

Ask YC: Has Paul Graham ever made a joke online? - maxklein

I've never met Paul Graham or seen any videos of him talking. All I know is that he created this site and that he posts here. But I noticed - every single one of his posts is super serious. I have NEVER seen PG crack a joke or follow up on a joke. I have to ask...<p>What's the deal with that? Is pg like some really humourless guy? Is he afraid of letting his hair down? Or is he like a really stern mentor like in the movie Kung Fu Dragon Master From the Shaolin Temple, where the master is all serious and then the American student thinks he knows kungfu and punches the master, and it turns out that actually the master just removed his underwear...but for startups?
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mechanical_fish
Go to IT Conversations and download the audio of PG's talks. There are some
supremely funny laugh lines.

From memory:

 _At our startup we had Robert Morris working as a system administrator...
incidentally, we also had him in charge of security. Our clients would ask
about our security and we'd say 'Don't worry; we've got an expert in
charge'..._

PG's humor is often subtle. (If you didn't see the humor in that last quote,
go google "morris worm".) He tends toward the sly, rather than the slapstick.
And he's fond of jokes that, when examined closely for a second time, or when
reduced to print on a page, turn out to have a lot of truth in them. But I'd
never describe him as a poker-faced guy.

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byrneseyeview
He clearly has a sense of humor:

<http://news.ycombinator.net/item?id=35079>

I don't know where you get the 'serious' impression. The content on his
website makes it seem like he's having a great time, most of the time. And you
might notice that he edits out the negative stuff pretty fast, e.g. comments
with angry interjections, or the deleted preface (available if you view
source) for this: <http://www.paulgraham.com/polls.html>

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tstegart
Oh man that thread is a riot! Half of it I don't understand and the other half
is like watching a nerd version of Ultimate Fighting Championship, only with
pocket protectors. Do we still get threads with over 150 comments anymore?
There should be a YC Classics thread list, because that definitely qualifies.

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pchristensen
Here's another: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=241134>

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rms
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=152428>

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kirubakaran
What are you talking about? Almost every one of his essays has jokes.

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kyro
Go to omnisio.com and watch his talk at the last startup school. Then you can
choose whether you want to delete this submission or not.

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alaskamiller
Paul is a really awesome guy in person when you meet him.

