simplicitea's comments

The way it was explained to me was that Microsoft low-balled the market on Office and pushed out the innovators who built the individual pieces and were able to do it because they had a fat bank to lean on. I buy the argument that Excel and Word provide exceptional value to society, but I'm not convinced that Microsoft was entirely necessary for that to happen. Then again, windows, task manager, recycle bin, start menu, etc. etc.

If you took a few minutes to consider that I may be a completely different person than the one you're conjuring up, you might have something more useful to say.

The goal is a 'normal job' which encourages me to learn through it's end impact. Further the goal is to take skills learned through developing for impact rather than profit and build something to draw enough of a salary on which has a disproportionate impact compared to it's cost. I want to be the driving factor, not be payed by or pay the driving factor.

Curious that ctrl+f 'climate' doesn't have a single hit before this comment, at 234 comments.

Since you mention a YC-like fund for activism projects, and at the risk of breaking a rule i may not be aware of (let me know) I'm gonna quote myself and hope you are interested or know people who may be interested

" OP here, actually floored by the rapidity and variety of responses. Thanks HN.

I'll take this opportunity to float an idea that's been kicking around in my head for a long time. The premise is to:

1) (this is almost certainly the easy part) build out a platform that is like a two-way khan academy - teacher and student, with at least the teacher having a tablet and a stylus that function well, sharing a digital blackboard, with a video chat optional -- where a student of something in a relatively privileged situation teaches a student of the same thing in a relatively less privileged situation -- where the sessions are stored and rewindable, both video and blackboard input.

2) the hard part; selling it as something to invest in and driving it to a point of having an endowment behind it, like Harvard's endowment, that allows the service to pay for moderation of student-teachers something like $12.00 USD an hour to teach, while subsidizing well-chosen students to have to pay something like $2 an hour to learn

it's been an idea for a passion project for a while "

And yet, there must be a supply of hackers to which you donate that money.

I'll admit that I didn't read the link that you shared. However, I'd like to assert that I feel fuzzies yield utilons to the individual in a similar manner as utilons yield fuzzies, each requiring refinement in their acquisition to be optimal. I think it's a more-grey area than your comment or the title of the article you linked implies (having not read said article).

I guess I have the advantage of starting out with close to a decade of low wages doing something that I enjoy ;)... I'm definitely attracted to billboard tech wages -- but I really could get by pretty comfortably with half were I building something I had faith in.

I'm skeptical of the premise (sounds self-helpy) but I'm gonna check it out. Thanks for the recommendation and I'm completely open to being wrong!

If you're located somewhere near Seattle, I would recommend going in to Central Co-Op and trying to talk to them about their story and business needs.

I'm not convinced yet that a non-profit is capable of doing what Facebook does. I'd love to read about it if you have any lit on the topic.

Why not? If we're being realistic and ideal simultaneously, one recognizes the immense social impact and shift driven by Facebook, as a social media platform as well as a lexus of modern web programming, at the same time as one recognizes that the user is the product to be sold and could imagine the potential negatives of that paradigm. So why not?

Actually, to follow up -- you mention simplifying the process to be easier on the user. Are myriad of questions one must laboriously answer to enroll in EBT programs a matter of... legislation? taxes? I would imagine that the questions have to do with honing in on a complex placement within the law which determines benefit levels. How do you go about simplifying a process which requires a large number of distinct data points by law or by census design?

already looked it up. do you ever find that a human response lends insight or relevant, current links that an encyclopedia lacks? I sure do.

Thank you for the Code for America recommendation, checking them out now

Do you have any recommendations for exploring what you call hyper-local work? I currently cook food for a living but even that, with it's immediate (feedback lol) to the local community, is a service that comes as a premium to people who don't need help. Where do you look for projects that fit your worldview as a programmer? Are there any groups of people based in Seattle that you'd recommend getting in touch with?

OP here, actually floored by the rapidity and variety of responses. Thanks HN.

I'll take this opportunity to float an idea that's been kicking around in my head for a long time.

The premise is to:

1) (this is almost certainly the easy part) build out a platform that is like a two-way khan academy - teacher and student, with at least the teacher having a tablet and a stylus that function well, sharing a digital blackboard, with a video chat optional -- where a student of something in a relatively privileged situation teaches a student of the same thing in a relatively less privileged situation -- where the sessions are stored and rewindable, both video and blackboard input.

2) the hard part; selling it as something to invest in and driving it to a point of having an endowment behind it, like Harvard's endowment, that allows the service to pay for moderation of student-teachers something like $12.00 USD an hour to teach, while subsidizing well-chosen students to have to pay something like $2 an hour to learn

it's been an idea for a passion project for a while

what's digital permaculture?