I love this idea. I always like to see side projects (even in place of a "real job") and this seems like the perfect way to integrate it with a resume. Funny, humble, and probably a pretty honest job title for a lot of developers with actual side projects to show off.
I actually suspect this statement blindsided most of the company. It seems the way DHH and Jason operate is to lead with big philosophies and work backwards to the practical implications. This is not just evident in their company practices, but how they develop software.
I also suspect things weren't necessarily toxic within Basecamp. Given their recent book title "It Doesn’t Have to Be Crazy at Work" and activity on Twitter, maybe they just see the writing on the wall and would prefer to nip this in the bud. "Political talk" (however we're defining it) has become all-consuming in the past year and perhaps they recognize it as a big distraction for anyone trying to get work done.
It is a privileged stance, but I'm sure there are many who appreciate the workplace being a venue where employees are encouraged to talk about other things.
Great idea! I have watched some lectures/talks online with terrible camera work (e.g. panning to the speaker when they are asking the audience to read the slide).
Another solution I've seen was to play a simultaneous video feed of the slides only. Not particularly efficient. Would love to see something like this instead for instructional content!
Still, you don't have the reverse mapping. Given a slide, how do you find the commentary?
The primary goal of this tool is to find the reverse mapping and to provide a simple tool to play the video from a given slide. This is very useful for going back to or skipping slides.
If the slide is not visible at all in the video, such mapping cannot be computed automatically.
100% - it's clear how everything works because they've pared down to the essentials. For their target market of small dev teams who just need to ship code, it's a godsend.
While I agree with much of the article, I think the following points were not sufficiently explored:
1. I got the impression that he felt this "fauxtomation" was the final iteration of any service practicing it.
To me, "fauxtomation" follows a fairly established startup methodology of doing things manually before automating. It allows sufficient time for engineers to observe the full scope before attempting to automate. In addition, it is provided as a sort of API to the end user while true automation efficiencies can be implemented incrementally with the in-house team.
The end goal of these services is almost certainly full automation. To a greater extent, I suspect this is the intended future of entire gig economies ("fauxtomation" at scale) created by the likes of Uber and DoorDash who are pushing for further advancements in technology to replace the comparatively high cost of human labor.
2. Where was the "partial automation" alternative to "full automation" in this article?
It seems that most of the described technologies fall short because the scope is too big. They do not allowing enough flexibility for fixing (and learning from) errors or accommodating unplanned use-cases. If a product (like self-service checkout) typically requires training for an employee to use properly, it is not ready for the average consumer.
I have heard the following quote used frequently:
> What can be automated, should be automated.
What is not given enough airtime is the inverse:
> What cannot be automated, should not be automated.
The immediate future is more cyborg than robot. A modern website is an assortment of modular APIs glued together. Some have referred to smartphones as a human appendage, and I think this is the proper analogy to view technology as a whole over the next decade: upgrades rather than replacements to our biological limitations.
Instead of replacing an entire industry with an industry-sized vending machine, large amounts of untrained workers will slowly be replaced by a smaller amount of trained practitioners who know how to use better tools. What this will mean for society as a whole, though, is anyone's guess.
Some pretty thought provoking points. Most of the argument seems to hinge on the idea that power laws are proof of centralization and that we're just seeing them manifest in different forms. Most of the examples of dominant personalities all came about in a pretty democratic way. I think the real test will be if they become entrenched. If they can fall out of favor just as quick as they came into favor and be replaced by someone currently fairly anonymous, maybe it is not so centralized?
Also if we do see strong evidence of centralization in certain areas, does that mean this trend will continue in the future? I wonder if we are entering into a new phase (#3):
1. 1970-2000 - decentralized, and fringe.
2. 2001-2020 - centralized, and mainstream. eBay/Airbnb as examples platforms that normalized online transactions and acted as a single trusted intermediary
3. 2021+ - decentralized, and mainstream. A substantial majority now accept the internet. Where the intermediaries were once providing a service, they may be perceived as an obstacle.
I think this is too small of a time window. On the thousand-year horizon, centralization has been consistently increasing.
We may fluctuate a bit to more decentralized in the next decade. If bitcoin "wins", then on one hand it's a story of decentralization - no one controls it! - but on the other it compresses a bunch of currencies and wealth assets into one.
And hopefully the miners don't eventually become centralized...
