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Further, D'Aloisio deserves credit for outsourcing technology development and app development to the right firms, and coalescing their work into a product that

Further, D'Aloisio deserves credit for outsourcing technology development and app development to the right firms, and coalescing their work into a product that made him millions. I can't tell if this is a brilliant dog-whistle dig or if it's actually being said without irony.

Hitchhiker 14y ago
I am afraid, its being said without irony.
eli 14y ago
I don't think it's ironic. I also don't think managing and coordinating multiple outsourced developers is at all trivial. (Though, true, it's probably not worth millions either.)
- UK-AL 14y ago
  Yes, but somo isn't some cheap outsourcing company. They will completely design your app, and then develop it for you. Its isn't a company where you manage a group of contracted coders.
  - eli 14y ago
    Fair enough. I don't know anything about them. I think my point, in a roundabout way, is that for many/most startups the actual writing of lines of code is not the hard part. At least, that's what I've found to be the case. If you can successfully outsource that task, more power to you.
    - rkuykendall-com 14y ago
      Kevin Rose paid someone a fixed amount to write Digg, and then paid other people salaries to continue writing it. Writing code is not the most important part of most businesses, excluding the few which are built on an emerging technology. Facebook, Amazon, HackerNews, Reddit, Wikipedia, Twitter, none of these would be hard services to get to 1.0 for any halfway decent programmer. But somebody had to know what to build, they had to believe in it, and they had to work for it, to learn from their mistaks and flush out the vision. And most of these people probably paid somebody else to write most of the code.
      - smtddr 14y ago
        I'm going to take a screenshot of your comment and show it to my family everytime they tell me: "You do this computer programmer stuff. I keep hearing they're making millions in "the valley", why don't you make an app?"
      - mbrock 14y ago
        And they had to get a sizable amount of other people to truly care about the thing enough to spend lots of their spare time dicking around on it. Reddit, Amazon, Facebook, HN, Wikipedia, and Twitter depend on unimaginable amounts of hours spent by volunteers all over the world who get $0 for contributing the actual content and camraderie, which really is almost the entire value (except the case of Amazon, where it's only a pretty big part).
        wilfra 14y ago
        Are you referring to reviews on Amazon? Are those really that big of a part of their business? I rarely read them, personally. I just assume they are gamed.
        mbrock 14y ago
        The whole recommendations engine is based on user participation. Amazon naturally collects tons of data about their users, and they probably wouldn't be happy to lose this data. If you were the only user of Amazon, it wouldn't work nearly as well. I would think that features like "other users also bought," the thing that pairs up books into relevant groups, "Listomania," and so on, were crucial to Amazon's success. And yeah, I do think the reviews are quite important to Amazon. A book with 4.5 stars and some intelligent good reviews must be good business for Amazon, don't you think? Even if some people are skeptical of reviews, they are probably much better than most other types of advertising.
pseut 14y ago
All of the articles I've read about Summly have a bit at the end where the author bends over backwards to not appear to be crapping on a 17yo. I read that passage the same way.
- badgar 14y ago
  Considering how much heat gizmodo got for calling out the same kid two years ago, I'm not surprised.
  - dopamean 14y ago
    What's the story there? I'm unfamiliar. Link?
    - pseut 14y ago
      http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-developer-cry http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-deve...
    - bobwaycott 14y ago
      The founder (then 15 yrs old) was basically dishonest, annoying, ridiculous ... etc. More here: http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-developer-cry http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-deve...
      - zem 14y ago
        not surprised they got heat - however annoying the guy was, that was a deeply mean-spirited article.
      - michaelochurch 14y ago
        I'd give him a pass on that. He was not unlike any other smart, impulsive, ambitious teenager with a passion for ideas (namely, his own). When I was 20, I was highly enthusiastic about a card game (actually a pretty good one; it plays really well and people I've never met write me about it) I created, called Ambition, and got into some flamewars that I shouldn't have. This is one of the rare cases where I wish I were born 5-10 years later; the web is now mature enough that, instead of flaming Wikipedia to make it a "real game", I would have just put it up as an HTML5 game and people could play it. When I was 20, you still had to know a lot to get a real computer setup outside of the CS lab. I didn't quit using Windows for home stuff until age 24 (2007). Now with 'brew install emacs' as opposed to bullshit '90s-era Windows nonsense, it's a million times easier for someone under-20 to start building instead of just talking. Convex dishonesty (see here: https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/03/29/gervais-macleod-19-living-in-truth-fighting-the-lie/ https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/03/29/gervais-macl... ) can be very tempting when you're trying to make a good idea "catch". You don't really have a sense of it being wrong until you're older (25+) and have seen what trust-sparsity does to organizations. If you're under 25, I think you deserve a pass on well-intended convex dishonesty. You just don't have enough experience with social systems to see why it is (usually) wrong.
tomasien 14y ago
I don't understand why this shouldn't be said without irony. If SRI says he built some part of the original app, perhaps without their engine to power it and really make it awesome, doesn't he deserve some credit? I think he does. Plus Summly DID have a lot of users, just not acquisition level users.
fauigerzigerk 14y ago
Coming from Wall St. it would be pretty absurd if it were irony. There's an entire world where billions are made from deal making and leveraging other people's work.

Hitchhiker 14y ago

I am afraid, its being said without irony.

eli 14y ago

I don't think it's ironic. I also don't think managing and coordinating multiple outsourced developers is at all trivial. (Though, true, it's probably not worth millions either.)

UK-AL 14y ago
Yes, but somo isn't some cheap outsourcing company. They will completely design your app, and then develop it for you. Its isn't a company where you manage a group of contracted coders.
- eli 14y ago
  Fair enough. I don't know anything about them. I think my point, in a roundabout way, is that for many/most startups the actual writing of lines of code is not the hard part. At least, that's what I've found to be the case. If you can successfully outsource that task, more power to you.
  - rkuykendall-com 14y ago
    Kevin Rose paid someone a fixed amount to write Digg, and then paid other people salaries to continue writing it. Writing code is not the most important part of most businesses, excluding the few which are built on an emerging technology. Facebook, Amazon, HackerNews, Reddit, Wikipedia, Twitter, none of these would be hard services to get to 1.0 for any halfway decent programmer. But somebody had to know what to build, they had to believe in it, and they had to work for it, to learn from their mistaks and flush out the vision. And most of these people probably paid somebody else to write most of the code.
    - smtddr 14y ago
      I'm going to take a screenshot of your comment and show it to my family everytime they tell me: "You do this computer programmer stuff. I keep hearing they're making millions in "the valley", why don't you make an app?"
    - mbrock 14y ago
      And they had to get a sizable amount of other people to truly care about the thing enough to spend lots of their spare time dicking around on it. Reddit, Amazon, Facebook, HN, Wikipedia, and Twitter depend on unimaginable amounts of hours spent by volunteers all over the world who get $0 for contributing the actual content and camraderie, which really is almost the entire value (except the case of Amazon, where it's only a pretty big part).
      - wilfra 14y ago
        Are you referring to reviews on Amazon? Are those really that big of a part of their business? I rarely read them, personally. I just assume they are gamed.
        mbrock 14y ago
        The whole recommendations engine is based on user participation. Amazon naturally collects tons of data about their users, and they probably wouldn't be happy to lose this data. If you were the only user of Amazon, it wouldn't work nearly as well. I would think that features like "other users also bought," the thing that pairs up books into relevant groups, "Listomania," and so on, were crucial to Amazon's success. And yeah, I do think the reviews are quite important to Amazon. A book with 4.5 stars and some intelligent good reviews must be good business for Amazon, don't you think? Even if some people are skeptical of reviews, they are probably much better than most other types of advertising.

pseut 14y ago

All of the articles I've read about Summly have a bit at the end where the author bends over backwards to not appear to be crapping on a 17yo. I read that passage the same way.

badgar 14y ago
Considering how much heat gizmodo got for calling out the same kid two years ago, I'm not surprised.
- dopamean 14y ago
  What's the story there? I'm unfamiliar. Link?
  - pseut 14y ago
    http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-developer-cry http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-deve...
  - bobwaycott 14y ago
    The founder (then 15 yrs old) was basically dishonest, annoying, ridiculous ... etc. More here: http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-developer-cry http://gizmodo.com/5830076/how-i-made-a-15+year+old-app-deve...
    - zem 14y ago
      not surprised they got heat - however annoying the guy was, that was a deeply mean-spirited article.
    - michaelochurch 14y ago
      I'd give him a pass on that. He was not unlike any other smart, impulsive, ambitious teenager with a passion for ideas (namely, his own). When I was 20, I was highly enthusiastic about a card game (actually a pretty good one; it plays really well and people I've never met write me about it) I created, called Ambition, and got into some flamewars that I shouldn't have. This is one of the rare cases where I wish I were born 5-10 years later; the web is now mature enough that, instead of flaming Wikipedia to make it a "real game", I would have just put it up as an HTML5 game and people could play it. When I was 20, you still had to know a lot to get a real computer setup outside of the CS lab. I didn't quit using Windows for home stuff until age 24 (2007). Now with 'brew install emacs' as opposed to bullshit '90s-era Windows nonsense, it's a million times easier for someone under-20 to start building instead of just talking. Convex dishonesty (see here: https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/03/29/gervais-macleod-19-living-in-truth-fighting-the-lie/ https://michaelochurch.wordpress.com/2013/03/29/gervais-macl... ) can be very tempting when you're trying to make a good idea "catch". You don't really have a sense of it being wrong until you're older (25+) and have seen what trust-sparsity does to organizations. If you're under 25, I think you deserve a pass on well-intended convex dishonesty. You just don't have enough experience with social systems to see why it is (usually) wrong.

tomasien 14y ago

I don't understand why this shouldn't be said without irony. If SRI says he built some part of the original app, perhaps without their engine to power it and really make it awesome, doesn't he deserve some credit? I think he does. Plus Summly DID have a lot of users, just not acquisition level users.

fauigerzigerk 14y ago

Coming from Wall St. it would be pretty absurd if it were irony. There's an entire world where billions are made from deal making and leveraging other people's work.