Comment by lisper | Hacker News Reader

Comment by lisper | Hacker News Reader

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> I find it rather harsh

Yes, that's the "tough" part of "tough love."

> How much due diligence do you perform on the decrepit man sitting on the sidewalk, holding out a cup of change, before you decide to throw some his way?

People on the sidewalk are typically not soliciting fifty to five thousand dollars. And if I meet someone on the sidewalk I can see their face and have a conversation with them which helps me assess whether or not they are trying to scam me.

> I'm somewhat like the psychologist, from your film, who had a practice, and now can't get a job at Burger King, but not for lack of trying.

The psychologist's name is (or was -- he died recently) Michael. And it's pretty clear that you haven't actually seen the film because if you had you would know that Michael was very much the author of his own fate.

> Preferring anonymity is not a crime, nor should it be a handicap.

It's not a crime, but it's not an entitlement either. Anonymity has a price.

> that first post ... received no replies

And did you stop to consider why it got no replies? And what you might do differently to change that?

> If I had the little bit of financial support that I requested, I could (and would) produce polished public output.

I sincerely wish you the best of luck. But if you fail to get the "little bit of financial support that you requested", you might want to consider the possibility that this is the result of choices you have made, and if you make different choices you might get different outcomes.

"People on the sidewalk are typically not soliciting fifty to five thousand dollars."

People on the sidewalk aren't offering you anything in return, either, as I am. I believe that GAGOOT could be a big project in the long term, and be influential in a real way.

"And if I meet someone on the sidewalk I can see their face and have a conversation with them which helps me assess whether or not they are trying to scam me."

I am open to video calls through Zoom or Skype, but no one has bothered to ask. Also, I am willing to provide evidence of my situation. Lastly, if this was a scam, then it must be a long con, given that it began with a post half a year ago.

> People on the sidewalk aren't offering you anything in return, either

That's not true. Offering entertainment on the sidewalk is very common, so common in fact that there's even a word for it: busking.

> I believe that GAGOOT could be a big project in the long term, and be influential in a real way.

The operative word there being "could". The internet is chock-full of people who think that their idea "could" be the Next Big Thing. The vast majority of them are wrong, so my Bayesian prior on anyone who says they have the Next Big Thing is very close to zero, and I see absolutely nothing here that would move the needle on that. I don't even have any evidence that you can write code.

> I am open to video calls through Zoom or Skype, but no one has bothered to ask.

And have you bothered to ask yourself why that is? And in particular, if there is anything you have done that may have contributed to this outcome, and which you could change in order to improve your odds?

> if this was a scam, then it must be a long con

Yes. So? Long cons happen. c.f. Theranos.

And even non-scams can be bad bets. (In fact, the vast majority are.)

BTW, are you familiar with urbit? Its marketing rhetoric is very similar to yours. And many people think that urbit is a scam, including me.

BTW2, Anonymity is not necessarily a show-stopper. Bitcoin is an existence proof. You might want to study its history, think about what made it succeed, and use that as a model.

"BTW, are you familiar with urbit?"

I found it, long ago, when researching whether there was anything like GAGOOT, but I dismissed it as being too complex, and therefore, neither a good substitute for, nor a viable competitor to, GAGOOT. However, much later, I came across a well-written article about it, which I shared in the following link.

https://freespeechextremist.com/notice/AOjpEat2uNnuBjVjxA

EDIT: In case FSE disappears from the Internet, here is my comment and the excellent article.

Here's an interesting recent article about Urbit. Some of the similarities to (and differences from) GAGOOT are quite striking. I wish I had the resources (time, energy, focus, competence, and so on) to neatly rewrite this from a GAGOOT perspective. I think that I need to find a good writer, with whom I can have long conversations, so that they can then understand enough about GAGOOT to write such nifty articles to explain it to people.

https://compactmag.com/article/the-dream-of-digital-homestea...

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