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Comment by sskates | Hacker News Reader

If you've ever run a company or any sort of organization, you'll realize that walking around blind is the default. It takes effort to get information on what's going on. Because you can't wait forever for perfect information, you end up taking calculated risks like Netflix did with Qwikster where it's not clear in advance if it will pan out.

As the OP realized, this results in Monday morning armchair quaterbacking from people who ask "why didn't they make the right decision in advance, are they stupid or something?" When in fact, no, they are not stupid, they just don't have perfect information about what will happen.

Incidentally, this is the largest advantage of startups- the cost of a risky bet is much lower because you don't have to risk hemorrhaging hundreds of thousands of customers each time you make a bet. As a result, you can take many more risks and come to a better solution more quickly.

edit: downvotes? what?

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There is a another side to that though: you do actually see a lot of CEO's who made the right call without having "perfect" information making less and less effort to gather any information with every new decision on the mistaken believe that they have great "vision". They're no longer taking "calculated" risks, just risks based on their own illusion of infallibility.

At some point in that process, the question "are they stupid or something" becomes justified. And not just as a form of armchair criticism. A company's survival can depend on it.

Also even if the CEO isn't stupid and makes an effort to get accurate information, the middle managers might just give him inaccurate information putting politics ahead of company loyalty. Do not underestimate the magnitude of this problem.

BTW, one thing corporations can greatly improve with modern technology is the ability of the floor-level positions to talk with the CEO and share information as to what is actually going on.

> Also even if the CEO isn't stupid and makes an effort to get accurate information, the middle managers might just give him inaccurate information putting politics ahead of company loyalty. Do not underestimate the magnitude of this problem.

The isn't it the CEO's fault for hiring bozos?

I think this was on the front page not too long ago: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-o...

When an org gets to a certain size, it tends to self-organize into a dysfunctional hierarchy...

A smart CEO should take this into account, and actively work to ensure a healthy culture.

It's a lot harder than it seems though.

Also relevant is the inverse issue: Monday morning quarterbacks have the benefit of hindsight, but they don't have information that was and is available on the field. Hastings was clearly trying to solve a real problem that Netflix is facing–he didn't create Qwickster just 'cause he liked the name. Perhaps its licensing issues, perhaps its something else. Hastings gambled that the benefit of separating streaming from DVDs would be greater than the cost of the customers it annoyed. He was wrong, but that doesn't make him stupid.

Reddit has vote count fuzzing to throw off bots, maybe HN has something similar and you got fuzzed into the negative for a short while?

it should be interesting to us, for you and only you to be able to see who downvoted you.

That would be a fantastic way to promote "revenge" voting.

Also a fantastic way to promote grudges. People who have been "publicly" ugly tend to want to justify it and are thus inclined to continue to be ugly as "proof" that they were right to do so to begin with. I would rather people have the chance to change their mind about me and move on. I have certainly changed my mind about some people and am less inclined to downvote their remarks than I once was (which sounds more personal and ugly than I mean it -- I am trying to say that getting to know someone better can change how you interpret something they have said). First impressions aren't always accurate.

no, it's a means to encourage those above the karma threshold to be more austere about their downvotes.

and only those below the karma threshold for downvoting should be able to see who downvoted them. this deals with the problem of grudges. and as someone mentioned below, the downvoter should also have the option of leaving feedback.

I don't see how this deals with grudges because I am talking about the psychological impact on someone who knows that it will be known they did the downvoting, not the psychological impact on the person getting downvoted (plus don't underestimate the long memories of some people who will still remember who downvoted them a long time later, after they have their own downvote privileges). Also, people who downvote currently have the option of leaving feedback by simply replying. So I don't really understand where you are coming from.

Maybe I would be helpful, if downvoters could leave a short piece of feedback.

I hate to start a meta discussion but there seems to be a lot of karma police trolling around lately who think the downvote button is there to vote down opinions they disagree with. I think it's time to raise that karma limit on downvotes again.

Anyway, what you said is spot on. It's easy to be an armchair quarterback and quite frankly there's far too many people spewing commentary like "that was stupid because I don't like it" and far less helpful things, believe it or not. Those who can go out and make dumb moves every so often. Those who cannot troll the Internet and criticize while trying to make themselves feel important.

I can't characterize all critics this way but there are enough out there to warrant my disdain. But I thought this whole post was a perfect opportunity for you to bring up what you said about startups. We really should be out there taking huge risks because the stakes may seem high but they're actually not in a way. I myself have gone out on a limb and experimented with my business. I'm small enough to do it and I sure as hell pissed off a few customers because of it. But in the end the risk was worth it because while I lose a few fans I ended up attracting more and was able to charge more money in the process. It allowed me to grow. I'm still small enough to take some risks and boy am I doing it. Your point is exactly what the guys at 37Signals talk about all the time. It's in their book. It's the advantage to being small and young.

Or, someone on a phone fat fingered the downvote button while trying to scroll. I suspect that posts in certain positions on the page are more likely to have this happen, due to scrolling cadence at common phone resolutions.

Are you left-handed. On both mobile and desktop browsers I scroll on the right and the buttons are on the left; I'm right handed which probably makes a difference.

I could understand that you would up- instead of down-vote but surely if you choose the vertical area in which the vote buttons are to scroll then you'd be forever clicking the buttons by accident. I suspect most scroll actions begin either on a scroll bar or on the text of a comment - would be an interesting heatmap to see though.

I am right handed, but my thumb's length is close to the width of my phone's screen, so, when I'm scrolling, my thumb is closer to the left than the right. On the desktop I use the scroll wheel exclusively.

The more you know ... I've never had a touch-screen phone; actively avoid them.

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