Hasnain says:

I know there have been arguments for/against tipping culture in America - I've always thought of good arguments "for" in the case of money directly going to a person (there's a separate discussion on if we should have an equitable system so they don't need to rely on tips).

A business asking for tips on every transaction so it can stay afloat because they lose money on each transaction ...

Hasnain says:

This was amazing. Most critiques of the wildly outsized CEO pay talk about the morality and inequality - which brings up lots of thoughtful discussions; but I feel sometimes has a harder time bringing about change given current societal norms.

This article instead looks at the data, cut in many different ways and basically shows that CEO performance is indistinguishable from random. So many quotes in here that I can't pick just one to quote. So I'll pick out a bit from the conclusion:

"A Harvard Business Review article, “The Art and Science of Finding the Right CEO,” lists “proven track record” as a top, “obvious” criterion for selecting CEOs. But, to quote Sherlock Holmes, “There is nothing more deceptive than an obvious fact.”

Journalists, investors, and boards are placing excessive emphasis on CEO pedigrees and track records. In a world that is feedback-rich, stochastic, and “fat tailed,” the simple narrative of the “great man” does not appear to have much quantitative merit — rather, it seems like yet another cognitive bias in the vein of those discovered by Daniel Kahneman. "

Hasnain says:

[pdf warning]

This is a white paper written by the folks at npm on their experience porting one of their backend micro services to Rust. It’s an interesting study because they handle the “the rewrite caused all the improvements” factor by rewriting it in 3 languages and comparing the results.

The main takeaway for me was that the Rust version took longer to write but worked out of the box in production; while with the JS version they were prepared to and had to spend quite a while post launch finding issues.

I wish it had more technical details, to be honest.

Hasnain says:

This was a really interesting read on tech in Silicon Valley and how it brings out inequality.

Lots of great discussion points. I’m a bit annoyed that 2/3rds is behind a paywall especially since this is effectively something leading us towards buying a book.

Worth reading though.

“Anand: That’s kind of amazing. But, in general, people in finance own the idea that they work in finance. Whereas, with tech, I think a lot of our culture has bought into the idea that there are these figures of emancipation, and liberation, and social leveling. And it has bought them a tremendous [amount] of space and freedom that they have exploited and abused.”

Hasnain says:

This was an eye opening read - college is held as this great equalizer for people, especially for private colleges. They’re viewed as a way into the “upper class” and into the elite.

And yet they’re still not accessible due to various biases and long held privileges that are hard to overcome.

Not to mention the different upbringing that is near impossible to unlearn

“Another thing I didn’t know: There were exceptions to rules, that some people broke the rules and got away with it. Some had been getting away with rule-breaking their whole lives. That wasn’t an option for me. Following the syllabus and course policies to the letter, I came to class ill, I came to class exhausted. I was never late. I didn’t ask for a sorely-needed extension on a paper, not any paper — something many students request and many professors grant — until I was a senior. It didn’t even occur to me to try.”

Hasnain says:

I read this last night and was hoping things will de escalate.

Still hoping things de-escalate and war can be avoided.

Hasnain has not yet written a summary for this.
Posted on 2019-02-25T15:48:21+0000

Hasnain says:

This is something that I've also noticed is becoming more prevalent across America, and especially so in the bay area.

While it starts with the oft-repeated Keynes quote about people living luxurious lives and not having to work, it goes into depth about *why* americans feel the need to over-work, discussing society, religion, politics and law.

Choice quote:

"On a deeper level, Americans have forgotten an old-fashioned goal of working: It’s about buying free time. The vast majority of workers are happier when they spend more hours with family, friends, and partners, according to research conducted by Ashley Whillans, an assistant professor at Harvard Business School. In one study, she concluded that the happiest young workers were those who said around the time of their college graduation that they preferred careers that gave them time away from the office to focus on their relationships and their hobbies."

Hasnain says:

This is a mini biography combined with a massive list of productivity hacks, both for the work environment as well as for personal life.

While I don't agree with every single thing in there (optimizing things so you can take work calls during your drive seems overkill); this is very worth reading. If just for looking at this approach and how to gather that much analytics on oneself.

Hasnain says:

This is an excerpt from a book - but it stands out vividly with a number of examples highlighting how a lot of tools and processes here have been targeted at men - and continue to discomfort, and even actively harm, women.

Goes into some classic examples (like air conditioning/temperatures in the office) to a lot of new ones that I wasn't aware of before.