Found in 5 comments on Hacker News
cs702 · 2025-01-29 · Original thread
I found the OP interesting and though-provoking, even though its title is too linkbait-ish for my taste, and the author completely ignores the harsh reality that most business decisions in Silicon Valley are driven by the fear that applications, platforms, and technologies can quickly become obsolete. Dominant companies like Intel and Research in Motion can get in serious financial trouble in the blink of an eye. Silicon Valley founders and CEOs are normally under so much crazy-intense pressure that outside calls for "nicer behavior" ring hollow and seem hopelessly naive to them.[a]

If someone asked whether the author has ever been responsible for growing revenues at any point in her life, my guess would be: probably not.

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[a] As Andy Grove used to say, "only the paranoid survive:" https://www.amazon.com/Only-Paranoid-Survive-Exploit-Challen...

wslh · 2024-02-03 · Original thread
The author missed the Fred Wilson's MBA Mondays Archive [1] which personally was a great resource in the quest for my "business success" (whatever it means). There is a more organized and illustrated edition here [2]. BTW, I always return to some articles such as "Commission Plans" for Sales [3].

Regarding books: - Only the Paranoid Survive by Andrew Grove (Intel) [4]. It is always in my "pocket". It is real experience with pain points from a top CEO, not an academic exercise.

- Other books that are not focused on business but are more "epistemological". For example, "How Life Imitates Chess" by Garry Kasparov [5]. I don't know who created this title for the book though. Many autobiographies, in general, or good business biographies such as "Hard Drive: Bill Gates and the Making of the Microsoft Empire" [6].

[1] https://avc.com/category/mba-mondays/

[2] https://mba-mondays-illustrated.com/

[3] https://avc.com/2010/08/commission-plans/

[4] https://www.amazon.com/Only-Paranoid-Survive-Exploit-Challen...

[5] https://www.amazon.com/How-Life-Imitates-Chess-Boardroom/dp/...

[6] https://www.amazon.com/Hard-Drive-Making-Microsoft-Empire/dp...

brudgers · 2021-06-17 · Original thread
My beard is gray. I tend to apply Occam’s razor. The problem with code is almost never a bug in the compiler.

The simplest explanation for your experience is not Google being incompetent.

I have read AskHN’s written a bit later under similar facts. The consultant is trying to get their own account reinstated because they made a new account on behalf of a client experiencing “arbitrary” mistreatment.

Outside of that, the market for consulting clients is a market for lemons. Good clients already have consultants. Those consultants hang onto good clients like grim death.

I could be misreading what you wrote. You might not have written down something that would change my take.

Maybe this is not a situation where you pay the dumb tax. But everyone pays it sometimes.

As for paranoia: https://www.amazon.com/Only-Paranoid-Survive-Exploit-Challen...

melling · 2021-02-10 · Original thread
Too big to fail?

Remember all those Intel clones?

Intel crushed everyone now we need to save it?

Do we have another option?

“Only the Paranoid Survive” -Andy Grove

https://www.amazon.com/Only-Paranoid-Survive-Exploit-Challen...

andrewstuart · 2016-03-22 · Original thread
Gordon Moore created Moore's law and Andy Grove made it happen.

Loved this book http://www.amazon.com/Only-Paranoid-Survive-Exploit-Challeng...

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