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I hate to admit it, but I have never found a way to become comfortable with the name "Hacker News". It violates one of the cardinal rules of business that I ha

by edw519 17y ago

I hate to admit it, but I have never found a way to become comfortable with the name "Hacker News". It violates one of the cardinal rules of business that I have tried to ascribe to: communicate exactly what you must with the right number of words, no more, no less. The word "hacker" means many things to many people. Make no mistake about it: I am a computer programmer. I write applications for business. I have used many different tools over the years and have settled into the ones I like best. I love to learn, but most of all, I love to deliver software to my consumer so that they can make things happen. I have written (what seems like) an infinite number of lines of code. I do it every day. I come to hn almost every day. (Imagine that, a programmer who works all day, every day, and takes his breaks by reading "Hacker News".) I can't imagine doing anything else. I have considered other careers several times for a few microseconds, but quickly regained my senses. I have a feeling that on my death bed (many years from now, I hope), my last words will be, "I love you, honey, and make sure that they check the repository for that new function I wrote yesterday."

jacquesm 17y ago
Interesting story, thank you for that. My own experience parallels yours with one big difference. Every couple of years I get totally sick of it and do something completely different for a while. Travel, build stuff in 'the real world'. It's a love/hate relationship, it is what I do best but I can't get over the frustrating feeling that we're doing this all completely wrong, there has to be a better way. But I haven't found it yet.
- edw519 17y ago
  It's a love/hate relationship For me, it's love. The only hate is when others mount speed bumps or road blocks to slow my progress. it is what I do best I suspect that's true for many of us here. We should be grateful we found our calling. (I remember once reading that Kareem Abdul Jabbar was born at the perfect time and place to become exactly what he was meant to be: a basketball player. I feel the same way about programming.) I can't get over the frustrating feeling that we're doing this all completely wrong, there has to be a better way. Yes, that's the meta beauty of it! I spend almost as much time working on how to develop better as I spend actually developing. But I haven't found it yet. Good. If you did, you'd probably die. They didn't name it continuous learning and improvement for nothing.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    > Yes, that's the meta beauty of it! I spend almost as much time working on how to develop better as I spend actually developing. That's a good rule, I do that too, about 2:3, 2 days to learn and work on my 'environment', 3 days on actual work. Not exactly like that, but on average that's what it works out to.
kingkawn 17y ago
"The word "hacker" means many things to many people." A little ambiguity helps people find the common ground to relate, nothing wrong with that.
keanemachine 17y ago
"I hate to admit it, but I have never found a way to become comfortable with the name "Hacker News"." My web filter in work is uncomfortable with the name "Hacker News" too. Thankfully, it has no problem with the URL http://news.ycombinator.com http://news.ycombinator.com though :-)
DrJokepu 17y ago
Initially coming from a mechanical engineering background, I was always puzzled by the "hacker" expression. The qualities that people attribute to "hackers" on this site are the qualities of any good engineer; the ability to find creative "shortcut"-like solutions to hard problems, the ability to apply advanced mathematics (or computer science, in this case) to real-world problems, to understand business needs, etc. Needless to say that many start-up founders are engineers themselves. But this is really just a terminology question so if people here prefer calling themselves hackers instead of engineers or computer programmers, well, I can live with that.

by edw519 17y ago

jacquesm 17y ago

Interesting story, thank you for that. My own experience parallels yours with one big difference. Every couple of years I get totally sick of it and do something completely different for a while. Travel, build stuff in 'the real world'. It's a love/hate relationship, it is what I do best but I can't get over the frustrating feeling that we're doing this all completely wrong, there has to be a better way. But I haven't found it yet.

edw519 17y ago
It's a love/hate relationship For me, it's love. The only hate is when others mount speed bumps or road blocks to slow my progress. it is what I do best I suspect that's true for many of us here. We should be grateful we found our calling. (I remember once reading that Kareem Abdul Jabbar was born at the perfect time and place to become exactly what he was meant to be: a basketball player. I feel the same way about programming.) I can't get over the frustrating feeling that we're doing this all completely wrong, there has to be a better way. Yes, that's the meta beauty of it! I spend almost as much time working on how to develop better as I spend actually developing. But I haven't found it yet. Good. If you did, you'd probably die. They didn't name it continuous learning and improvement for nothing.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  > Yes, that's the meta beauty of it! I spend almost as much time working on how to develop better as I spend actually developing. That's a good rule, I do that too, about 2:3, 2 days to learn and work on my 'environment', 3 days on actual work. Not exactly like that, but on average that's what it works out to.

kingkawn 17y ago

"The word "hacker" means many things to many people." A little ambiguity helps people find the common ground to relate, nothing wrong with that.

keanemachine 17y ago

"I hate to admit it, but I have never found a way to become comfortable with the name "Hacker News"." My web filter in work is uncomfortable with the name "Hacker News" too. Thankfully, it has no problem with the URL http://news.ycombinator.com http://news.ycombinator.com though :-)

DrJokepu 17y ago

Initially coming from a mechanical engineering background, I was always puzzled by the "hacker" expression. The qualities that people attribute to "hackers" on this site are the qualities of any good engineer; the ability to find creative "shortcut"-like solutions to hard problems, the ability to apply advanced mathematics (or computer science, in this case) to real-world problems, to understand business needs, etc. Needless to say that many start-up founders are engineers themselves. But this is really just a terminology question so if people here prefer calling themselves hackers instead of engineers or computer programmers, well, I can live with that.