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>These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors This is such a stupid position to take. First

by blhack 13y ago

>These are Burning Man hippies, self-styled artists, people who graduated from great schools with useless majors This is such a stupid position to take. First of all, do you realize that those "Burning Man Hippies" are, uh, literally the people who started google? Do you realize that google has made enormous donations to those "burning man hippies"? And yes, "uesless degrees". History, art, literature, these are all "useless" of course, the only valid degrees are either hard science and hard engineering, I'm sure? What aspects of life do you enjoy, man? A good design aesthetic? Cause that's art... Or, perhaps good food? That's also art. Maybe a good book, wait... Architecture? Beauty? Something? Possibly something that poets and artists have given you a context for, or study? -- This is such a stupid lazy attitude to take. Come out of your hole sometime and you'll find a whole world out here full of things that you can enjoy. Just try to steer clear of those pesky "artists" who got useless degrees. -- The people who are crying about google's buses are idiots. Don't group them together with artists or "burning man hippies".

hcurtiss 13y ago
I think by "useless," he meant, "useless for purposes of making money."
- etjossem 13y ago
  Apple made a lot of money by not thinking this way, and other big companies in SV have started to notice. Skilled industrial/UX designers often come out of a humanities or art major. In fact, so do developers, product managers, and marketing staff. Blame the protesters for throwing bricks into a bus window, but don't blame their majors.
  - Crito 13y ago
    I don't think this is a case of Apple employees smashing up Google buses. Maybe their peers from college who got the same degrees went off to find productive jobs, but I am struggling to believe that these particular people did. If you cannot leverage your degree, then your degree is worthless (at least in your hands).
    - etjossem 13y ago
      You've misinterpreted me. I am in no way suggesting that Apple employees are smashing a Google bus. I'm just trying to clear up two big assumptions people in this thread are making. 1. Humanities degrees aren't monetarily worthless. They're quite valuable (measured in dollars) to people who are passionate about the user experience, because they help those people land and hold onto design jobs. I mentioned Apple because it has historically been really supportive of the liberal arts, but it's certainly not the only one. http://stratechery.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Apple-Tech-LiberalArts.SteveJobs.jpg http://stratechery.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Apple-Tech... 2. The claim that the vandals have humanities or art degrees was (as far as I can tell) invented by HN because they think these guys (https://www.indybay.org/uploads/2013/12/20/800_gbus.jpg https://www.indybay.org/uploads/2013/12/20/800_gbus.jpg) look like hipsters. There's no evidence to support it.
      - jessedhillon 13y ago
        Point 2 is well-taken. This is only my opinion and observation. Not factual in the sense that it draws on empiral measurements for its validity.
- smsm42 13y ago
  Are they making anything else with it? I mean, except for smashing windows and annoying a bunch of sleepy coders? I'm ok with "not everything is money" but what they have to show in non-money part? Usually their "anti-capitalism" is just another way of saying "I'd work as little as the society allows me without going hungry and do stupid shit like breaking windows and defacing other's property when I'm too bored". My experience is that people who actually can do stuff with their life (degree or not) don't go around smashing windows. They are too busy doing their thing to spend time on breaking other's things.
jessedhillon 13y ago
Eh, you know what? I think you've gone way out of your way to construe my comments as meaning something different than what they do. Do you think that it was your local bookstore owner and restauranteer throwing bricks in the window? Do you even think it was someone so dedicated to their art that they've appeared in galleries and have become known for their craft? Maybe there was some brilliant author in the crowd? Somehow, I doubt it. As for "useless" degrees -- I majored in Political Science so I know what a useless degree is. The point is not to denigrate them for having an economically useless degree. The point is to expose what I think is the real motivation here, that slackers have found it increasingly difficult to float without having any real contribution to make back. It used to be that you could graduate with a soft humanities degree, rent a shitty loft in a neighborhood like West Oakland and still live pretty well. Now, you're gonna have to move out to the suburbs unless you can contribute, generate and capture substantial, financial value. Certainly engineering is not the only field worth a damn. My comment was an allusion to a strategy employed by a certain class of privileged people, which is essentially to find a local minimum of effort/reward even though they typically come from a background which affords much greater opportunity. I contend that it's the demands of these people on display today, being presented as if it were aligned with the needs of Oakland's truly poor. In short, the people protesting today are poor for different reasons than the people whose struggle they are claiming in the passage I quoted.

by blhack 13y ago

hcurtiss 13y ago

I think by "useless," he meant, "useless for purposes of making money."

etjossem 13y ago
Apple made a lot of money by not thinking this way, and other big companies in SV have started to notice. Skilled industrial/UX designers often come out of a humanities or art major. In fact, so do developers, product managers, and marketing staff. Blame the protesters for throwing bricks into a bus window, but don't blame their majors.
- Crito 13y ago
  I don't think this is a case of Apple employees smashing up Google buses. Maybe their peers from college who got the same degrees went off to find productive jobs, but I am struggling to believe that these particular people did. If you cannot leverage your degree, then your degree is worthless (at least in your hands).
  - etjossem 13y ago
    You've misinterpreted me. I am in no way suggesting that Apple employees are smashing a Google bus. I'm just trying to clear up two big assumptions people in this thread are making. 1. Humanities degrees aren't monetarily worthless. They're quite valuable (measured in dollars) to people who are passionate about the user experience, because they help those people land and hold onto design jobs. I mentioned Apple because it has historically been really supportive of the liberal arts, but it's certainly not the only one. http://stratechery.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Apple-Tech-LiberalArts.SteveJobs.jpg http://stratechery.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/Apple-Tech... 2. The claim that the vandals have humanities or art degrees was (as far as I can tell) invented by HN because they think these guys (https://www.indybay.org/uploads/2013/12/20/800_gbus.jpg https://www.indybay.org/uploads/2013/12/20/800_gbus.jpg) look like hipsters. There's no evidence to support it.
    - jessedhillon 13y ago
      Point 2 is well-taken. This is only my opinion and observation. Not factual in the sense that it draws on empiral measurements for its validity.
smsm42 13y ago
Are they making anything else with it? I mean, except for smashing windows and annoying a bunch of sleepy coders? I'm ok with "not everything is money" but what they have to show in non-money part? Usually their "anti-capitalism" is just another way of saying "I'd work as little as the society allows me without going hungry and do stupid shit like breaking windows and defacing other's property when I'm too bored". My experience is that people who actually can do stuff with their life (degree or not) don't go around smashing windows. They are too busy doing their thing to spend time on breaking other's things.

jessedhillon 13y ago

Eh, you know what? I think you've gone way out of your way to construe my comments as meaning something different than what they do. Do you think that it was your local bookstore owner and restauranteer throwing bricks in the window? Do you even think it was someone so dedicated to their art that they've appeared in galleries and have become known for their craft? Maybe there was some brilliant author in the crowd? Somehow, I doubt it. As for "useless" degrees -- I majored in Political Science so I know what a useless degree is. The point is not to denigrate them for having an economically useless degree. The point is to expose what I think is the real motivation here, that slackers have found it increasingly difficult to float without having any real contribution to make back. It used to be that you could graduate with a soft humanities degree, rent a shitty loft in a neighborhood like West Oakland and still live pretty well. Now, you're gonna have to move out to the suburbs unless you can contribute, generate and capture substantial, financial value. Certainly engineering is not the only field worth a damn. My comment was an allusion to a strategy employed by a certain class of privileged people, which is essentially to find a local minimum of effort/reward even though they typically come from a background which affords much greater opportunity. I contend that it's the demands of these people on display today, being presented as if it were aligned with the needs of Oakland's truly poor. In short, the people protesting today are poor for different reasons than the people whose struggle they are claiming in the passage I quoted.