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0 points6stringmerc7y ago0 comments

Very interesting perspective and glad you tied together the disparate lines of thinking. Merit in product is, unfortunately, a variable not predictive of success. The strategy component is critical - that is a beautiful, great product that is solving a non-existent problem is probably doomed. There's no path to riches designing the best roller skate wheel marketplace platform, but even a poorly designed gambling tool could probably find a way to profitability.

The only thing I think is outside both of these elements - product quality and viable strategy - is the component of luck be it right place, right time, or catching an unforeseen wave of buzz. The most well known success stories typically owe a non-insignificant amount of debt to good fortune out of the control of the product or strategy. It's a real elephant in the room and it's difficult for ego to acknowledge either in success or failure, but it's real.

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eldavido7y ago· 1 in thread

I agree 100%.

Another point: we're actually talking about strategy (Stratechery/MBA worldview) vs. operations (build the best product, do things well -- HN view). This is a well-worn argument in business circles and it's funny to see it manifest here under a different name. http://www.davidralbrecht.com/notes/2018/09/strategy.html

Hackers are operators :)

I get the sense that strategy vs. operations matters differently depending on the characteristics of the business. I don't really have a coherent articulation of this point yet. It might change over time (something Ben suggests in today's post), or perhaps based on industry maturity or type of product, or market concentration. But it feels like something where people are arguing and are both right, because their arguments are insufficiently qualified/scoped (X is true vs. X is true when Y, Z are true).

uniclaude7y ago

Hackers are not operators, in the context of hn at least.

If there's anything you see every day on HN, it's people relentlessly arguing about "building what people want", and "solving problems". One of (the?) most popular HN member, patio11, got a lot of this massive amount of karma because he gives a pragmatic and clear view of generating sustainable revenue in business. This is what the HN crowd likes.

The old fairy tale of hackers only focusing of products and ignoring strategy is long gone, and most people here know this.

It's not necessary to differentiate hackers and strategy people.

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