Good phrases Manmal. Thanks: "I have the same feelings, and I suspect it's what makes many people keep reading sites like HN." Reading HN somehow makes you fee

Good phrases Manmal. Thanks: "I have the same feelings, and I suspect it's what makes many people keep reading sites like HN." Reading HN somehow makes you feel that you still have a chance, that you are still "training" with the best ones and feeling the "market competitors" (that are represented by HN readers). You didn't abandon the game and accepted to be a failure. You are not "competing" with a low rank community that you can find anywhere. Somehow in an unconscious way society around wants you to be a failure, or better they want you behind them, unless they see you as a god that they think that they cannot surpass. "50 years ago - with our skillset (I assume the average HN reader), we would have been heroes in our local communities - teachers, engineers, perhaps inventors. There was so much low-hanging fruit for people with brains." I'm not sure about what i'm going to say now but I think that in every community there is a limited need for people with brains. Few people with brains are enough. The problem is that nowadays there is a tendency to larger but fewer communities, meaning that less people with brains are needed, and to suceed you'll need "super brains". Not great words but I hope you (HN readers) understand the meaning.