
Ask HN: Does survival bias in self-taught/bootcamp developer stories matter? - thomascountz
The stories I find always have one thing in common: the writers &quot;make it.&quot; They get the job, get into a Bootcamp, or launch a profitable sass app; whatever their goal may be, if they&#x27;re writing about it, they&#x27;ve achieved it.<p>Similar question asking for anecdotes here:<p>https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.reddit.com&#x2F;r&#x2F;cscareerquestions&#x2F;comments&#x2F;6w30de&#x2F;for_those_who_travelled_down_the_selftaught_path&#x2F;
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owebmaster
Every succesful spot on the earth is subject to "survival bias". For each
Neymar and Messi there are hundreds of thousands of kids literally killing
themselves trying to be the next football superstar. Most of them are going to
fail but the next Neymar will for sure come from this pool.

The "self thaught" career is the same, with the difference that a lot more
people trying it succeed. But it is still difficult and a lot of people won't.

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jwilliams
It's less likely a traditional "survival bias" scenario because effort
matters. I'm sure participants who commit the strongest get the best outcomes
(and a more likely to write about it).

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UK-AL
There's probably a lot people who also put in a lot effort and failed. They're
not going to write about it.

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jwilliams
Well that's the survivor bias question - is there another factor that's
important when you consider the whole population?

In this case, anecdotally, I doubt it. Even the linked discussion thread has a
number of discussions on the reason for failing -- and lack of effort was the
major one.

