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there is a pattern starting to emerge here on hackernews of highly voted posts by people who present themselves as experts and thought leaders who shamelessly p

there is a pattern starting to emerge here on hackernews of highly voted posts by people who present themselves as experts and thought leaders who shamelessly put their lack of understanding at display. it's frightening.

lynguist 2y ago
Like on Reddit etc, which I deliberately avoid for this reason. The hiding of the vote count and the heavy moderation still help a lot that HN is still a massively better platform than any of its alternatives.
ozim 2y ago
I see it the other way around. People think if someone wrote blog post with technical details and it got upvoted - somehow it has to be an expert.
- tessierashpool9 2y ago
  go the extra mile and click on about and then check out the linkedin profile. i quote: "I graduated top of my class with a BSc in Computer Science [...]. I have a strong background in software engineering and technical leadership"
  - zie 2y ago
    Who doesn't think of themselves as an expert? That doesn't mean they are one.
    - bunderbunder 2y ago
      Why not both? In my career, I have met countless people who are experts in programming in general, but with relatively modest skills in database systems. Which is fine! It's really hard to be truly expert in both. There's a reason why "programmer" and "database administrator" used to be two different professions. I'd like to think that I'm better than your average developer at flogging RDBMSes, but most DBAs I've worked with can still run circles around me when it comes to information modeling and database & query optimization.
      - Tostino 2y ago
        At a lot of companies, there are still full teams of people slinging t-sql or pl/SQL all day long to support their organization. Not DBAs, just developers who primarily work inside the database system their entire life.
        hiAndrewQuinn 2y ago
        I keep my old SQL Server Anki cards alive for just such a use case. It's been a minute since I had to jump into a 3-digit-LOC SQL script that does some arcane financial processing or what have you, but there's a nice steady niche there in case I ever want to throw my hat back into the ring.
pwdisswordfishz 2y ago
Starting?
noduerme 2y ago
eh. This probably shouldn't have gotten so many votes, but it's a little interesting from a logic standpoint. It falls somewhere in the region of a StackOverflow question that makes some people scratch their heads and functions as nerdbait for everyone who knows the answer. These things don't rank for that long on HN, (and I agree that the self-important "expert" blog posture is silly), but I do find them to be a better daily checkin for my brain than actually going on S.O. anymore...
hobs 2y ago
I think that's more a pattern of your understanding growing over time. Most technical writing is actually at the start of the technical journey, there's more people there and its more interesting to talk about strategy and ideas when its not "messy" with internal details and trade offs you make. I encourage folks at any technical level to write, and I encourage folks to check authors work with a critical eye no matter how long the source has been in the industry, no amount of experience can protect you from being wrong.
daswerth 2y ago
The idea that someone should refrain from publishing a blog post about _anything_ unless they are a certifiable expert is not reasonable. Many people (correctly) write to learn, and even if they are publishing just to "present themselves as experts", it's on the reader to determine value.
- izacus 2y ago
  In a world filled with false bullshit, crating more false unchecked writing instead of educating yourself is not a benefit to anyone.
  - DangitBobby 2y ago
    What was false in the article?
  - ozim 2y ago
    In a world where there was less false bullshit people believed smoking is fine and sugar is healthy. Amount of false bullshit doesn’t make qualitative difference. Only difference to make is that people should not take something as truth just because it is written in a book or in a blog post or if person has a degree or not.
Pxtl 2y ago
Or maybe people understand but still think it's dumb and hideously inconvenient? Ergonomics matter.
finnthehuman 2y ago
> starting to emerge here on hackernews It's not getting worse, you're getting better. HN has for a long time been where I go for whatever you call the tech equivalent of watching stoners think they're having a deep conversation.
deleted 2y ago
[deleted]

lynguist 2y ago

Like on Reddit etc, which I deliberately avoid for this reason. The hiding of the vote count and the heavy moderation still help a lot that HN is still a massively better platform than any of its alternatives.

ozim 2y ago

I see it the other way around. People think if someone wrote blog post with technical details and it got upvoted - somehow it has to be an expert.

tessierashpool9 2y ago
go the extra mile and click on about and then check out the linkedin profile. i quote: "I graduated top of my class with a BSc in Computer Science [...]. I have a strong background in software engineering and technical leadership"
- zie 2y ago
  Who doesn't think of themselves as an expert? That doesn't mean they are one.
  - bunderbunder 2y ago
    Why not both? In my career, I have met countless people who are experts in programming in general, but with relatively modest skills in database systems. Which is fine! It's really hard to be truly expert in both. There's a reason why "programmer" and "database administrator" used to be two different professions. I'd like to think that I'm better than your average developer at flogging RDBMSes, but most DBAs I've worked with can still run circles around me when it comes to information modeling and database & query optimization.
    - Tostino 2y ago
      At a lot of companies, there are still full teams of people slinging t-sql or pl/SQL all day long to support their organization. Not DBAs, just developers who primarily work inside the database system their entire life.
      - hiAndrewQuinn 2y ago
        I keep my old SQL Server Anki cards alive for just such a use case. It's been a minute since I had to jump into a 3-digit-LOC SQL script that does some arcane financial processing or what have you, but there's a nice steady niche there in case I ever want to throw my hat back into the ring.

pwdisswordfishz 2y ago

Starting?

noduerme 2y ago

eh. This probably shouldn't have gotten so many votes, but it's a little interesting from a logic standpoint. It falls somewhere in the region of a StackOverflow question that makes some people scratch their heads and functions as nerdbait for everyone who knows the answer. These things don't rank for that long on HN, (and I agree that the self-important "expert" blog posture is silly), but I do find them to be a better daily checkin for my brain than actually going on S.O. anymore...

hobs 2y ago

I think that's more a pattern of your understanding growing over time. Most technical writing is actually at the start of the technical journey, there's more people there and its more interesting to talk about strategy and ideas when its not "messy" with internal details and trade offs you make. I encourage folks at any technical level to write, and I encourage folks to check authors work with a critical eye no matter how long the source has been in the industry, no amount of experience can protect you from being wrong.

daswerth 2y ago

The idea that someone should refrain from publishing a blog post about _anything_ unless they are a certifiable expert is not reasonable. Many people (correctly) write to learn, and even if they are publishing just to "present themselves as experts", it's on the reader to determine value.

izacus 2y ago
In a world filled with false bullshit, crating more false unchecked writing instead of educating yourself is not a benefit to anyone.
- DangitBobby 2y ago
  What was false in the article?
- ozim 2y ago
  In a world where there was less false bullshit people believed smoking is fine and sugar is healthy. Amount of false bullshit doesn’t make qualitative difference. Only difference to make is that people should not take something as truth just because it is written in a book or in a blog post or if person has a degree or not.

Pxtl 2y ago

Or maybe people understand but still think it's dumb and hideously inconvenient? Ergonomics matter.

finnthehuman 2y ago

> starting to emerge here on hackernews It's not getting worse, you're getting better. HN has for a long time been where I go for whatever you call the tech equivalent of watching stoners think they're having a deep conversation.

deleted 2y ago

[deleted]