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Comment by kohanz | Hacker News Reader

The problem for them is: we are the powerful ones now.

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We built this internet.

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Actually, we are in charge now. You just haven’t realized it yet. Automate or be automated. If you don’t know how to map out complex systems. If you never got grounded as a kid for taking things apart. If you are too lazy or unwilling to learn our ways. If you don’t work for us yet, you soon will.

The above lines are absolutely cringe-worthy and take away from what is for the most part a decent account of the events. I can understand if someone temporarily holds onto such feelings due to the emotional shock of being wronged by someone else they consider a 'bully' (but really just sounds like an immoral/unethical businessman). However, if you actually hold onto this mindset day-to-day, I would say that is problematic.

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That part made me cringe too. "Actually, we are in charge now. You just haven’t realized it yet." is a complete joke. Whom ever pays the bills is in charge, and if you work for anyone that ain't you.

I believe the entire ecosystem of "hackathons" to be a scam for Billy like people to exploit naive developers. In fact, if one reads the terms of many corporate sponsered hackathons, the corporation (I'm lookin at you Intel) backing the event claims usage rights to any ideas pitched.

> I believe the entire ecosystem of "hackathons" to be a scam for Billy like people to exploit naive developers.

Bingo!

That combined with the frequent references to Billy being in good shape and going to the gym just felt like a really heavy handed attempt to get "nerds on board against the jock".

Yep. I found this story horribly and very immaturely expressed, but it may still serve well as a cautionary tale.

And what did you think of Bobby's emails? All just fine to you?

I'm not sure what point you're making here. I don't see how those two things are connected.

Indeed. Some very smart people built the Internet over a few decades. Appropriating the work and effort of so many other people is disingenuous. Building a website does not equal "building the Internet."

And lets not forget the great quote “The Internet was so well done, but the web was by amateurs”.

I can't take developers like this guy seriously, he definitely falls in the amateurs camp Alan Kay talks about.

I read this piece as a rejection of the author's entire line of thinking. Being taken advantage of is something that can easily happen no matter what your technical skills are, because your people reading skills are still lacking.

This isn't just about "Billy," this is about the startup CEOs that champion "hustle" for their programmers who are on an options plan to earn at best a hundredth of what their bosses will get.

In the end it's all about value: the value you expect to get out of your work, the value you put into yourself, the value you project to the world and the people signing your checks.

Right. The moral of the story shouldn't be "the tech people are in charge, fuck people that can't code." There is some value to what Billy did (or would do). The problem is that this particular Billy is an asshole.

The moral of the story is "Don't work for/with people who don't respect what you do." Billy wanted a few code monkeys, and saw Startup Weekend as his way to get a few code monkeys to build shit for free.

If there's value in what someone like Billy does, then software developers should learn those skills; business, negotiation, finance. Then we wouldn't have a story like this at all.

The moral of the story is people like Billy won't succeed in the tech industry, because the 'coders' have choices.

Seems to be lot of morals of this story. I hope young developers have read this and taken it to heart...every hackathon I have ever been to has had at least one non-technical person pitching their business idea, and often they're looking for suckers to work for free. And, the real WTF is that they often find them (then again, it is usually inexperienced developers who can't deliver much in a weekend, so it probably just serves as a learning experience for all parties involved).

Yes, though there is value to specialization

Yeah he needs to get over the whole bully narrative. He sounds like he's still 16.

Excuse me, but I am proud, card carrying memember of the Kingmakers club.

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