
Paul Graham on Doing Things Right by Accident - runesoerensen
http://www.themacro.com/articles/2016/02/paul-graham-startup-school-radio-interview/
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peterclary
Off-topic but: Hooray for transcripts! I can see the benefits of being able to
hear the pauses, tone, inflections, etc. but even leaving aside the deaf and
hearing-impaired, there are so many advantages to having the text (it's
searchable, you can read it while listening to music, it's quicker to read it
than to listen to it).

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miseg
The color codings with the names of the speakers helped a lot too. Very
different to an unformatted wall of text, which you'll often see with podcast
transcripts.

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aresant
"Plus, then, I had given this talk about the Harvard Computer Society, and I
said, “If you want to raise money, raise money from people who made the money
doing startups. And then, they can give you advice, too.” And I suddenly
noticed, they were all looking at me. And I had this horrifying vision of them
all e-mailing me their business plans. Which is funny, because that’s what YC
turned into."

That gave me chills.

The entire startup experience, the essence of being an entrpepreneur for me is
in that moment when your brain subconsciously processes all the data around a
problem and throws out something obvious and audacious in the same breath. And
before you can conciously object BAM you have said it outloud and the
adventure begins.

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bcook
Please, for the ignorant (no offense intended, as I am an entrenched member),
can you more precisely/consisely explain your critiques? The reasons behind
your "chills" are foreign to me.

My intuition often betrays my experience.

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ktRolster
"Gives me chills" in that context is not a criticism, it means (roughly) that
he really liked and related to it.

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kbenson
I believe "frisson" is the word you are looking for.

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graeme
It's the same thing. Though "gives me chills" is more common in English. I
only knew "frisson" because I speak French, I'm not sure I've ever heard an
English speaker use it. (until now)

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BellsOnSunday
I don't think frisson is that unusual, or that it means the same thing as
"gives me the chills" \-- the latter implies that you're frightened, IMO.

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jessaustin
It depends on context, but "gives me the chills" certainly _can_ mean what
they're talking about upthread.

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conceit
Well, I'd agree but chilly has something to do with cold, whereas goose bumps
would rather correlate with warmth from a suddenly increased blood pressure.
I'd say thrilled (say frilled) was a good compromise, if it wasn't
preoccupied. Anyway, I'd not get a kick out of the remark so I wouldn't know
what it really means.

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Outdoorsman
>>Paul : It is actually a trick for interviews. If someone asks you a boring
question, just answer the interesting one they might have asked, and nobody
complains.<<

That's classic...

An example of how to actually live "your" own life in this world...not paying
a great deal of attention to uninteresting things that others bring up; rather
molding those same things so that they become interesting, and illuminate
parts of your life and the lives of others...

In my estimation, my life is what it is--one I'm very happy with--because of
my having just that attitude...

And, yes, I totally agree:

>>Paul : When I was a kid at Christmas, the Sears Catalog was your reference
work.<<

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moeamaya
I generically agree with your sentiment, but there are often times where a
simple question causes me to reconsider humanities' goals. These "boring"
questions become stratified and ultimately challenge and provide friction to
my strongly held beliefs, where that which was once uninteresting has become
supremely relevant.

PG is a boss and has done more for startups than anyone I know, but he isn't
beyond critique. Boring questions are ripe with depth outside the capacity of
CS and tech entrepreneurs, and deal with the realities of everyday people.

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Terr_
This reminds me of a bit from "The Dilbert Future" (1997):

> Most people won't admit how they got their current jobs unless you push them
> up against a built-in wall unit and punch them in the stomach until they
> spill their drink and start yelling, "I'LL NEVER INVITE YOU TO ONE OF MY
> PARTIES AGAIN, YOU DRUNKEN FOOL!"

> I think the reason these annoying people won't tell me how they got their
> jobs is because they are embarrassed to admit luck was involved.

> I can't blame them. Typically the pre-luck part of their careers involved
> doing something enormously pathetic. Take me, for example. I'm a successful
> cartoonist and author because I'm a complete failure at being an employee of
> the local phone company.

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dec0dedab0de
I have been lucky quite a few times along my career path. However that "luck"
was usually the result of identifying a good opportunity, and taking a risk.
There are many people "stuck" in their current jobs because they don't see
opportunities for what they are, or because they're too afraid to act on them.
Fortune favors the bold.

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Ma8ee
And some bold people lose or never get the opportunities. I don't claim that
character isn't an important factor, but what we normally would call pure luck
is also an important one. That someone is stuck doesn't mean that they don't
dare or don't see the opportunities. They might just be unlucky.

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pkrumins
That reminds me of this amazing talk called Why Greatness Cannot be Planned:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQPL9GooyI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dXQPL9GooyI)

TLDV: Innovation is not driven by narrowly focused heroic effort. We'd be
wiser and the outcomes would be better if instead we whole-heartedly embraced
serendipitous discovery and playful creativity. We can potentially achieve
more by following a non-objective yet still principled path, after throwing
off the shackles of objectives, metrics, and mandated outcomes.

This also matches my experience 100%. All my best discoveries are accidental.

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visakanv
+1. As a writer, literally all of my best work is completely unplanned. On
hindsight there was preparation, background, context, etc, but still.

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meowface
I've heard this sentiment expressed for the creation of music and art as well.

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telesilla
I'm a composer as well as a software developer. There is no way in hell I
could plan an interesting piece of music. You really just have to wait for it
to come, however importantly it does mean you have to be ready to listen: i.e.
put yourself in environments and states of mind that are most receptive and be
extremely well-honed on your craft on a technical level so you can execute
well.

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derefr
I think this is a sentiment most people share, because most creative people
only output—at most—a few masterworks in their lifetimes.

I bet the people who are constantly pumping out works that, on their own,
would be considered achievements—the Picassos and Frank Zappas and Stephen
Kings of the world—have a pretty different view on how much of creating
something good is inspiration vs. a schlepp.

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Swizec
Any famous writer I've ever read about has said that the amateur waits for
inspiration, whereas the professional just sits down and gets to work.

12 months from now you won't be able to tell what you wrote while inspired and
what while schlepping.

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visakanv
> 12 months from now you won't be able to tell what you wrote while inspired
> and what while schlepping.

I've been writing almost every day for probably about a decade now. The
reality of it is a little more nuanced that that.

It's more like... 20% of the time you were inspired, you'll realize that what
you produced was still crap.

Similarly, about 20% of the time you were schlepping, you'll realize it was
actually pretty good.

And about maybe 20-30% of the time, you'll find yourself getting 'inspired'
midway through a schlep. And as you do it more and more often, you start
subconsciously preparing things in anticipation of the work.

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Swizec
So, 20% chance of crap while inspired, 36% to 44% chance of good while
schlepping?

I'll take those chances. Especially if it increases my chance of getting
started at all.

Remember, the only option with 0% chance of great is not doing anything.

~~~
visakanv
Yup, exactly!

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notahacker
Reading about how his original motivations were purely pecuniary, he was keen
to sell his company as quickly as possible and his ambition was to go back to
essay-writing and hobbyist programming, I can't help thinking _young PG
probably wouldn 't get accepted into YC these days_...

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f14ist
This is an interesting thought. Might be the kind of thinking that led to the
YC fellowship?

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bootload
_" Early-stage startups are just fast-moving chaos. That is a constant. That
was true in Henry Ford's day, it was true when we started YC."_

Interesting quote. There must be some organisation to early startups,
otherwise they wouldn't work. Is the chaos just a description of what cannot
be observed and described?

Fantastic read. Liked the bit about straw-drawing to talk to customers.

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Hermel
The "organization" at startups is to do whatever makes sense and to not waste
energy on internal politics. Obviously, that requires the founders to be
naturally well-aligned in what they do.

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bootload
_" do whatever makes sense and to not waste energy on internal politics."_

Your right, small team organisation is what startups must succeed in. So
obvious, I missed this.

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aws_ls
I guess PG is a genius. I realized a bit painfully, that I may be much
mediocre in comparison. I know comparison is wrong/etc. But what the heck?

I also wonder now, that what I think (and say to friends) of as my life style
business tech startup, is actually a Zombie? Did we really manage to hit the
magic break even (revenue = comfortable salary + expenses). Hmm...But
something in me tells me that, there's more to it, as my effort has been
ongoing, although its little less than thrice of the time PG spent on Viaweb.

One motivation, which also contributes to make me keep working in it, is my
earlier partners, who still have a stake, and they contributed a lot, to this
in the early years. Somehow, there's a feeling in me that they should get a
good return on that effort. Which also means that my returns will be more, so
its not a pure selfless line of thought there.

Just some musings, after reading the very good interview transcript. And just
want to assure that there is no irony/sarcasm in my post (I think, it may come
across like that in the early part). And also no "sympathy" replies please. As
I actually feel quite upbeat about things.

Apologies for being tangential (if I have been), just felt like writing this.

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S4M
I find interesting the part where PG says that a startup either makes its
founders rich either goes down, and basically discards the possibility that it
ends up to be just enough to pay its founders a good salary. I think it can be
a pretty nice outcome but then again YC must select founders who are very
ambitious.

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pc86
It has to do with what YC selects for in part, but no startup in the PG sense
of the word (hyper growth, mass adoption/virality, high risk) would ever give
the founder(s) a good job and nothing more. YC is not in the business of
pulling off $30k a year in draws from a sustainable business.

You have the big exist or you shut it down and try something else. There's no
middle ground, which is part of why "startup" has a very specific definition,
and why YC doesn't invest in SMBs.

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EGreg
_e-commerce was not my life’s work. I didn’t actually want to spend my life
working on this. I did it to get money and make that money._

 _Aaron : Yeah. This is such an interesting thing because it’s so opposite
from what you tell people a lot of the time, what YC tells people, certainly,
of “Don’t do things just because there’s a business there,” right?_

This is it, right here. If you want to know what most successful
businesspeople have in common - not the unicorns - it's that they were
prepared to sell their first venture and/or give away a lot of equity to the
right people to make it work. Once they have the money, comnections and track
record, they can have much more control in their next company.

We went a completely different route. We've tried to change the world... :)

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alanwatts
"Superior work has the quality of an accident"

-Alan Watts, The Way of Zen

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Kenji
I can't believe one of the founders was doing this alongside grad school and
PG was like yeah you know, you have a lot of spare time there.

And here I got so much work with full time studying that I can barely finish
reading a single book alongside. How can people say university is enjoyable,
fun, lots of spare time? For me it's just endless hard work and barely any
breaks inbetween.

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tinkerdol
Depends on what program you're in? In general I think grad school (esp. the
PhD level compared to Master's) typically gives the student a lot of freedom.
At the PhD level often you are basically an independent researcher and might
meet with your advisor once every three weeks or so.

If that were the case, and you could complete enough work to keep your advisor
happy within one week, that gives you two weeks of time to use...

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beambot
> might meet with your advisor once every three weeks or so.

Only if your advisor is fairly senior (ie. Not pre-tenure)!

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ArkyBeagle
It's amazing the lengths to which people will go to avoid Windows programming.
I know I have :)

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cableshaft
I've done a good amount of mobile and python development, and Windows
programming used to be awful, but it seems to have gotten a lot better,
especially with ASP.NET.

I prefer it and I'm a lot faster programming using C#/Visual Studio than I am
with Javascript + framework + text editor.

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z3t4
I love listening to (success) stories. You should make more of those.

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lsniddy
luck = opportunity + preparedness

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vidoc
Full-of-himself !

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dominotw
Right?? I was sitting here reading this and going I cant be the only one
thinking this guy is some sort of a narcissist. And all the ridiculous
sycophancy of poeple here trying to infer secret wisdom in his uninspiring
answers only makes the whole thing even more bizarre.

Poverty is poverty only when you have no means to make your life better.
Suffering form special snowflake syndrome is not poverty.

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kkoomi
Which parts of the interview made you feel that he was narcissistic?

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dominotw
you mean other than the example in the parent comment?

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JohnD19
I stopped reading this "treatise" when in the first paragraph Aaron spoke
highly of the war criminal Donald Rumsfeld.

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terravion
Aaron specifically says you might not want to emulate Donald Rumsfeld. I'm
really starting to think that conservatives might have a point that the 21st
century left has a problem with name calling and ad hominem to shut down
debate. It is possible to think that Donald Rumsfeld should be on trial and
still be willing to learn from him.

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deciplex
> _I 'm really starting to think that conservatives might have a point that
> the 21st century left has a problem with name calling and ad hominem to shut
> down debate._

Most of that is movement conservatives complaining that their days of
hijacking American culture seem to be in jeopardy (they think - I am not so
optimistic).

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darshanp
One of the best things I've read in a long time. Paul Graham is God!

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known
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window)

