What are you asserting then, exactly?
3,043 karma · joined March 30, 2007
1. Pick idea personally interesting to you (seems self-evident)
2. Use time box (not a new idea, and mostly a known concept)
3. Use external accountability (also not a new idea, and mostly a known concept)
So, it's kind of a shallow piece not really introducing new information to me.
What I don't get is all the hate on HN--which is a sad state.
I get the perhaps accidentally inflammatory tone of the article, which is "you have enough time, what you need is motivation."
It can be offensive to people who are struggling with kids and literally have no more time, but really want to work on side projects ... to have some random dude on the internet say, "look man, all you need is just more motivation!"
Okay, I get that.
So for the Hackernoon editor: maybe less shallow and potentially presumptuous pieces that offends people with kids.
And for the people with kids or some life circumstance that prevents you from doing side projects but are extremely motivated: no need to be sarcastic about how difficult life is to raise a kid on Hacker News.
1. Camaraderie with other developers IRL
2. Technical assistance when you're stuck with a technical problem
3. What else?
Then try to address these needs individually.
Sure, you can find someone to geek out over general technical stuff (1), but maybe you don't geek out over the same technical stuff (iOS vs. back-end web), so he/she doesn't know as much about back-end stuff to help you debug (2). Or vice versa.
For #2, there's so much help online though. For #1, look for a developer group (maybe a HN monthly meetup). If there isn't one, start one, and you'll start meeting like minded people near you. A few years back I started a HN monthly meetup in San Diego, and it was a fun crowd.
I will give you this much. Your length response sound like you're a pretty educated person.
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Time zone: I'm can be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Technologies: Python, Django, Ruby, Rails, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Time zone: I'm can be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
EDIT: I mean. I can't see any graphics from my command-line only browser.
1) the gender the end-user identifies with, or lack thereof
2) the end-user's sexual partner preference, or lack thereof
With this HTTP header info, the web server can then display the most politically correct ASCII image, plus the most optimal sales conversion rate for this product #win-win
Update: I am able to reproduce the issue on w3m as well. Please fix your web site to be more command-line friendly.
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
iOS, 2x YC PORTFOLIO EXPERIENCE, LOCAL TO SF BAY AREA
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
iOS, 2x YC PORTFOLIO EXPERIENCE, LOCAL TO SF BAY AREA
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
E.g.
- "Note that importance of the results of a solution does not make the problem important."
Parallel: a good product for an unimportant or small market, does not make the market important or big.
- "Thus working on the problem at the right time is essential. Einstein tried to find a unified theory, spent most of his later life on it, and died in a hospital still working on it with no significant results. Apparently, he attacked the problem too early, or perhaps it was the wrong problem."
Parallel: The importance of timing and the market conditions. Too many startups have tried an idea and didn't work at some point in time, but totally worked in a different time period. E.g. Webvan vs Instacart, Uber Eats, et al.
- This is true whether one is searching for a scientific breakthrough or searching for product-market fit: "There are a pair of errors that are often made when working on what you think is the right problem at the right time. One is to give up too soon, and the other is to persist and never get any results. The second is quite common. Obviously, if you start on a wrong problem and refuse to give up, you are automatically condemned to waste the rest of your life (see Einstein above). Knowing when you persist is not easy -- if you are wrong then you are stubborn; but if you turn out to be right, then you are strong willed."
- Increasing the odds of exposure to a positive black swan is similar whether one is searching for a scientific breakthrough or searching for a large new product-market fit: "Many times a discussion with a person who has just done something important will produce a description of how they were led, almost step by step, to the result. It is usually based on things they had done, or intensely thought about, years ago. You succeed because you have prepared yourself with the necessary background long ago, without, of course, knowing then that it would prove to be a necessary step to success."
- Walking the thin line of hubris vs. confidence: "Without courage you are unlikely to attack important problems with any persistence, and hence not likely to do important things. Courage brings self-confidence, an essential feature of doing difficult things. However, it can border on over-confidence at time which is more of a hindrance than a help."
- "If you believe too much then you are not likely to find the essentially new view that transforms a field, and if you doubt too much you will not be able to do much at all. It is a fine balance between believing what you learn and at the same time doubting things. Great steps forward usually involve a change of viewpoint to outside the standard ones in the field."
Parallel: Sometimes industry outsiders are the one who finds a market opportunity and transform it in ways that insiders never thought of.
- The importance of having a vision: "You need a vision of who you are and where your field is going. A suitable parable is that of the drunken sailor. He staggers one way and then the other with independent, random steps. In n steps he will be, on the average, about 3n steps away from where he started. but if there is a pretty girl in one direction he will get a distance proportional to n. The difference, over a life time of choices, between 3n and n is very large and represents the difference between having no vision and having a vision. The particular vision you have is less important than just having one - there are many paths to success. Therefore, it is wise to have a vision of what you may become, of where you want to go, as well as how to get there. No vision, not much chance of doing great work; with a vision you have a good chance."
- "I must now take up the unpleasant topic of selling your ideas. Too many scientists think that this is beneath them, that the world is waiting for their great results. "
Parallel: Great software engineers think that all they have to do is build a pretty product and customers will line up and be banging down the engineer's door. If you're looking to start a business, you have to think about sales / user acquisition.
I view software as means to an end, and that end is solving a real concrete physical problem in the real world.
It's hard to look at a specific vertical / domain and try to guess what kind of app you can build for them that would make an impact, as an outsider looking in.
So, become an insider by getting a job and doing real hands-on work in an area outside of programming. For me, since I figured I got the "hacker" part down, I wanted to get the "hustler" part down, and I joined a very early stage startup and did all things customer-acquisition, in charge of the singular goal of bringing in money. A hardware company at that.
Then, military has always fascinated me, so I sought to get an insider's perspective.
Now I've got additional perspectives that has been constructive in helping me understand where else and how else software might be able to make an impact, which is helpful when you're looking for opportunities to ... make something people want.
iOS, 2x YC PORTFOLIO EXPERIENCE, LOCAL TO SF BAY AREA
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
iOS, 2x YC PORTFOLIO EXPERIENCE, LOCAL TO SF BAY AREA
+ Location: SF, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, CA, US.
+ Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
+ Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
+ Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
+ Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
+ Time zone: I'm can even be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
+ Complementary technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
+ Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
+ Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
+ Satisfied free-lance clients reference list upon request.
+ Email: jayliew at jayliew ¤ com
+ Remote: OK
iOS, YC STARTUP EXPERIENCE, COMPUTER SCIENCE, SAN FRANCISCO BAY AREA LOCAL
,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸-( Happy July 4th, America! )-,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸
* Location: SF, Mountain View, San Francisco Bay Area, Silicon Valley, Palo Alto, CA, US.
* Technologies: iOS, iOS, iOS. Swift. Native. iOS.
* Education: Computer Science / CS / C.S. bachelors degree.
* Soft-skills: No language or cultural barriers. I speak fluent and clear "American" English and have years of customer-facing experience with both technical and non-technical people. You’ll have no friction communicating with me and I will collaborate with your current team just fine.
* Time zone: I'm can be available locally in-person to sync with your team face-to-face during normal US business hours (no need to wake up at 3am remote team meeting.)
* Sample work 1: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) app: http://www.seebetty.com
* Sample work 2: Enterprise P2P Social Recognition App Proof-of-Concept: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBTNISgYR7M (short 5-min walkthrough demo)
* Experience: I’ve worked for 2 YC portfolio companies to date (1 hardware, 1 software). I've also worked for publicly-traded tech companies as a contractor and as a full-time employee.
* Work authorization: Full work authorization + US secret security clearance.
* Other technologies: Python, Django, jQuery, full-stack web, DevOps, Redis, LAMP, SQL, Parse, Postgres, Heroku, Objective-C, Obj-C.
* Résumé / CV / LinkedIn / Resume: (sensitive info) Please drop me an email and I’ll respond with PDF.
* Email: jayliew at jayliew dot com
,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸-( / Happy July 4th, America! )-,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸,.-~´¨¯¨`·~-.¸