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Online interactions aren’t any less complex, they’re just different. Newer generations are more online and less fan of an idea of an “office culture”. This all

Online interactions aren’t any less complex, they’re just different. Newer generations are more online and less fan of an idea of an “office culture”. This all seems based on the idea that just because something happened before, the only way to reproduce it is to replicate its setup. Times have changed & people have changed since. Office work will continue to exist but some magical “work culture” isn’t just thanks to the office. And 20 people can change trajectory but they’re absolutely nothing without the 180k to stir the boat.

meta_x_ai 2y ago
Do you have data to prove that? If not, then leaders have every right to go with their gut instincts. Give me an example of a company that is immensely successful (massive growth) like say OpenAI that are fully remote
- ElevenLathe 2y ago
  You're arguing on capital's terms. The company isn't owed massive growth. They are allowed to have it if labor is willing to work under the conditions they provide and if the state continues to allow their incorporation and its related benefits (and they get lucky, presumably).
  - meta_x_ai 2y ago
    That's perfectly fine. Considering OpenAI, Google, Amazon despite their strong RTO policies are attracting the top talent, they don't have worry about pleasing midwits not applying to their companies. Self-attrition by entitled, highly paid mid-performers are the greatest gift to corporations in this economy, where there is fresh batch of engineers wanting to take their place
    - no_wizard 2y ago
      >despite their strong RTO policies are attracting the top talent I suspect its not that simple[0] Never mind the fact, that the sheer size of these organizations means they are full of average tech talent. Go lang was created in part to specifically address the fact that the engineers Google hires in droves needed a simplified language to work productively in a relatively quick manner, consistently. [0]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinecruzvergara/2023/03/02/companies-outside-of-big-tech-are-winning-top-talent-this-year-heres-how-theyll-do-it/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinecruzvergara/2023/03/02...
    - ElevenLathe 2y ago
      So are you a corporate exec? Or just choosing to identify with management for reasons of...psychology? politics?
- gagik_co 2y ago
  Massive growth is your arbitrarily chosen definition of success. Companies that have grown massively required a less competitive environment and the time to do so (with many being founded before fully remote was as common) and/or took a ton of funding (with oldschool investors who obviously see in-office expansion as the needed/natural sign of growth). There are plenty of profitable and growing companies that are fully remote, whether that’s “successful” is just how you want to see it.
- no_wizard 2y ago
  Firstly, do you have any data that proves that it isn't true? You haven't made any data driven assertion here either. Secondly, what is 'massive'? Like, adoption curve growth for many remote first companies is huge, like Zapier, but I digress, that is a very subjective thing. Gitlab has been day one remote. Zapier Deel Posthog Others have transitioned to be fully remote, like GitHub[0] and GitHub has had a second wave of massive growth around the same time and its continued to this day. [0]: https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/09/github-lays-off-10-and-goes-fully-remote/ https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/09/github-lays-off-10-and-goe...
- spjt 2y ago
  Not really a "company" but any number of OSS projects. Linux etc.
v1ne 2y ago
How do you recreate the rich interaction that you have when you meet somebody face to face, when you have to use (a) Amazon's crappy Zoom clone (forgot the name, they forced their applicants to use it, too. It's horrible and couldn't even cope with my German keyboard layout) or (b) some text-based messaging? Even if you replace (a) with a proper video chat solution, it's a much, much narrower channel than real interaction between people where people perceive all these tiny non-verbal signals like changes in posture, gestures, mimics, breathing, and you can actually point a colleague to something with your finger, all in real-time. So, no, from my perspective, online interactions are very sad and simple, compared to real-world interactions. I work in a low-latency field, maybe I'm more sensitive to latency. But I find all those narrow communication channels a nuisance. I find it frustrating to have to rely on a variety of tools to achieve collaboration: Chat, video chat, digital whiteboard, code sharing. There is so much friction, at least in my workplace, to switch between those tools or to combine them. This can surely be improved, but there are things that naturally can't disappear, like latency. Honestly, I'm dreaming of a place where people have to work from the office again. So I can have a Kanban board with paper cards on a board again, for everyone to see, touch, and write on.
- no_wizard 2y ago
  > no, from my perspective, online interactions are very sad and simple, compared to real-world interactions.... All of this is to say, you find it 'sad and simple' and therefore, it is sad and simple? To be completely honest, this sounds like an inability to adapt to change and not using the right tools for the right job (and/or the tool is available, its not being maximally used). Rather, its shoehorning old things into a new era, which of course never works well
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
- ghaff 2y ago
  Pure anecdata. And there are some other factors that include more pre-COVID events and travel. But basically, a fairly hard switch to pure-video conferencing meant that, for the most part, I basically didn't establish new relationships (with some exceptions) to most people before I left. It wasn't sustainable but it was a fairly short runway. More generous travel budgets and more event travel would have helped certainly. But I wouldn't have been happy in a long-term pure WFH environment. (For context, even in a nominally working from office environment I was doing business travel for months a year.)
anal_reactor 2y ago
> Online interactions aren’t any less complex, they’re just different. Exactly why I spend days on chatrooms instead of going out and making friends.

meta_x_ai 2y ago

Do you have data to prove that? If not, then leaders have every right to go with their gut instincts. Give me an example of a company that is immensely successful (massive growth) like say OpenAI that are fully remote

ElevenLathe 2y ago
You're arguing on capital's terms. The company isn't owed massive growth. They are allowed to have it if labor is willing to work under the conditions they provide and if the state continues to allow their incorporation and its related benefits (and they get lucky, presumably).
- meta_x_ai 2y ago
  That's perfectly fine. Considering OpenAI, Google, Amazon despite their strong RTO policies are attracting the top talent, they don't have worry about pleasing midwits not applying to their companies. Self-attrition by entitled, highly paid mid-performers are the greatest gift to corporations in this economy, where there is fresh batch of engineers wanting to take their place
  - no_wizard 2y ago
    >despite their strong RTO policies are attracting the top talent I suspect its not that simple[0] Never mind the fact, that the sheer size of these organizations means they are full of average tech talent. Go lang was created in part to specifically address the fact that the engineers Google hires in droves needed a simplified language to work productively in a relatively quick manner, consistently. [0]: https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinecruzvergara/2023/03/02/companies-outside-of-big-tech-are-winning-top-talent-this-year-heres-how-theyll-do-it/ https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinecruzvergara/2023/03/02...
  - ElevenLathe 2y ago
    So are you a corporate exec? Or just choosing to identify with management for reasons of...psychology? politics?
gagik_co 2y ago
Massive growth is your arbitrarily chosen definition of success. Companies that have grown massively required a less competitive environment and the time to do so (with many being founded before fully remote was as common) and/or took a ton of funding (with oldschool investors who obviously see in-office expansion as the needed/natural sign of growth). There are plenty of profitable and growing companies that are fully remote, whether that’s “successful” is just how you want to see it.
no_wizard 2y ago
Firstly, do you have any data that proves that it isn't true? You haven't made any data driven assertion here either. Secondly, what is 'massive'? Like, adoption curve growth for many remote first companies is huge, like Zapier, but I digress, that is a very subjective thing. Gitlab has been day one remote. Zapier Deel Posthog Others have transitioned to be fully remote, like GitHub[0] and GitHub has had a second wave of massive growth around the same time and its continued to this day. [0]: https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/09/github-lays-off-10-and-goes-fully-remote/ https://techcrunch.com/2023/02/09/github-lays-off-10-and-goe...
spjt 2y ago
Not really a "company" but any number of OSS projects. Linux etc.

v1ne 2y ago

How do you recreate the rich interaction that you have when you meet somebody face to face, when you have to use (a) Amazon's crappy Zoom clone (forgot the name, they forced their applicants to use it, too. It's horrible and couldn't even cope with my German keyboard layout) or (b) some text-based messaging? Even if you replace (a) with a proper video chat solution, it's a much, much narrower channel than real interaction between people where people perceive all these tiny non-verbal signals like changes in posture, gestures, mimics, breathing, and you can actually point a colleague to something with your finger, all in real-time. So, no, from my perspective, online interactions are very sad and simple, compared to real-world interactions. I work in a low-latency field, maybe I'm more sensitive to latency. But I find all those narrow communication channels a nuisance. I find it frustrating to have to rely on a variety of tools to achieve collaboration: Chat, video chat, digital whiteboard, code sharing. There is so much friction, at least in my workplace, to switch between those tools or to combine them. This can surely be improved, but there are things that naturally can't disappear, like latency. Honestly, I'm dreaming of a place where people have to work from the office again. So I can have a Kanban board with paper cards on a board again, for everyone to see, touch, and write on.

no_wizard 2y ago
> no, from my perspective, online interactions are very sad and simple, compared to real-world interactions.... All of this is to say, you find it 'sad and simple' and therefore, it is sad and simple? To be completely honest, this sounds like an inability to adapt to change and not using the right tools for the right job (and/or the tool is available, its not being maximally used). Rather, its shoehorning old things into a new era, which of course never works well
- deleted 2y ago
  [deleted]
ghaff 2y ago
Pure anecdata. And there are some other factors that include more pre-COVID events and travel. But basically, a fairly hard switch to pure-video conferencing meant that, for the most part, I basically didn't establish new relationships (with some exceptions) to most people before I left. It wasn't sustainable but it was a fairly short runway. More generous travel budgets and more event travel would have helped certainly. But I wouldn't have been happy in a long-term pure WFH environment. (For context, even in a nominally working from office environment I was doing business travel for months a year.)

anal_reactor 2y ago

> Online interactions aren’t any less complex, they’re just different. Exactly why I spend days on chatrooms instead of going out and making friends.