7 ms·
I DM'd a Korean presidential candidate and ended up building his core campaign
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- tt_dev 10mo agoSoon to be a Netflix series
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoI’m deeply honored. Thank you.
- b3lvedere 10mo agoThas was quite fun to read. Thank you for sharing this short time of your (development) life, including all the reasons and logic on why and how.
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThank you so much for reading it. I’m really glad you enjoyed it.
- Jotra7 10mo ago[dead]
- deaux 10mo ago[flagged]
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoI’m not familiar with the situation you’re referring to, but my experience was different. From my side, the collaboration was positive and genuinely respectful. Just wanted to share another perspective.
- philipallstar 10mo agoBy the sounds of it you're sharing the only perspective with any validity so far.
- mananaysiempre 10mo agoThat isn’t necessarily “different”. Someone with truly horrifying opinions can be genuinely respectful and pleasant to work with, unless you fall into the wrong social group. (I know nothing about this guy’s opinions and don’t have much reason to care, either, I just feel the need to point out how people tend to overestimate the alignment between “nice people” and “people I agree with”. Much as they do the one between “nice people” and “people it’s worthwhile to listen to”, but that’s a story for another day.)
- wjsdj2009 10mo ago@mananaysiempre I completely agree with your point.
- MisterTea 10mo ago> Someone with truly horrifying opinions can be genuinely respectful and pleasant to work with, unless you fall into the wrong social group. This is how psychopathic tyranny and bullying works "I'm nice and friendly so long as I get my way." I worked with a manager just like this. Super friendly guy until something doesn't go his way and he'll rip you apart in front of everyone. Also the kind of person who manipulates everyone into doing all his work for him while he spent most of his time looking at sports cars and tattooed women on line. Being overly nice and friendly in a position of power is a HUGE red flag for me because it inevitably is a front for manipulation.
- mananaysiempre 10mo agoThat’s a thing, but not the thing I was talking about. I was talking about the existence of people who are just nice and pleasant in the normal healthy manner in their ordinary lives, except they hold some opinions that you (or I, and possibly even not both of us) would find horrifying. (That description actually applies to most people who have ever lived, but that they exist among our contemporaries is both more stark and more important. It makes me much more averse to being $NOTNICE to people who are $WRONG, because I don’t think I would want to live when people habitually were, and perhaps even thought it was virtuous to be, not nice to those they know are in some way morally wrong.)
- mothballed 10mo agoThe bigger the loon, the more impressive the successes of campaign professionals. Loons are also useful stepping stones. Use them for career progression and then cast them aside, you could even claim they abused you or took advantage of you and that you're excited to help <X> next who actually cares about the people.
- baiac 10mo ago[flagged]
- deaux 10mo agoNot entirely sure how conservatism is related to either - DOGE is far removed from conservativsm, and the second topic I talked about is even less related to it. Both are views by the politician from this politican who this entire article is about, sounds pretty related to me. Very strange downvotes as well, not used to that here. I guess they'll remain now that above has been flagged.
- davidw 10mo agoWho you work with certainly matters, but it does show that it's incredibly easy to get a foot in the door with a lot of political things. People complain so much about politics as being this completely foreign and detached thing. But it's not if you put a bit of effort into it.
- mothballed 10mo agoWell yeah of course it's not hard to get involved in politics, if the involvement is supporting people who are rich and powerful even if it is via the use of a more modest looking young mouthpiece. OP was supporting a conservative party, so basically going with the flow of a bunch of what a bunch of influential and rich people wanted as their pawn. If you have something that is of little consequence to the rich, like mothers against drunk driving or something, sure you can probably get it done as it's a token gesture and the powerful just pull strings to get out of those prosecution anyways. If you look at actually trying to move the meter away from the status quo of the rich and powerful, rather than just repainting the pieces on the chess board, you see politicians like Bernie Sanders or Ron Paul found the whole thing rigged against them. Bernie was railroaded by the upper echelons of his own party and Ron Paul found his name magically erased from practically all the talks on the high level debates in the press to the point they would just skip over his name in the primary poll rankings.
- davidw 10mo agoIt's incredibly easy to get involved with people like Mamdani or Seattle's Katie Wilson or so many others, if that's your political angle. The same is true on the other side. We should be encouraging people to be more involved. That helps shape outcomes.
- mothballed 10mo agoKatie Wilson's claim to fame is doing the bidding of rich and powerful King County Metro union gang / alias "ATU" for the purposes of using exploitive taxes to take from the population of Seattle (who have infamously been fleeced on massive gouged public transit construction costs) and reshuffle the money to cushy transit union lobby and their benefactors so their precious fiefdom would not be downsized. She then created a payroll tax to enrich rich contractors to create a tiny amount of "affordable housing" (buzz word used to enrich construction contractors at public cost) for a select few. She is basically a shining beacon of a mouthpiece for the rich and powerful as they are all too happy to be the benefactors of her tax policies that largely socialize costs and privatize the earnings albeit under a false flag of helping the poor. Mamdani has been legally barred from the Presidency, the position we are discussing. He simply cannot. In fact, I suspect that is part of the reason why Trump has been so weirdly chum with him, he's simply not a threat for the presidency and never will be.
- hitekker 10mo agoDo you have links to back up your claims? The only context I have is that the OP helped a right-of-center political candidate in his country of origin.
- robertkoss 10mo agoThat was a great read!
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThanks a lot! Glad you enjoyed it!
- joncrane 10mo agoI thought this was a fascinating story. Also cool to see the technical details like AWS in there.
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThanks a lot! Glad you enjoyed it :)
- devsda 10mo agoIts an interesting read for sure. With those little takeaways in between like talking to users first to understand their requirements, building an mvp and shipping it as early as possible I was half expecting the article ending with the kind of startup lessons/wisdom you typically see here on HN. But I'm really glad it wasnt. Not everything has to have a grand lesson or takeaway. I enjoyed reading your once in a lifetime experience.
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThanks for reading! I wanted to tell the story as it happened, rather than turning it into a set of principles or advice. Happy to hear you enjoyed the ride :)
- jezzamon 10mo agoEnjoyed reading this! Nice job in throwing together something polished in such a short time
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThank you! It was chaotic but fun to build something real under that time pressure. Glad you enjoyed the read!
- roetlich 10mo agoInteresting! The article talks mostly about how this all worked, but rarely about what was actually discussed. Which opinions of the party do you like or support?
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThanks for the question! I’d prefer not to dive into policy positions here — the main focus of my post was the product-building process and what it was like to work behind the scenes.
- rafram 10mo agoYou write: > I want to see what it would look like if someone like this had more power and responsibility. You were attracted to his campaign because of his policy positions, which most people see as dangerous and offensive.
- Jotra7 10mo agoHe won't answer this because he knows it's abhorrent...
- rPlayer6554 10mo agoThanks for sharing! Really admire your bravery and trying new things.
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoThank you so much! I really appreciate it.
- cm2012 10mo agoNeat. I have volunteered for political campaigns in the US before, but didnt find it rewarding.
- skybrian 10mo agoHere is the politician’s Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Jun-seok https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lee_Jun-seok
- skybrian 10mo agoThese parts jumped out: > He has been noted for his staunch antifeminism and support from South Korean idaenam (young men). … > He became popular in the 20s and 30s due to his opposing stance against political correctness such as "faux feminism," introducing reforms supporting meritocracy rather than outright equality of outcome. I know only a little about Korean politics, enough to know that it’s very dramatic with wild stuff happening, but not really to understand it. From the outside, the politics around feminism there seems rather strange. > Lee was an early proponent of the finger pinching conspiracy theory, a claim alleging hidden radical feminist messaging in advertisements Speaking of strange. > Lee's advocacy of merit-based processes such as exam scores, credentials, and measurable qualifications has been viewed by supporters as aligning with younger voters' expectations of fair competition. I suppose all the political content was left out of the linked article, but it would be nice to have more context. Also, looks like he’s at least somewhat technical: > After graduating from Harvard University in 2007, Lee returned to Korea to perform military duties working as a software developer (alternative military service as industrial technical personnel) at 'Innotive', an image browsing software startup, a subsidiary of Nexon. > After completing his national service, Lee prepared to start his own venture. He received funding from the venture startup program backed by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups on 5 August 2011 and founded Classe Studio: an ed-tech startup that developed personalized tutoring software and workplace training applications.
- ricardobeat 10mo agoWhoa, that was an actual thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finger_pinching_conspiracy_theory https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finger_pinching_conspiracy_the... Weird diseases of a chronically online generation.
- deaux 10mo ago
- lacoolj 10mo ago> ... and to find out whether things like this happen in other countries as well. I didn't DM anyone, and I didn't run the campaign, but there happened to be the John Edwards campaign HQ near me so I walked inside and said I could help do their IT, next day I was a full-on volunteer. They took me to Charleston for a rally (which was cool cuz I never been) and even got me a jacket with my name and the campaign logo on it. Was pretty nifty at the time. Few months later they hired me and sent me to New Hampshire for the primary. Wasn't long after that that we were no longer in the running, but was great experience. Highly recommend more young people attempt cold walk-ins/calls/DMs like this article mentions.
- euroderf 10mo agoSeconded. Political campaigns are fun. And if you're not sure it's for you, start by volunteering for a local campaign.
- varnaud 10mo agoI don't like that particular presidential candidate but this was an interesting read. Thanks for the insight into the details of a campaign like this. I like your writing style.
- wjsdj2009 10mo agoI’m glad the story itself was enjoyable regardless of political alignment. Thank you.
- jon9544hn 10mo agoMan that’s a dope experience for sure! Congrats!
- guizadillas 10mo agoGreat technical work, horrible candidate
- agentifysh 10mo agothe technical part was interesting but im not sure this is a candidate I'd want to be associated with publicly....i guess most English speakers just see "oh cool a candidate in a country i have parasocial relationship with through consumer pop culture" and not the horrific ugly side of Korean politics and some of its candidates, Lee in particular.
- bofadeez 10mo ago[flagged]
- mellosouls 10mo agoCongrats OP, good story. Don't let any kneejerk negative responses from those who don't like his worldview get you down.
- creakingstairs 10mo agoPeople are knee-jerking at “anti-feminism” part of Lee which I admit would look pretty off-putting to anyone who is not familiar with what’s going in South Korea. “Feminism” in Korea has taken on a different meaning sadly. I’ve commented in HN before at how abhorrent women’s right has been in Korea, especially up to my mother’s generation. It really has drastically improved last 20 years. However, many young men feel like the pendulum has swung too much to the other direction. Society still expects men to do “manly things” (mandatory army service, physical labour etc) but girls around their age get policy benefits instead. I’m not going to into whether this feeling is justified or not. But wanted to point out most don’t want women’s right to regress to their mom’s generation. They just want to feel like they are treated equally in society.
- pstuart 10mo ago[flagged]
- pessimizer 10mo agoIt really reads as exactly the evil victim mentality of the people wildly overrepresented at the top that we get in the US. The military service thing is obviously a real issue, though, but I don't know why that wouldn't be solved by forcing women into mandatory public service in the same way a man with a disability would be. Is it just that Korea doesn't have the social services to absorb the manpower? Military service is also a benefit that women don't get, too. They don't get to make the connections in the military that would help them along in their careers. > They just want to feel like they are treated equally in society. Shouldn't you wait until your country is half run by women before claiming oppression? Until your boss and CEO are as likely to be women as men? I feel like this stuff it bought into by marginal men who are oppressed by other men of a higher class, and average women catch all the flack because they're simultaneously accessible and denying marginal men what they want on a daily basis. They don't see upper-class men as enemies because they don't ever see upper-class men; when they hear about upper-class cruelty, they fantasize about the revenge they would take if they were in power, especially on the women who say no. In Korea, the anger about conscription just gives them a semi-legitimate gripe that seems like it should be taken away by conscripting women.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- profstasiak 10mo agoOP, great work. Commentors here are not from Korea, so maybe we should refrain from commenting about policy of a given candidate? I really enjoyed your story, about how much tech can achieve. Technology really is a multiplier of effort. Amazing story.
- deaux 10mo ago> Commentors here are not from Korea HN is an international place. Even just Silicon Valley itself is.
- mintchoco 10mo ago[dead]
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- alexpotato 10mo agoI wish there was a repository of "cold DM" stories like this to help inspire younger folks that you can "just do things." My own story: - helped found my college paintball club (Rutgers University) - that became our college paintball team (where we played other schools) - graduate - had a real job (involving LOTS of database work) - find out that year after I left, the team go to go to paintball World Cup (and I was mad/envious that I didn't get to go) - quit my job - wanted to go to World Cup and only person I knew was the head of the college league so DM'ed him asking if he needed help with the college event. He replies that he actually needs help with a player database and asks if I know databases? (I do) - Go to world cup, love it, keep working on the player database - Three years later I'm the General Manager of the pro-paintball league (I was 26!) People would often ask me, at the time, if this was my dream job. I would often answer "Calling it my 'dream job' would imply I knew it existed as an option to dream about. I just emailed a guy and one thing led to another and here I am"