While I agree the comment will rub the startup groupies the wrong way, I don't really think the question itself is unsubstantial, especially in comparison to the post, as the post does not address the question. And I elaborated in response to a comment to it.
It's telling of the fact that we don't see most, or even 10%, of what gets posted here. There's far too much to read.
If you see a post that ought to have been moderated but hasn't been, the likeliest explanation is that we didn't see it. You can help by flagging it or emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com.
I don't expect you to read everything, but your choice of what to call out is still telling. If you truly think this is the sort of comment that needs direct intervention, I'd politely suggest you should set aside 2-3 hours per week to read comments on /new posts.
To be clear: I do not have the time or energy to back this up statistically, but my experience is that you are substantially more likely to choose to get involved in threads/comments that challenge startup culture than you are in threads/comments that embrace bigotry, conspiracy theories, and other genuinely appalling content.
Edit: To elaborate a bit and put a final touch on this before I call it a night, the problem isn't that I see you condemning comments like this; it's that I rarely-to-never see you condemning substantially worse comments. It seems to communicate a clear choice to allow repugnant behavior as long as it doesn't criticize startup culture/founder worship.
> I do not have the time or energy to back this up statistically
Please don't portray this as a case of being asked for an unreasonable level of effort. You've provided no examples or evidence at all.
As the other moderator, I do spend at least that number of hours each week looking at or looking for substantially worse comments than that, and usually they’re from troll accounts that we insta-ban without commenting about it.
As for the topics in which we post moderation replies: anyone can easily see in our feeds that we post plenty of similar comments in non-startup-related threads every week. Often I barely even know what the topic of the thread is, because I’m working through lists of flagged and killed comments, not discussion threads. This is why we ask people to flag comments they think break the guidelines.
I don’t see you flagging very often at all. I mean that not as a complaint; nobody is obliged to flag things. But if you did, it would be the simplest and most convincing way of building a case to prove that this bias and inadequate moderation exists.
He argues for lowering experience of everyone except founders, so that founders dont have more free time and dont have to learn what university teaches.
It is favoring 1 group, not wide areas of the human experience.
Similar in smell to political science degree --> career politician, I think pg nails it:
> The hard part of startups is product: knowing what to build, and being able to build it. And that kind of knowledge comes from studying computer science or mechanical engineering or molecular biology, not management or finance.
> Another thing that will tend to draw universities away from the optimal path is business schools, if they have them. Business schools were not designed to train founders. They were designed to train the managerial class of the large industrial companies that arose in the early 20th century; they're the West Points of industrial capitalism. That's why their official name is usually the School of Management. But while the skills they teach might be useful in running companies beyond a certain size, they're not the critical ingredient in founding them. And the skills that are are already taught by other departments. So to the extent business schools affect their parent university's strategy for preparing founders, it can only be by adding error.
> And that kind of knowledge comes from studying computer science or mechanical engineering or molecular biology, not management or finance.
But then he also states:
> Indeed, preparing students to start startups is closer to the ideal of liberal education than preparing them for almost any other kind of career.
This is pretty myopic and is obviously biased from someone embedded in the startup space, perhaps not surprising given how little value most startups provide. Not everything in life is a whiz-bang, fail fast, build-some-new-product-from-scratch startup. In fact, most things are not.
Pay attention to actual liberal arts universities. Their goal is on the long-term and not to satisfy some near-term need of startup founders making the next killer app or product. It can be argued that most startups build towards generating value only in the sense of monetary value, in that most startups' goal are purely about the exit. It really has little to do with building products. Most venture capitalists got their wealth from the dotcom bubble. Almost none of them know how to build actual products.
> What do universities have to do with startup founders? Gross.
Please don't post unsubstantive comments or shallow dismissals to Hacker News. We're hoping for curious conversation here, not bilious.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
While I agree the comment will rub the startup groupies the wrong way, I don't really think the question itself is unsubstantial, especially in comparison to the post, as the post does not address the question. And I elaborated in response to a comment to it.
I'm not concerned with "groupies", but with the quality standard on HN, which the GP post was obviously below.
The "Gross." remark (Edit: now removed) at the end was unnecessary, but the bulk of the comment seems like a pretty legitimate question to me.
It's telling that I see far worse HN comments on a daily basis that don't warrant a finger-wagging condemnation from you.
It's telling of the fact that we don't see most, or even 10%, of what gets posted here. There's far too much to read.
If you see a post that ought to have been moderated but hasn't been, the likeliest explanation is that we didn't see it. You can help by flagging it or emailing us at hn@ycombinator.com.
https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
I don't expect you to read everything, but your choice of what to call out is still telling. If you truly think this is the sort of comment that needs direct intervention, I'd politely suggest you should set aside 2-3 hours per week to read comments on /new posts.
To be clear: I do not have the time or energy to back this up statistically, but my experience is that you are substantially more likely to choose to get involved in threads/comments that challenge startup culture than you are in threads/comments that embrace bigotry, conspiracy theories, and other genuinely appalling content.
Edit: To elaborate a bit and put a final touch on this before I call it a night, the problem isn't that I see you condemning comments like this; it's that I rarely-to-never see you condemning substantially worse comments. It seems to communicate a clear choice to allow repugnant behavior as long as it doesn't criticize startup culture/founder worship.
> I do not have the time or energy to back this up statistically
Please don't portray this as a case of being asked for an unreasonable level of effort. You've provided no examples or evidence at all.
As the other moderator, I do spend at least that number of hours each week looking at or looking for substantially worse comments than that, and usually they’re from troll accounts that we insta-ban without commenting about it.
As for the topics in which we post moderation replies: anyone can easily see in our feeds that we post plenty of similar comments in non-startup-related threads every week. Often I barely even know what the topic of the thread is, because I’m working through lists of flagged and killed comments, not discussion threads. This is why we ask people to flag comments they think break the guidelines.
I don’t see you flagging very often at all. I mean that not as a complaint; nobody is obliged to flag things. But if you did, it would be the simplest and most convincing way of building a case to prove that this bias and inadequate moderation exists.
I edited the comment to contain only the question and not commentary.
I appreciate the edit, but now that I read the edited comment, I think I was responding mostly to the "Gross." bit.
[dead]
What is the point of a university if it not to provide education that could benefit wide areas of the human experience?
That's not what he is arguing, though, is it?
Is founding a company not a thing some humans experience?
He argues for lowering experience of everyone except founders, so that founders dont have more free time and dont have to learn what university teaches.
It is favoring 1 group, not wide areas of the human experience.
Ever heard of an MBA?
Similar in smell to political science degree --> career politician, I think pg nails it:
> The hard part of startups is product: knowing what to build, and being able to build it. And that kind of knowledge comes from studying computer science or mechanical engineering or molecular biology, not management or finance.
> Another thing that will tend to draw universities away from the optimal path is business schools, if they have them. Business schools were not designed to train founders. They were designed to train the managerial class of the large industrial companies that arose in the early 20th century; they're the West Points of industrial capitalism. That's why their official name is usually the School of Management. But while the skills they teach might be useful in running companies beyond a certain size, they're not the critical ingredient in founding them. And the skills that are are already taught by other departments. So to the extent business schools affect their parent university's strategy for preparing founders, it can only be by adding error.
He states:
> And that kind of knowledge comes from studying computer science or mechanical engineering or molecular biology, not management or finance.
But then he also states:
> Indeed, preparing students to start startups is closer to the ideal of liberal education than preparing them for almost any other kind of career.
This is pretty myopic and is obviously biased from someone embedded in the startup space, perhaps not surprising given how little value most startups provide. Not everything in life is a whiz-bang, fail fast, build-some-new-product-from-scratch startup. In fact, most things are not.
Pay attention to actual liberal arts universities. Their goal is on the long-term and not to satisfy some near-term need of startup founders making the next killer app or product. It can be argued that most startups build towards generating value only in the sense of monetary value, in that most startups' goal are purely about the exit. It really has little to do with building products. Most venture capitalists got their wealth from the dotcom bubble. Almost none of them know how to build actual products.