

Ignore Everybody. - rfugger
http://gapingvoid.com/ie/

======
jmitcheson
Wow. I have to say: if you opened the page and then left immediately due to
all the spammy looking stuff up the top, GO BACK. This was a pretty good read.

It's basically about startups from the point of view of an artist but every
point translates perfectly to software.

~~~
MoOmer
Thank you - I left the page, figuring that the large image with colored
sentences was the content.

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gbog
On this one

    
    
        34. Beware of tur­ning hob­bies into jobs.
    

It is true, but only half-true I guess. I have been bitten but this issue:
With an engineering background, I loved music, and decided to try to live by
music, so I became a sound engineer. I had to stop. After some time I could
not listen to anything but raw classical (eg Bach). If you love music and want
to continue loving it, don't make it your daily job!

I guess it is different with coding: If you like to code, maybe there is no
problem in doing it also as a daily job (arguably).

~~~
Random_Person
This is the closest to home for me.

I started coding when I was around 10. I wrote software every day for 12
years, enthralled and eager to try new things. I learned every language I
could get my hands on. When it became a job, I lost all my passion for it. I
quit coding for 10 years. Not a single line. I decided to become an automotive
mechanic instead...

Today, I'm in IT and my creative outlet is board games. I not only play them,
but I design them as well. Last year I licensed my first game and suddenly
this dream that I have always had of being published was fulfilled. My first
instinct was to embrace that success and use the boost to create more success.
I had to pause. I was trying to force success again.

The difference this time was that I realized quickly that I was trying to
monetize a hobby. Forget it. I'm not abandoning passionate game design for
money. It's just not worth it.

~~~
the_cat_kittles
I think the rub is that creative things (maybe almost everything, actually)
really only grow out of intrinsic motivation. For most people, money is the
exact opposite of that.

~~~
Random_Person
I completely agree with you. I also think that "most people" never truly
understand and instead chase the almighty dollar believing it to be the
measure of their success.

Money doesn't motivate me at all. It is a means of surviving without self-
sustaining. I cut my pay in half to become an automotive mechanic and it was
the greatest move I ever made. I was no longer working for the dollar, I was
working for the joy of fixing things. Literally overnight I became poor and
happy simultaneously.

~~~
the_cat_kittles
That is really, really cool and inspiring. I think way more things can be
fascinating and fulfilling than we think, its just a matter of thinking about
them right. Shakespeare's "for there is nothing either good or bad, but
thinking makes it so" rings truer every day to me.

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gruseom
This piece contains the immortal line "Never compare your inside with somebody
else’s outside." I've quoted that to my kids (and myself) many times.

These are hard topics to write about, because inspiring talk quickly slides
into feel-goodness which is dangerously close to the black hole of
complacency: one false move and you get sucked in. What Hugh writes doesn't do
that (edit: mostly), perhaps because he's so direct about the loneliness and
pain of creative work. "Nobody suddenly discovers anything. Things are made
slowly and in pain."

There's also something about the contrast between his trivial business-card
doodles and the life-and-death questions. The high and the low go together and
understand each other. It's the mediocre middle that sucks.

~~~
vibrunazo
> These are hard topics to write about, because inspiring talk quickly slides
> into feel-goodness

Don't you think that "Ever­yone is born crea­tive; ever­yone is given a box of
cra­yons in kindergarten." Crosses that line? It's really easy to prove that
wrong. Statistically, that's a bad advice. In my personal opinion, that sounds
like a dishonest mean to get your readers to like you.

I don't blame him tho. I don't think he's doing any wrong. There's a
difference between "scientifically correct" and "politically correct". And I
understand that, unfortunately, life sometimes makes you choose the political
path instead of the scientifically correct one. If a kid with mental disorder
asks you "will I ever be an astronaut?", it might be dishonest to pat him in
the back and tell him, of course you can, just try hard enough. But I wouldn't
blame those who would.

~~~
gruseom
No doubt he crosses the line - it's hard not to. I'm not sure I agree about
that particular quote, though. If we all went by probability, nobody would do
anything great. The soul does not live by statistics.

I am no authority, but FWIW my experience of creativity comes from a place I
find hard to believe every human being doesn't have access to. As Bob Dylan
sang: "In this you are not so unique". The difficulty is that we are governed
almost completely by the desire to believe and do what other people say.

~~~
vibrunazo
> If we all went by probability, nobody would do anything great.

You can be humble and productive at the same time. That's one of the goals of
the Lean Startup.

Skeptically analyse the viability before doing something. That's different
from avoid doing at all. You just need to be skeptical about your own
knowledge and abilities, and then you can make a better decision. That's a
good advice. But "believe in yourself above all else", not so much.

~~~
gruseom
Funny you should bring that up. I dislike the Lean Startup ideology precisely
because it is at odds with the creative process as I understand it. Did you
see the interview with the Pinterest founder the other day? He said he was
glad he hadn't known about it earlier because it would have convinced him to
give up. Twitter may be a similar case; the founders said they kept going for
a long time when people were telling them it was useless.

When you see something other people don't see, measuring their opinions is
likely to tell you you're wrong. But what if you're not wrong? Emerson has a
great line somewhere about the pain of having an original thought and giving
it up under pressure, only to find out later that it was right.

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freshfey
The greatest insight I got from this (pretty awesome) book was that sometimes
your friends criticize your ideas and projects, because deeply they are scared
that your relationship will change if you're successful.

~~~
clarebear
You can find friends who will help you change for the better. When you do,
value them.

------
crusso
Pretty good read, but I always have an ironic chuckle when someone advises you
to "ignore advice from others".

That advice is only out-shined by blogs that advise others to "stop telling
everyone else what to do".

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Pent
Some good insight, better then it looked like at first because it actually
goes into detail... Still not sure if I'll remember any of it tomorrow.

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nate
Hugh's been a favorite of mine too. One of the only newsletter's I've
subscribed to. You might dig this blog post of mine that was up on HN awhile
ago that mentioned Hugh and Jobs and the effort of going against the grain.

<http://blog.inklingmarkets.com/2010/01/ignore-everbody.html>

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deedubaya
I have this one on my wall, good reminder to look at every day.

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kghose
Not a deep link, but a link to the site directly

[http://www.gapingvoidart.com/ignore-
everybody-11x14-p-69_0.h...](http://www.gapingvoidart.com/ignore-
everybody-11x14-p-69_0.html?utm_campaign=ignoreeverybody&utm_medium=ignoreeverybodyimage)

~~~
austingulati
That's just the image at the top, the real value is in the article. I didn't
notice it was there until I read the comments and someone pointed it out.

