notburnt

Try to write out difficult sections (pen & paper) to get started.

I've found that gives my brain the time it needs to get a handle on overly complex or boring texts.

Assume it's going to take you time so don't aim for completing too much the first few times. Don't worry about how much time it's taking, just worry about getting a couple of conceptual wedges in place. Follow pomodoro method.

I call bullshit.

The fact that you are outing yourself (now and in your HN profile) is very unlike any other "spook" I know.

It's laughable that you say your " background is all out there for people to see".

The reality of being a citizen of the US is that the intel community doesn't make it easy to do so.

Speculation based on a coherent story is a short-cut when I am deferring actual research: a back of envelope calculation.

So, you got me: I didn't actually research the events :)

But, where would I start with such research?[0] It seems like articles are written with a specific narrative in mind: either Jobs as genius or Jobs as copy cat.

Is there anything I could look at that's sort of independently verified/agreed upon as being the truth? Does such a thing even exist? I hope it does.

It feels like these events have gone into annals of legend, not history :)

[0] is this reliable? https://web.stanford.edu/dept/SUL/sites/mac/parc.html.

I went with the "engineers" label in response to the "business people" label by parent. I like neither when ascribing intents to actions.

Anyway, I like to give benefit of doubt when attributing intent to people's actions. As evidenced by the responses, seems like I'm off the mark here. Over and out :)

I realize that. Thanks for the condescension. But, you realize that people aren't motivated by just one thing, right? Even if they are business people, right?

Anyway, knowing what we know about Job's obsession with getting things right (as he saw it), you do think that his sniping at specific look and feel issues was just to put the engineers down?

To me, it's a more cohesive picture if I interpret his actions as being motivated by obsession to UX/asking more of engineers ( I know these guys weren't working for him).

But, as you said, neither of us were there.

Yeah, I read that: seems to support my point. Basically: they had been doing it for years, but Jobs saw what was missing to make it actually usable.

Could be wrong: I wasn't there :)

Also interesting is how Kay dismisses Job's objections as being motivated by needing to put someone down.

I can as easily see them being constructive usability criticisms: details that the engineers steeped in developing it missed, but concrete things that would stop actual customer adoption.

How else are you going to get funding?

Don't exactly remember but I think it was right before/around 2.X.

I remember having a few aha moments when reading through the Redis code.

Something I've noticed: in the US people generally have an aversion to being even mildly uncomfortable.

And, it's culturally acceptable to be on medication so people take it for basically any inconvenience.

Sweating a little? Crank the AC. Small headache? take a pill. Bad day? Have a drink. Workout left muscles sore? Another pill. Sprained ankle? Obviously you need pain medication!

It's easy to see how there is a low threshold to abusing pain medication.

I was actually thinking of checking out a few local credit unions. Maybe that will work?

The schadenfreude is high in this article.

They took a shot but missed. It happens.

Everyone second guesses when things don't work out. That happens too.

:( This post rubs me wrong. Maybe because it's so centered on author while purportedly under a parenting blog. Maybe because it's screaming that the author is the type of "smart" person that gives them/(us?:)) a bad name.

To anyone nodding along to the post, because you are so special that you don't have friends: "smart" people everywhere have gone through feeling isolated from their age peers. Smarter people figure out how to navigate the shortfall rather than increasing it. Feynman anyone?

As an aside, I have a kid starting kindergarten this year who's been reading/writing for 2 years now. At home (and at pre-school by request) we make it a point not to over-praise this.

Because I don't want one innate attribute warping his whole identity.

I hope he settles, quickly and with a massive payout from United. I hope he laughs all the way to the bank.

That might make it more probable, as compared to a protracted legal battle that just drops out of sight, that a random person will challenge United when put under the same circumstances.

The real culprit here are the LEOs. They had no business getting involved. And, even less business using force. It's another case of LEOs unlawfully escalating to violence. Here I would agree with you: he shouldn't quietly settle his case with CPD.

The average 4th year US service member will probably have put up with massively more crap than the average college graduate. Which makes them tough in a specific way. That seems plausible enough :)

What I was objecting to

A) "Life is tough/ college isn't". Put in those terms, "Life is tough, X isn't" works for basically anything. And, I would argue, military service is closer to college (specific schedules, insulated from real world, the amount of time spent on PS/XBOX) than real life.

B) the tone that seems to indicate that the military has a monopoly in all types of toughness.

Let's be honest, being in the military isn't tough.

Put another way: Life is tough, military is not[0]

[0] no true scotsman.

I was in this situation. Was told they were transitioning to a new stack, but that never happened.

I gave it(wasted) 1 year.

But, in retrospect, I waited too long. If anything, after 3 months, I should have said: "My expertise is X. I want to work on it. I'd be happy to come back when you guys are actually doing X."

I recommend interviewing at other places asap. Life's too short.

1. Be bros with the current one

2. Make sure there is enough online sniping so the current one thinks it isn't worth it.

The chemical test positive happened to me too: they swabbed my bag and the machine beeped and I got a free full body massage.

This was when I was flying home from college for summer.

I explained it as "This is the bag I use for school: something must have touched it during chem lab".

I am a coward for saying this, but your objective when flying is to get to point B. So, make it easy on the jack-booted thugs.

You don't affect change by annoying your local officially sanctioned thug. You affect change by voting.

If you want to make a stand, then come prepared for that: knowledge of law + 24 hours to kill.

Yeah, I remember that.

When I say game, I mean: practice questions you can expect to get (a little googling will help).

To think anyone would get through those interviews without prepping is ridiculous. Google specifically actually tells you to prep and what things to practice.

And also, since so many people do prep, the bar for acceptable performance is much higher than it would otherwise.

At this point, I'm not sure what these interviews are supposed to be measuring.

Good point. It's not.

The point is to make OP feel better in the ensuing rants against technical interviews.

My advice to OP would be to understand that tech interviews, like all standardized testing, are something to be gamed (practice makes perfect).

You can rant all you want, but you will have little power to change it as a random applicant.

Just game it, and move on.

SimpleBlocker is a chrome plugin I use to block out distracting websites.

Here's what I did:

1) Installed RescueTime

2) 1 week later looked at my most visited websites and made a list of all I didn't want to visit again.

3) I added them to Simple Blocker and set a random password.

Now, I can't use chrome to access those sites, unless I uninstall the plugin. And, I've made a deal with myself that I wont uninstall it for atleast 2 months.

Anyway, tools can only help. At some point you just have to do it.

I read it as: "your opinion is wrong because you don't seem to have the requisite experience".

And, in such cases, I don't think people can be allowed hide behind the "right to an opinion". If you think about it, this is the source of "alternate facts".

But, hey, that's just my opinion :)

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but that doesn't mean unfounded opinion has to be respected or borne just because.

Too many things people say are "just because I think so" without much thinking going into why or how they came to that conclusion. So, maybe calling out baselessly opinionated people is ok?

As an aside, seems like the response was in the same tone as the parent's comment.