree. “sour grapes” is usually correct. But it’s also usually the least productive when we’re here just talking, not doing.

DaoVeles 2y ago

Absolutely, some days I could be convinced that people would fight back with me saying "water is wet". When you see those really great things here it does restore some faith in the place but they are getting further apart all the time. A real shame.

peterweyand38 2y ago

[flagged]

MuffinFlavored 2y ago

> excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. Not being funny, how often is this the answer: I didn't have one prior, I'm being told what to think by "smart people" online and I make my identity alignment with them. I'm empty and can't think of anything on my own, so when I read something, I add it to a memory bank to bring up later in life in conversation with others to come across as "knowing a little bit about everything"

calmbonsai 2y ago

Um well, Mr. Beast IS a fraud (do a casual search), the content is crass, exploitative, and it's perfectly reasonable to critique a person when they have a personalized brand. This is no different than what's done in ANY entertainment media contract negotiation that takes place with "on-air talent".

guywithahat 2y ago
I realize this is semantics but he’s not a fraud, because he delivers on the things he says. If he didn’t spend 48 hours (or however long) underground that would make him a fraud, but he did. The content might be of dubious quality, but it’s not fraudulent
- blackeyeblitzar 2y ago
  See https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I It alleges that many of the “contests” are staged and artificially manipulated and potentially violate laws around such games. I think to many that might feel like fraud.
- calmbonsai 2y ago
  I see you haven't done even a casual search.
  - guywithahat 2y ago
    Here's a video titled "$1 vs $10,000,000 Job!" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdjh81uH6FU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wdjh81uH6FU). He then proceeds to look at a number of jobs, with a job that make basically no money ranging to an NFL player. It's clickbaity, there are a lot of easy jokes in the episode, but there's nothing fraudulent. He's not lying about anyone's salary, he pays people out in shows where they make money, and nobody is being scammed. All of his videos are like this. I'm not saying you have to like him, but fraud describes something very specific which he is not doing. I'm sure there's some disgruntled employee complaining somewhere, but I have not seen any legitimate complaints about him. All those "Mr Beast is a fraud!?!" videos have no substance, and are just people using his name for views.

GlacierFox 2y ago

Is it just me or is the way you construct sentences jarring and hard to read? Not sure if it's my dyslexia but I had trouble deciphering the first couple of paragraphs/word jumbles.

usefulcat 2y ago
Is this meta-meta commentary? I genuinely don’t know but if so I salute you.
- GlacierFox 2y ago
  Haha yeah. I just found those no-period, scattered paragraphs personally hard to read and take in.
  - cdchn 2y ago
    You're spot on; every paragraph is one sentence, except for one paragraph that is two sentences.
windowshopping 2y ago
No you're not alone but I didn't realize it until you said it. And I am not dyslexic.
gk1 2y ago
+1 I read the whole comment and still have no idea what point they’re making or even what side they’re on. To the grandparent: if you put in the effort to make yourself more clear, you might get the quality responses you wish for.
antegamisou 2y ago
No, this person/LLM model indeed writes way too long sentences.
TeaBrain 2y ago
It's not you. The entire comment is a disorganized mess of poorly thought out and non-cohesive grammar. In the section quoted below for example, he starts off by writing about critiques, in which he appears to have immediately grasped for words that aren't suited for the purpose, such as how the nonsensical "personalized to" should have been "focused on". He add the completely unnecessary pseudointellectual "to one extent or another", to make it seem like he is intensely judging ideas. He then says the "social purpose" is "universal" which I'm not following the meaning of at all. I doubt many others are either, but it just seems like another pseudointellectual throwaway. He then follows that with "which is that I felt uncomfortable that reading this might mean I have to re-evaluate my worldview", which is perhaps the most atrociously nonsensical and poorly laid out sentence fragment I've read in a long time. In the part following that, he needed a period before "actually" for it to make sense as he likely intended. Honestly, it seems like he's just trying to write words as they come to him as if in a heated and rash spoken conversation, in which he has a elevated personal impression of erudition, compared to the people he believes he communicating down to. "The actual critiques are personalized to the content and, to one extent or another, valid, but the social purpose of the critiques is universal which is that I felt uncomfortable that reading this might mean I have to re-evaluate my worldview and I'm going to dive into the comment section and upvote all the people telling me actually, I don't have to do that."

xwolfi 2y ago

You are wrong to think public debates are here to reach an understanding between the debaters. Whining that nobody submits to you in a fight is ridiculous: fight, show us your genius, and don't come crying to mommy if we fight back. Your goal is to convince the audience, not your opponents.

pasquinelli 2y ago
nobody's actually paying attention, so your goal is really to fight with people online because that's what it takes to get your blood pumping.

bwy 2y ago

I wonder how many of those "sour grapes" commenters have actually read the thing–my guess, not many. Then on the first page of the "silly little book," where I already have the question: "why should I read this? Why would an employee spend time reading this?" Immediately he addresses that: "if you read this book and pass a quiz I’ll give you $1,000." And if you've seen MrBeast videos, it's not inconceivable that everyone who's read the manual has actually received $1,000. Corporate leaders would do well to learn from just this. What are you saying in the all-hands meeting that takes 1,000 SWE-hours that's actually worth that much? What value does your employee handbook/documentation provide (in my experience, a lot of documentation provides negative value by virtue of being so out-of-date, confusing, or just wrong). Jimmy has probably done the math (in a intuitive sense; I don't think he has strong math skills), and it's worth the employee-hours for him to pay them $1,000 to read this PDF to avoid having them waste time or make mistakes they've already made. It's probably worth a lot more than $1,000.

Timber-6539 2y ago
Basically treats his own employees like his subscribers. "Stay tuned for the $1000 giveaway!". Have you never watched any of Mr Beast's videos? The fact that you made it to his company is enough incentive for you to go through the onboarding document.
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
- matthewowen 2y ago
  IME people are actually quite bad at thoroughly reading and absorbing onboarding material. Adding incentives so that they actually do it is probably pretty valuable.
qwertytyyuu 2y ago
Heck I’m not a subscriber to him and I read the whole document
jdgoesmarching 2y ago

Pannoniae 2y ago

I'd personally love to hear your views and thoughts. Either about this subject or in general. You seem very thoughtful and self-aware, which is always a positive thing. Don't let the naysayers get to ya....^^

analog31 2y ago

I have a hypothesis, that once a thread has more than N comments, a sub-comment under the top comment is more likely to stay close to the top of the page, than the same thought expressed in its own top comment. And certainly more likely to be seen than any new thread. Or, people are just more likely to see something closer to the top, that inspires them to comment. Therefore, the top comment in a top page thread is itself a natural comment magnet. I don't know of an antidote to this, except that I try not to do it myself. And wary of the possibility of a pot-kettle situation here.

matheusmoreira 2y ago
> I don't know of an antidote to this Display comments in random order. Then it becomes possible to add a top level comment and have it not disappear forever into the bottom of the page, forever unseen. Alternatively, comment as quickly as possible. Ideally, be the first person to comment. Just comment your general thoughts and then fill in everything you wanted to say over a series of edits while simultaneously improving the comment's logic, grammar and spelling. This one goes all the way back to stackoverflow. It's a habit I have never been able to shake to this day because of how active I used to be on that site. Probably contributed to my account getting rate limited here.

zulban 2y ago

"and decided I didn't have the energy to face the endless onslaught of nitpicks and misunderstandings" Meh, just write it well and share, then ignore the feedback. You should really only listen to feedback from smart people that you trust anyway. But I understand your position.

Dig1t 2y ago

So true man, the best part of this site are the positive and thoughtful folks. It's pretty easy to be negative and find flaws in things, it's more difficult and constructive to find the positive and try to learn.

lxgr 2y ago
There's positive thoughtfulness, critical thoughtfulness, and knee-jerk reactions of both kind as well. At least personally I appreciate both kinds of thoughtful comments, and it's what's keeping me coming back here. Equating valid criticism with "negativity" on the other hand honestly seems pretty toxic/cultish to me.

ipv6ipv4 2y ago

> But also my larger meta-point is that there's a now near ubiquitous "sour grapes" attitude that's pervaded HN I’ve recently noticed it everywhere. Not just on HN.

danpalmer 2y ago

I really enjoyed the book "The Smartest Guys in the Room" about the Enron scandal for two reasons. The first and more obvious was that it was a deeper look into the systemic issues that led to the failures, which meant it was less "they did a fraud" and more about the way culture evolves at a company to the point that they did it. Perhaps more importantly though, was my takeaway that it mostly wasn't fraud, it was truly innovative accounting that with hindsight was the wrong idea, but if the world worked out just a bit differently, could have led to them winning the market and taking the financial world in a new direction. It's not obvious to me that the fraud timeline is the only one or even the most likely one, we'll never know. "History is written by the victors" is what comes to mind here. Or in another way, it's survivorship bias. I haven't read the Mr Beast document yet but I can imagine what's in it because my previous company had similar material (although likely far less controversial), and I'd bet many commenters here have similar culture documents, handbooks, mission statements, and so on, which when read out of context or through the lens of a future scandal could appear far more incriminating than otherwise. We need to get better at distilling what it is in material like this that is a contributor to the success/failure/scandal, and what... just is... doesn't have an impact, or could have been another way. We need to be better at actually learning from these things in a nuanced way.

MrVandemar 2y ago
> mostly wasn't fraud, it was truly innovative accounting that with hindsight was the wrong idea When your "innovative accounting" makes you feel, at some point, that you should be shredding important documents, I think it mostly was actual fraud. You know, criminal behavior. Let's call it like it is: a bunch of rich, extremely entitled people who decided they should, you know, be more rich by abusing their privilage and positions, and who helped nobody except themselves. There's nothing admirable there, just another of those lessons that we ignore continually: cockroaches wear suits, and often expensive ones too.
- danpalmer 2y ago
  This is the point of the original comment, you have failed to engage in the actual material and have instead just concluded a binary position of "bad". Read the book. I came in thinking "Enron bad" at the beginning, but left the opinion I stated above, that they did clearly commit fraud, but that it wasn't just a bunch of bad people deciding to do fraud one day, that it was a slow transformation from things that were obviously legal, to things that were obviously illegal, where it's actually surprisingly hard to draw a line separating the two. Mark to market accounting for energy businesses doesn't work (in this way at least). We know that now because Enron tried it, legally, and it didn't work, somewhat spectacularly.

the_gorilla 2y ago

I can tell everyone here has something in mind that they're all talking about, but don't want to say specifically what it is. I definitely agree that if you make any sort of substantial post, you're going to get a million low effort replies nitpicking small details. If you try to respond to all of them, you'll either run out of posts or lose your mind. Most of the time people just pick one small detail, post something completely incorrect or unrelated, and move onto the next headline post to respond to.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]

snowwrestler 2y ago

You’re not engaging with the linked content either, you just picked this thread to pose a general complaint about conversations on HN. Be the change you want to see! Post your thoughts on the Mr Beast doc as a reply to your first comment and see how it goes.

rtpg 2y ago

Well instead of posting what you wrote you posted this complaint, which just contributes to this vibe. You have the right to vent of course. If you post something interesting people will read it! Sour grapes comments are kinda boring, and complaints about sour grape comments are also kinda boring. If you don’t want certain kinds of conversations in a community, one of the best things to do is to “crowd that out” by just offering positive alternatives, with interesting posts. I have a lot of social complaints about finance, but still love reading about it. Cuz it’s interesting in the abstract!

ants_everywhere 2y ago

What concepts did you feel were new here that aren't beaten to death in standard entrepreneur/hustle porn?

cdchn 2y ago
I tried scouring this document for anything novel or insightful and couldn't find anything. Just a lot of spelling errors and run on paragraphs.

kentbrokeman 2y ago

[dead]

troad 2y ago

> One distressing trend I've noticed becoming ubiquitous on HN is that any writing that is confronting to a consensus worldview becomes flooded with highly upvoted comments that are, in essence, excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. In as far as this is a document that says 'do your best, give 110% 25/8, sacrifice everything for the company', most of what I'm seeing here is the same general approval that latter-day HN gives all impractical advice that a very young person might come up with. ('Just do gooderer, all the time!') I don't think the change is that people now are now closed-minded, I think it's more that something like Mr Beast's PDF of peppy twenty-something bromides simply wouldn't have made the front page at all in 2014. This would be over on Digg with the other pop-Internet stories. More broadly, given that the comment section appears around 60-70% positive for Mr Beast, I'm unsure what it is you're actually after. Would you prefer it be 100% positive? Wouldn't that be a huge loss for the intellectual diversity that this site has to offer? Aren't there other, better places for hive takes (e.g. Reddit)? Respectfully, I think the takes you're taking issue with are precisely the remnants of the old, diverse HN, and the takes you're tacitly encouraging are the monoculture that's taken over the rest of the Internet.

rexpop 2y ago

What I find even more tedious is the viewpoint that imagines itself "confronting to a consensus worldview" while echoing mainline meritocratic commercialism. Shades of "What You Can't Say"[0]. 0. https://www.paulgraham.com/say.html https://www.paulgraham.com/say.html

mrmetanoia 2y ago

I agree. We have to raise our personal standards to raise our community standards. The nihilism here is a self fulfilling prophecy and sad to see.

whall6 2y ago

I’m fairly certain most of the “sour grapes” comments are AI generated

johnfn 2y ago

I think this style of meta commentary is more damaging to any discourse than the behavior that you're saying you've identified. Looking over the top comments, other than yours, I see a good majority of people honestly trying to engage with the content. I'm not exactly sure where you're seeing a "ubiquitous "sour grapes" attitude", but it seems to me that your own post typifies such a description more than the rest of the discussion here.

hnthrowasjkdasd 2y ago
[flagged]
rsoto2 2y ago
I would refute this point but my opinion is actually too based and even scares me.

ghiculescu 2y ago

Please share what you wrote, lots of people might value it despite all the naysayers.

tptacek 2y ago

I've never seen a Mr. Beast video prior to reading this. I thought there was some interesting stuff in it (I have a recent professional interest in video stuff, though let me reassure everyone I don't plan to show up in any), some standard-issue "trying to keep a founding team culture going" stuff, and some stuff that read like self-gratification. I didn't write the PDF off. It's worth filing away. I'd be interested in your takeaways. I did go watch a couple Mr. Beast videos. I can see why people knee-jerk about them here. They are just not my cup of tea, and they're not in a way that really rubs me the wrong way. That's OK! I can be convinced that's just a "me" thing! It doesn't matter; I'm not building too much of "don't like Mr. Beast" into my identity. I take your point, but also get why people might have viscerally negative opinions about this particular subject? I get the frustration with superficial negativity crowding out discussions though.

weaksauce 2y ago
> I take your point, but also get why people might have viscerally negative opinions about this particular subject? I don't think it's just the fact that his videos are expensive click bait where he throws money around... it's the fact that he has some very shady, borderline illegal(maybe actually illegal?) practices. the livestream marketing the chocolate to children to win entries into giveaways that he then scrubs from the internet are probably not legal is one example. there are a few videos on how scummy he is. I think the visceral reaction to him as some kind of genius is warranted. that said the pdf has some nuggets of wisdom even if it's from a tainted source.
- YZF 2y ago
  I'm sure there are management lessons to be learnt from the Mafia ;) There are other tech companies the skirt things like regulatory and other borders. I'm not a fan of Mr. Beast but it's quite a phenomena and human nature being something universal I'm sure there are some interesting nuggets from how that business is run. I also don't get or watch reality shows from more traditional media.

h0l0cube 2y ago

> confronting to a consensus worldview There's a bit of missed irony here that you decrying the 'sour grapes' crowd with 'sour grapes' of your own, and yourself have been upvoted to the top. I do agree this culture of indulged victimhood is really dragging internet discourse down, but you surely can see your own complicity in it?

totetsu 2y ago

It’s just system justification bias

gmd63 2y ago

Hating on "nitpicking" is the funniest thing to me. It's a bold admission that one has abandoned attention to detail. Huge red flag.

enugu 2y ago
Yes, correction of a detail is good and not a problem. But using that to mock the central point is a popular strategy in discourse. In the disagreement hierarchy(https://paulgraham.com/disagree.html https://paulgraham.com/disagree.html) this is level 4 or 5, but pretending to be level 6. Like using a bug to say that the software lacks basic value.
the_gorilla 2y ago
I wonder if this is meant to be ironic because this behavior is exactly what was being criticized. You just picked one specific detail to focus on and ignored everything else.
- mydogcanpurr 2y ago
  No, a lot of people on this website value very highly their completely irrelevant nitpicks. I’m starting to think it’s just the kind of mind the tech industry attracts, because I’ve noticed it in some coworkers as well.
- gmd63 2y ago
  The anti nitpicking attitude is the core point of the parent commenter's post. I agree with sensible prioritization as exemplified in the linked article, as should everyone. But the author of the comment I'm responding to is expressing discomfort with a culture that identifies holes in their reasoning. They're so uncomfortable with having details of their arguments challenged that they aren't saying what they really want to say. I know an "anti nitpicker" who is entirely opposite to that attitude when it comes to their social appearance and perception. One hair on their tie is catastrophic. One publicly searchable webpage that shows a decades old picture of them is an extreme problem that warrants hiring a company to clean up. It's interesting how, in matters that are important to some of these people, seemingly inconsequential and irrelevant details suddenly matter to an extraordinary degree. The anti nitpicking stance is a byproduct of the extreme overvaluation of social perception. Often these people do not like to look like they have made a mistake. And thus they avoid conflict or paint it as irrelevant in belief that it will save their appearance.

sashank_1509 2y ago

The way I understand this is that now HN commentators are filled with what Nietzche would call the “last-men” who have “last-men” values while in the past it was not as widespread. Another site filled with such people is Reddit, where I stopped bothering to comment anymore as it is far more dominated by people in this category than HN. Yes, it is exhausting to read through those comments, more exhausting to argue against them. Not sure if it is worth it anymore, this is probably not a tide that can be stopped. But HN is still one of the few sites that is not wholly dominated by last men, and you can find thoughtful comments that broaden your perspective occasionally. Enjoy it while it lasts!

Der_Einzige 2y ago
What a stupid meme. "The last men" is most closely seen in that movie Wall-E, with the humans who are on that spaceship. HNs userbase builds far too much for that. Nietzsche was so garbage, he was just buttmad that Philipp Mainlander and Schopenhauer were 1. much more correct and 2. more famous than he ever was in their own eras. It's also telling that Nietzsche is the foundation behind all of the garbage from the french post-modern neomarxist/critical theorist/situational international folks. You are the thing you hate.

blackeyeblitzar 2y ago

In case people aren’t aware of the “fraud” accusations mentioned in this comment, here’s a video: https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I https://youtu.be/k5xf40KrK3I There are many more discussing all that has come out recently about that channel.

rsoto2 2y ago

He constantly runs illegal lotteries and lies to kids. What is so complex and insightful about your understanding of this situation that you have to hide it in the group chat? Companies like uber and lyft constantly ride the line of illegality and that's how they're able to turn profits. tldr it's not that deep bro, business people are shady and draw ire mostly thanks to decades of business people being shady and drawing ire.

langsoul-com 2y ago

Let's not indite just HN here. It's more the world is the same and this is just an extension of the internet norms. Think toxic game forums. They used to be nice and a good place, but now? It's a hot mess and everyone who wants proper discourse already self selected out.

RobLach 2y ago

Is this linked pdf an example of something “confronting the worldview consensus”? Or the comments here? Not a rhetorical question; confused.

golemotron 2y ago

Nietzsche called it 'Ressentiment'

klik99 2y ago

I think there's plenty to learn from it, but there's two big problems when applying his approach in a more generalized way: a) The youtube market is not like other markets, his strategy is successful because (among many things) the youtube algorithm promotes frequent posting. He knows youtube very well, but it's clear from his other business ventures that he's not good in other markets. I don't think you can translate ALL the stuff there into other markets. b) There's a lot of unhealthy stuff mixed in with the parts that seem like they drive his success. If somebody does X, Y and Z and gets insane levels of success, they may not realize that it's X and Y driving the success, and Z is actively harmful. But I guess it depends on what you consider "harmful" - some might think "harmful" means "hurts the bottom line" and some might think "hurts those lowest on the rung". Either one of those might be true. It's like people who think being an asshole like early Steve Jobs is the way to be a successful leader, when he arguably achieved more lasting impact when he mellowed out. With that context, I think some of the critiques you mention have substance. "He's making low value content" -> I think this is true, because he's optimized for the market he's in. I think it's a legit critique that this strategies may not be sustainable or applicable to "high value content". He even expressly says this: "Not the highest quality videos.. It’s to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible." "the culture of the company is horrible" -> I absolutely think this is worth talking about, and I find it hard to see building a long term company on his approach. The myth that you need to push people to breaking points to be successful is poison. "he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill" -> Well anyone saying that is just wrong. He obviously is very good at what he does. Personally, I don't think it's a good long term business strategy to depend so much on a single larger company, one who has a history of changing the algorithm without warning or explanation. But it's a good, but painful, short term strategy, and he will come out of it perfectly fine whenever he suddenly becomes irrelevant. But there are others who won't/haven't come out with much, and I think it's good to have a discussion if this is right or not. But there are good things there, the critical components, the importance of communication. The direct feedback of "You are my bottleneck" is good, but it easily could turn into passive aggression and ways to pass the buck. I'm sure there's plenty of low quality comments here, but don't just write off all criticism as virtue signalling or whatever. There are def lessons in here, but that doesn't mean it's all above questioning.

2y ago

krick 2y ago

> 750+ words of my takeaways <...> I briefly considered also posting to share with the community I'm not going to beg you to share it after all, but just letting you know: if you would, I'd read it.

grecy 2y ago
Same

Der_Einzige 2y ago

No one is going to be happy about what I'm about to point out, but reap what you sow HN. This is directly and fully as a result of 1. the current (terrible) set of rules and 2. Dang being a moderator (and this communities unending fawning over his moderation) Fix both of these, and HN would have far fewer issues related to what you are describing. All other explanations of this phenomenon which don't talk about the above two are not even close to on point.

dredmorbius 2y ago
Which HN discussion guidelines would you change (add, remove, modify), and what about dang's moderation gives you concern?

screye 2y ago

Could you elaborate on the takeaways that challenge existing priors ? The points in the OP boil down to: * Focus on your product * Hire well * Be extra diligent towards bottlenecks * State your metrics clearly * Communicate often and immediately ________ These are standard guidelines for running businesses. HN commenters are unimpressed because there are no novel generalizable takeaways from his document. For a few years, Adam Sandler was producing low-brow schlock that made 100s of millions in the box office. It was effective. It's not clear if there was a takeaway ________ There is 1 takeaway from Mr. Beast that appears generalizable. Sometimes, for a short duration, you hit gold. During that time, obsessively extract all value you can. Merch, videos, exploitation, what have you. For a solid minute, you're Midas. So touch as many things as you can. Be shameless beyond recognition. Too often, businesses see their hockey-stick moment as a sign of long term sustainable growth. That's a lie (in expectation). A moment is all it is. Wring out your business for every dollar you can extract, liquidate as much as you can, and bail before you're past the crest of the wave. I'm confident that Mr. Beast's Youtube stardom will die in a few years. But, he will leave behind a legacy of obsessive extraction that is unlikely to be matched for quite some time.

bsder 2y ago

> He's making low value content/the culture of the company is horrible/he's a fraud/it's more luck than skill. Does this guy know his business? Oh, hell, yes. He clearly knows his business cold. Success always has a significant chunk of luck, but skill is a part of luck, and he clearly demonstrates that skill. However, just because someone really knows their business and does well at it does not mean we simply give them a complete pass. For example, payday lenders know their business very well yet we still consider them to be exploitative and parasitic. This guy is super-specializing in explicitly targeting pretty much mostly teenaged males with purely dopamine hit content with very little benefit (if any and possibly a negative effect) to the audience. He is pushing the video equivalent of junk food to an audience with weak, underdeveloped impulse control. This is going to get pushback, and it absolutely deserves that pushback. > excuses for why it's not necessary in this instance to re-examine your priors. Which priors should I reexamine? The fact that he is effectively targeting adolescent males? The fact that YouTube is all consumed with feeding the ad machine and should be forced out of Google? The fact that social media has turned out to be a pox upon our society?

aaronbrethorst 2y ago

killthebuddha 2y ago
I think it’s basically “HN is extremely hostile to iconoclastic ideas”
- santoshalper 2y ago
  How about even more basic "HN is arrogant."
  - nmz 2y ago
    Reminder to look at the twitter user "shithnsays"
  - nine_k 2y ago
    Bonus points for a self-referential comment! :-]
johnfn 2y ago
I think OP is saying: * He thinks most people dislike Mr. Beast, his company, and think he's popular only due to luck. * He thinks this document makes good points, but that most people won't be able to see them due to what they believe about Mr. Beast prior to reading it.

testfrequency 2y ago

I credit HN for being the unofficial hangout for nerd snipers

daedrdev 2y ago

People on HN need to think about how wrong others can be about topics they are knowledgable about, then consider that they might be that person in topics they don't know much about

ajkjk 2y ago

Strongly agree.

sanderjd 2y ago

I think I've been reading this same kind of critique of HN for over 10 years now. And I'm hedging here, I originally wrote over 15 years, but realized that my memory of 2009 might not be that good. But either way, a long time! That doesn't mean the criticism is false. But it's always weird to me when I see it put forward as a new thing.

xkcd1963 2y ago

Stop reading crp on the internet and get back to work, "founder"

homefree 2y ago

HN comment quality has been degrading for a while, I’m no longer that active here because of it (unfortunately). X is a better source in most cases now (if you choose well and only use the following tab).

utfhsess 2y ago

[flagged]

barrkel 2y ago

You are absolutely right that a large % of people, when confronted with evidence of the kind of obsessive focus required for unusual success, have mental antibodies activated which reject the message, to preserve their ego and sense of self-worth. Don't dismiss the entire community because of the loud people and their upvoters though. There are other people here, and they don't necessarily browse HN at a high enough frequency to outvote or outcomment the majority. (I personally think the document is very good, on-point, and great advice for ambitious young people. I'm no longer that young any more, and I'm also aware of a different side: when you push really hard, you can end up burning out. That's the other side of the intensity the document advocates. You can burn out. It's the single biggest reason I don't push so hard these days.)

glmbk 2y ago

For the "sour grapes" metaphor to work the grapes need to be desired at first. This isn't the case here. Most people do not want to be rich at any cost. I might feel some jealousy about Microsoft or wolfram.com, but not about a YouTuber whose massive team produces bland addictive videos, especially if YouTube is full of good videos if you know where to look.

infecto 2y ago

I’ve noticed this a lot too. It happens across multiple topics, and if you present a well-thought-out counterpoint or idea, it often gets dismissed. As for his content, I don’t watch it and don’t have an opinion on it, but the document itself was engaging and well-written. It’s unfortunate that the focus has shifted entirely to the content he produces.

emchammer 2y ago

If you write everything as if you must put your name to it, and then do put your name to it, your writing becomes stronger, and those kind of contrarian-neuroses go away. This account name is not my real name, but I have thought about making an HN account with my real name. Mostly I just try to spend less time on HN these days.

im3w1l 2y ago

Well I spent an entire week writing a 75000 word essay refuting his document that I shared with some select heads of state. No you can't see it, because of your attitude. Your attitude is really very bad. It's bad. Not good.