Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by jriddycuz 5348 days ago
Of course there are influential parties in the Valley, but that still doesn't make it one thing. What the OC seems to have reacted against was the reification[1] of the industry into a single thing. Of course you can influence an industry, but the key to understanding what that means lies in the the "fluid" part of "influence." The whole thing is a dynamic, swirling mass of people and groups constantly interacting with and reacting to one another. An industry isn't really a thing so much as it is a convenient way for us to refer (somewhat nebulously) to a collection of companies that operate in certain fields.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reification_(fallacy)
1 comments
ahoyhere 5348 days ago
I agree with you. As I get older & more persnickety, it's got to the point where every time I hear somebody refer to "the community" or "the industry" as if it's a coherent entity with goals and plans and capable of taking action (or even having a stance), I cringe. What that really says to me is "I live in a fantasy land, run! run away! fleeee!"

In any "community" or industry ("community" in quotes here because people abuse that word so much worse, calling swathes of people with no connection whatsoever a "community" if they share some superficial trait), there will be a small handful of people who DO lead opinions and DO do things and DO make plans.

But then the rest are a swirling mass with no particular inlets or outlets.

link
mattmanser 5348 days ago
But you can see it happening before your eyes every day.

You can see it in how everyone's website or logos look the same. How some ephemeral concept of lean startup infects through people talking about startups. How startup incubators start popping up everywhere.

The influence is there, to dismiss it as childish or 'fantasy' is strange to me. It's just not a physical thing, it's a subtle form of group think. And it's quite easy for someone like Techcrunch to use their influence over that group think to engage in positive discrimination, which Arrington says they have, highlighting Black and Hispanic startups more than they technically merited.

link