[Analemma_]

I can understand complaining about cynicism, but it's dishonest to pretend it's not coming from a real place. All the complaints people are voicing elsewhere in this thread are true:

- it's true that you will get jack squat if you're employee #4 or later (and in the process you'll work more hours with less job security than at a FAANG)

- it's true that the startup scene has delivered basically nothing of real value to the economy in the last fifteen years: it has all been regulatory arbitrage, intrusive ad-tech, financial engineering, and, of course, shitcoins

- it's true that the people at the top turned out to be amoral psychopaths who practically tripped over themselves to kiss the ring when authoritarianism arrived and their talk about improving the world was hot air

If you're going to complain about the cynicism, you should at least respond to the above instead of pretending it's just grumps wanting to ruin everyone's fun.

[Tcepsa]

Thank you for collecting these here--it's been very heartening for me to see that I'm not the only one around here that sees these kinds of things and finds it difficult to maintain a positive outlook. I appreciate that there are still folks on HN willing to point out stuff like this.

[dnissley]

I'll just point out that you're presenting your view of the world and beliefs as if it were based on objective fact. The things you've listed here are all narratives pushed by the media, so I would be understanding that you and many others would feel because of this that they are indeed objective truths, but they are in actuality far from that. Even if these stories are made up of objective facts, they ignore many others which contradict them. For example, I also consider myself grounded in reality and I can think of ways in which these things you've listed as "true" could turn out to be far more complicated.

I like this comic / poem, which I feel captures the essence of what I'm trying to get across here:

Try as I might to live simply, my life tends towards complexity.

My ordered thoughts veer off track, once they turn inward I can't turn back.

The path forward twists and tangles, I lose myself at every angle.

The clear vision I hold inside me, fractures into something far more exciting.

http://www.incidentalcomics.com/2019/05/disorder.html

[fragmede]

"Jack squat" is still in the millions of dollars for holders of a golden ticket, but it is fundamentally a gamble.

> it's true that the startup scene has delivered basically nothing of real value to the economy in the last fifteen years

"basically" is what Wikipedia calls a weasel word. If you're determined to look at the world through a particular lense, by discarding any points to the contrary, you're basically right. That's not the same as actually being right, but it comes down to attitude and world view. If you believe the world is shit, you can find countless examples of it being shit. Because sometimes it is. If you want to have hope and believe in better, you can find those examples too. Because they're also there. Life isn't a math problem though, so you can't take 100 misery points and combine them with 200 hope points and end up feeling happy.

As far as the people at the "top" being amoral psychopaths. It's the amoral psychopaths who make the most noise. A humble quiet person funding soup kitchens and not talking about it isn't going to ping on anybody's radar. Yeah the psychopaths exist, but so do the helpers.

no one wants to believe they're the grump ruining everyone's fun, but would you take all that emotional effort to go challenge the grumps, who are just going to argue, aren't going to appreciate anything you do, and are just a bunch of cynical unhappy assholes, or would you just go find a different digital lawn? (which may just be one thread over, having fun with the idea of an electrostatic wall)

[SR2Z]

> "Jack squat" is still in the millions of dollars for holders of a golden ticket, but it is fundamentally a gamble.

I was interviewing with a bunch of mid-stage (series A/B) startups for senior/staff roles. Without exception, every single one offered me so little equity that the only way they'd EQUAL big tech pay was if they hit a slam dunk and became multibillion dollar monsters.

> no one wants to believe they're the grump ruining everyone's fun, but would you take all that emotional effort to go challenge the grumps, who are just going to argue, aren't going to appreciate anything you do, and are just a bunch of cynical unhappy assholes, or would you just go find a different digital lawn?

The situation above was without factoring in dilution and across a few different sub industries. I think it's pretty reasonable to make fun of founders for this.