I believe that Zed was striving for Zen in his post.
As a college student and someone who read LPTHW, I'm quite happy to see this entry. I have seen the negative attitudes of many self-ascribed "programmers" in the CS department at my University. I feel like a lot of this comes from the point that Zed was making - the old dogs are upset because new people are circumventing how they learned to code. It's strange that some people hold so dearly to their old methods of learning, but I do feel like one must let go of that way of thinking if they wish to be happy.
The new methods of learning are great and they usually don't cement anyone into thinking they're a "programmer." One of my best friends goes to RISD and he learned to code from LPTHW and he is one of the best coders I know (although I think his style is weird sometimes... but that's beside the point). What matters is he is making cool things and he is humble about it. People shouldn't be too attached to any one thing on this earth, it takes away from our complexity as humans. We have such boundless potential and I hate to see that get knocked down by people who are afraid of losing their identity as a "programmer." Those people are so much more than that too! Even if they read all of Knuth's literature and have built compilers, humans aren't robots, why should we act like them? We must let go of the identities that cause to inflict harm on people.
Zed has come across as rather harsh in some of his writing, but this post is very beautiful. I'm not saying that Jeff is a bad guy, I'm just glad that Zed wrote this post.
Hopefully in time we can all let go of the identity of being a programmer. Most of us use libraries built by other people that are so abstracted anybody could do it! And what's cool about the people who are building the gnarly libraries is they put it out for opensource - they want people to use it 8^)
Don't be concerned with the bullies, go out there and have fun!
After their Safari tracking system fiasco they announce this: the ultimate form of tracking. It shouldn't come as a surprise that Google would make this considering the rest of their products.
I love Google and their products, but I feel this takes it over the line. At what point will Google be satisfied with the amount of information they're able to collect? Maybe the world will become some strange Utopia where products like these glasses are acceptable and Google made the right call, but Google should take a step back and realize they're making technology for humans, not robots.
If this trend continues I bet we'll see Google Children roaming our street. Ok, that's pretty hyperbolic but you get my point.
There is something sleazy about Facebook that extends beyond privacy failures. I don't like the idea of blending a new community I'm about to join with the filth on my Facebook friends list. I think this mostly applies to younger people who ended up adding everyone they knew through high school: my Facebook friends are mostly just an accumulation of people I don't really care about.
If I wanted to join a network separate from Facebook, why would I want that network to have access to my Facebook?
I use Spotify and Songkick reluctantly only because they are great services. Facebook is a great way to get your name out there, but I'd rather fill out a few text fields than have a service I want to use depend on Facebook.
People join new networks to get away from Facebook, not extend it into every sector of their lives.
If I wanted to join a network separate from Facebook, why would I want that network to have access to my Facebook?
Possibly because that network offers thing that FB doesn't, even if you don't have a problem with it.
People join new networks to get away from Facebook, not extend it into every sector of their lives.
Are you sure you aren't attributing your own personal opinions to others? Not wanting to login using FB has other possible explanations, like not trusting the new site/app not to spam your friends. It's not necessarily trying to "get away" from Facebook.
It is my hope that humanity finds a healthy balance between technology and tasks that humans do. Yes, it would be great if Apple didn't have to exploit Chinese workers to make their products. But no, it would not be great if my Doctor was put out of work by a robot. I honestly feel that the government will have to issue some sort of standard that limits technology to some sense.
Yes, I would save money by going to the robot dentist, but my dentist would be out of work in no time. It partially rests on humans to keep the exploits of technology at bay. We can't turn personable human tasks into machine work.
Our world can be set up to be completely self-sufficient. Yes, a few people would make a lot of money, but I personally believe the impacts would be horrendous.
What separates the Dentist from the bank teller? Clearly ATM's have drastically reduced the need for Bank tellers, yet nobody seems that concerned about it. More generally, I suspect there is always going to be gap’s when as a field gets automated. As the more complex the task the harder it is to automate and less cost effective it is to do. So, it feels like the steady erosion of low end jobs everywhere vs. a sudden loss of a single profession.
We can see this as an increased demand for education / training. But, not everyone is able to keep up and over time ever fewer people are going to be capable of the remaining niches. It's possible that the service industry's are going to continue to absorb the less capable, but that does not help the economy in the long term.
"What separates the Dentist from the bank teller?"
One of them has his or her hand in your mouth and might need to drill, remove, fill or otherwise mess around with your teeth. I think a lot of people would be more comfortable with a human element in all medical interactions, even if robots are eventually as effective.
What about when robots become more effective? Drastically more effective?
I would not let a modern day robot work on my teeth, they are too stupid, but I can imagine a day (fairly soon) when this will not be the case, and my gut reaction will start to be the exact opposite: I would not let a human being work on my teeth.
I wouldn't bet against that, but what I was saying was that right now there is a big difference between a human bank teller and a human dentist, and an even bigger difference between an ATM and some future dentist robot. It's just a bad analogy because they are not similar interactions at all.
We already have robotic dentists doing dental work better than a human can. Back in the dark ages of say 1995 if you wanted to get your teeth into better alignment you went to this guy who attached this complex apparatus that would forcefully move the teeth in your mouth and every so often you would go back to this same person to do adjustments and such. Sure, it often hurt, look a long time, looked bad, interfered with proper dental care, and only allowed for fairly simple work, but at least it was expensive.
Now, with automation and 3D imaging technology we can have a specialist specify what to change and let a computer design a series of discrete non-invasive attachments that allow a home users to quickly attach and remove their implant. It's far less painful, takes less time,can far more precisely preform complex work like rotating a tooth, and the only downside is it costs about the same amount as braces. Note: This is an actual company not just BS (http://www.invisalign.com/Pages/default.aspx).
PS: I still occasionally see a teller for complex interactions, but I trust an ATM to be far more accurate for my day to day needs. And there is still plenty of work for orthodontists, but a lot of the simple stuff is simply better handled by a machine.
That's fascinating, thanks. But has this technology reduced the need for orthodontists? Does it mean that orthodontists now need to learn how to program? I think this is just another example of humans using more software.
It's reduced the time an orthodontist spends per patent and allowed non orthodontists to do simple things that used to involve an orthodontist. But, it has also convinced a lot of adults to get dental work. So, in the short term it's fairly neutral, but in the long term we are going to need fewer orthodontists.
As to programming; I don't know a lot about how the software works, but advanced users in front of really complex software like Excel and Photoshop tend to blur the line between a Specialist and Programmer.
Was not thinking of this currently. Do you think people outside of the startup world would be interested? I'm trying to make the designs interesting enough to appeal to others.
Totally.
I just wouldn't make anything so centered around the idea of a startup. As long as people have reason to gravitate toward the design, people will want it. This goes beyond aesthetics, though. It's probably a difficult balance to achieve, but it's definitely doable.
It's a paper that focuses on some strange patterns that came out of a statistical analysis of the 1988 Computer Science AP test. It turns out that there are a few questions that end up being a great indicator towards someone's natural programming ability.
Great article. Thanks. This in particular blew my mind:
"“Educators of computer science have repeatedly observed that
only about 2 out of every 100 students enrolling in introductory
programming classes really resonate with the subject and seem
to be natural-born computer scientists…I conclude that roughly
2% of all people ‘think algorithmically,’ in the sense that they
can reason rapidly about algorithmic processes."
But that is a quote from Knuth based on an older unpublished study, and seems to be a conjecture with weak evidence. Not sure it is actually mind blowing.
Other than the Google logo in the bottom left hand corner, Google has done a great job of taking the back seat on development. You can pretty much make a map that looks like it's completely void of the Google family.
When creating a mapping application, it's extremely important to stay away from that. There's no point to creating an application that's just a styled Google map. There has to be a point to having your application centered around a map. I think a drawback of using Google maps (or any of the mapping services) is that it's so familiar to people. A lot of people might assume that the application your building is just a Google growth. Fortunately, Google has a good deal of features built into the API to keep that from happening. You can pretty much design what your map will look like down to the most seemingly superfluous of details.
Mapping applications are so awesome because of how interactive and driven by visual exploration they are. I think there will be a lot more of them doing things that we don't expect to see in the future.
One last note: Any TileMill developers out there? What would your advice be for someone who is making a mapping application/considering moving over from gmap?
"This knowledge isn’t superficial in a survey-course sense: It is about both deep structure and practical applications. Knowing about, in this sense, is crucial to understanding a new problem and what must be learned in more depth in order to solve it."
I am usually of the school that finds more value in deeply understanding a single thing than having good knowledge of a lot of things.
When it comes to start-ups and hackers, do you think it's more important to have a deep knowledge of a few topics or a fair understanding of a lot of topics? I think it's more beneficial to have the kind of knowledge that the article described, than a true bare bones understanding of programming.
You don't need to know compiler languages to code the next big thing. It just gives people an indication to how smart the founders are, which means a lot.
"do you think it's more important to have a deep knowledge of a few topics or a fair understanding of a lot of topics"
I have been thinking a lot about this. My conclusion is that the optimal thing is somehow both. When I say both, it sounds bullshit, but it is not. I think the key is to be ABLE to study specific topics deeply, know what is deep understanding, know what really tight focus is, learn and practice one or two specific topics very deeply AND with this kind of developed mind, go into lots and lots of quite diverse topics following your interests and needs. And be brave to sometimes dig a bit deep into something which no one expected you to dig into.
So optimally your knowledge should be 'incalculable' by other people. A kind of interesting, a little bit strange knowledge-portfolio which is not very common.
TL;DR: Go very deep into something (extremely deep if possible), learn a little a bit of everything (extremely only the basics about extremely lots of things) to avoid knowledge holes, and go a little bit deep into unexpected things to make your knowledge-base incalculabe and interesting.
But it also depends to a large degree what you want to do with your life. A good junior-to-mid grade Infantry officer for instance does not really need a deep knowledge of any one particular thing, but he needs to have a broad knowledge of many things and be able to move seemlessly between them and relate them to each other.
On the other hand, for a mathematician, even saying he wants a deep knowlede of math is far too broad, it would be better to say he wants to focus in on something like Chaos Theory. Even that might be too broad and many fine mathematicians spend their careers working on a handful of closely related problems in a very narrow sub-field of a field of mathematics.
I agree with nadam. You can use the knowledge you gained from fair understanding of a lot of topics to learn the next topic deeply in a more efficient way.
Making money in music today's music industry is absurd. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if major record labels vanished in the next 100 years.
You'd imagine a band that's put out a record on a successful label and toured the world multiple times would be covered in wealth. That's not the case at all. In fact, most touring bands don't even make enough money to be in the black. At the end of the day, past the flights, cost of gas, and cheap meals lies an elastic state of negative to mediocre profit.
Why then do small acts still tour? Well, it's fun and it's probably been a dream of theirs for some time now. I for one am extremely thankful that bands continue to put out amazing music with only enough money to barely support themselves.
Here's the thing: bands don't need major labels anymore. That's because it's basically level playing field now: you can make an amazing album on your laptop in a barn in rural Massachusetts and still have the ability to compete with the major labels. No longer are people sucked into the radio aggregate of the 90's when all you could discover were boy bands. Now we have these amazing things like Bandcamp and Spotify that allow you to stream virtually anything! That's pretty amazing, but what's the use if everyone is listening to the demands of a major label?
So with that being the case, couldn't this problem be solved? All it will take is a push for bands to stay away from huge labels and for listeners to find that music. That's where Spotify should come in.
What's interesting about this entire thing is that a long tail company like Spotify is potentially able to shift the power from the shit that most major labels produce to better and more meaningful music. If Spotify can find a way to direct people's tastes away from most major label garbage, they might be able to solve this issue.
Maybe Spotify will push for more independent artists and incorporate musicians on Bandcamp into their catalog.
Although I'm pretty sure that musicians who put their music directly on Spotify only receive a pretty small cut, Spotify should be able to overcome their major label woes by putting a focus on smaller more niche based music.
It is my hope that musicians stay away from large labels. And no, I am not some indie purist, I just think that major labels are diluting the quality and diversity of music and that we have the power to change that.
"So with that being the case, couldn't this problem be solved? All it will take is a push for bands to stay away from huge labels and for listeners to find that music. That's where Spotify should come in.
What's interesting about this entire thing is that a long tail company like Spotify is potentially able to shift the power from the shit that most major labels produce to better and more meaningful music. If Spotify can find a way to direct people's tastes away from most major label garbage, they might be able to solve this issue."
In response to this there was an older article posted here about some of the numbers behind Spotify: http://pansentient.com/2011/04/spotify-technology-some-stats...
One quote in particular speaks to your point, interestingly in a section called "The Short Tail?":
"During a week-long analysis of all music played via Spotify:
88% of track accesses were for the most popular 12% of all tracks on Spotify.
79% of server requests were for the most popular 21% of all tracks on Spotify."
While it might be a nice idea that Spotify could somehow shift user taste towards more independent artists, the numbers here seem to say that people go to Spotify for mainly popular, culturally relevant tracks. I think a company attempting more of what you're saying is the YC company Earbits with their model focusing on discovery of smaller artists. Personally I'd rather listen to popular music I know on Spotify, and I think most people feel the same way. I just wish there was a viable business model there. Music is a very tough vertical.
> "During a week-long analysis of all music played via Spotify: 88% of track accesses were for the most popular 12% of all tracks on Spotify. 79% of server requests were for the most popular 21% of all tracks on Spotify."
It also says that only 60% was ever played: 79% of plays are for 35% of the played catalogue. There are some numbers missing, but I would expect those 35% to represent a far greater selection of music than what was available in even the largest record shops in the 90s - and totally eclipsing the combined play lists on the radio at any one place at any one time.
Also, Spotify is available anywhere, not just to those living in big cities with many radio stations and big record shops. Oh, and then there's the 21% of plays for the other 65% of the catalogue.
Also, Spotify is available anywhere, not just to those living in big cities with many radio stations and big record shops. Oh, and then there's the 21% of plays for the other 65% of the catalogue.
I think you overestimate the reach of broadband internet. There is certainly a lot more rural radio access than there is high speed internet.
* No longer are people sucked into the radio aggregate of the 90's when all you could discover were boy bands.*
Don't be so sure about that. Labels still offer what they always excelled in- marketing. Bands that self-promote often have no idea what they're doing, and even when they do they are up against thousands of other bands making their best efforts at self-promotion.
Accessible music production + the internet != your music reaching it's audience. It's still a massive uphill climb. And most people are still listening to the radio and discovering boy bands.
