181
Most cited
Posts that commenters keep linking to, ranked by how many different people have cited them in Hacker News comments. 520 posts.
182
An Engineer’s guide to Stock Options
There's a lot of fear, uncertainty and doubt when it comes to stock options, and I'd like to try and clear some of that up today. As an engineer, you may be more interested in getting on with your job than compensation. However, if you're working at
183
The Product-Minded Software Engineer
Product-minded engineers are developers with lots of interest in the product itself. They want to understand why decisions are made, how people use the product, and love to be involved in making product decisions. They're someone who would likely make a good product manager if they ever decide
184
Right versus pragmatic
At a previous job, the shared men’s bathroom for the floor was laid out like this:
185
Rules for Negotiating a Job Offer (2016)
When the story of how I landed a job at Airbnb went viral, I was surprised at how infatuated people were with my negotiations. Media stories portrayed me as some kind of master negotiator—a wily ex...
186
Is TDD Dead? (2014)
A series of conversations between Kent Beck, David Heinemeier Hansson, and Martin Fowler. We discuss Test-Driven Development (TDD) and its impact upon software design.
187
How to be a consultant, a freelancer, or an independent contractor (2009)
This is a series of pages that guide you through the creation and operation of a successful consulting business. I’ve written this after running a fairly successful consultancy business in the mid-90’s and reviving this business in 2008. I’m primarily active in software, so some of the things in here will be skewed in…
188
Some reasons to work on productivity and velocity
A common topic of discussion among my close friends is where the bottlenecks are in our productivity and how we can execute more quickly. This is very different from what I see in my extended social circles, where people commonly say that velocity doesn't matter . In online discussions about this, I frequently see…
189
190
191
192
On me, and the Media Lab
(Please be sure to read the addendum at the end of this post.) A week ago last Friday, I spoke to Joi Ito about the release of documents that accuse Media Lab co-founder Marvin Minsky of involvement in Jeffrey Epstein’s horrific crimes.* Joi told me that evening that the Media Lab’s ties to Epstein went… Read More »On…
193
Fuck Your 90 Day Exercise Window (2016)
Written pieces, talks, and other bits by Zach Holman.
194
The Next Mission
Slides for the brief talk that I gave at a Harvard seminar on privacy and user data organized by John Taysom last week.
195
Joel on Software: Exploding Offer Season
If you’re a college student applying for jobs or summer internships, you’re at something of a disadvantage when it comes to negotiation. That’s because the recruiter does these negotiations for a l…
196
Reflecting on 18 Years at Google
I joined Google in October 2005, and handed in my resignation 18 years later. Last week was my last week at Google.
197
I quit my job to focus on SerenityOS full time
Hello friends! :^) Let me tell you a story…
198
What It's Like To Be Ridiculed For Open Sourcing A Project
Yesterday my colleague mentioned that a script I wrote was getting a lot of attention on Twitter. This particular project was something I wrote a couple years ago to help me out with a workflow. I …
199
200
Options vs. Cash
I often talk to startups that claim that their compensation package has a higher expected value than the equivalent package at a place like Facebook, Google, Twitter, or Snapchat. One thing I don’t understand about this claim is, if the claim is true, why shouldn’t the startup go to an investor, sell their options for…
201
Delegate or die: the self-employed trap
Derek Sivers official site. Thoughts on philosophy, culture, self-improvement. Author of Useful Not True, How to Live, Hell Yeah or No, Anything You Want.
202
Please stop asking how to find a technical co-founder.
Listen guys, I’m sorry. But, I just can’t do it anymore. I can’t keep having this conversation with every non-tech founder. It’s just too painful. On you, on me, and everyone else that you’ve approached. I was once on the search for a technical co-founder, so I can empathize.
203
Happy people don’t leave jobs they love
Resignations happen in a moment, and it’s not when you declare, “I’m resigning.” The moment happened a long time ago when you received a random email from a goo
204
Aaron Swartz: How I Hire Programmers
There are three questions you have when you’re hiring a programmer (or anyone, for that matter): Are they smart? Can they get stuff done? Can you work with them? Someone who’s smart but doesn’t get stuff done should be your friend, not your employee. You can talk your problems over with them while they procrastinate…
205
Whose bug is this anyway?
Some bugs look so impossible you start blaming the OS, the tools, or the compiler. This post digs into three of them.
206
Administrative Purgatory
your case is still going through administrative processing and we don't know when that process will be completed. Last year I was denied to go to the US when I was about to travel to San Francisco. Me and my employer's legal team never got answers as to why this happened so I've personally tried … Continue reading…
207
Organizational Skills Beat Algorithmic Wizardry
It's not about technology for its own sake. It's about being able to implement your ideas.
208
Reflections
The second birthday of ChatGPT was only a little over a month ago, and now we have transitioned into the next paradigm of models that can do complex reasoning. New years get people in a reflective...
209
Why GitHub is not your CV
Two days ago, Ashe Dryden published an article I’ve been desperately wishing someone would write for months: The Ethics of Unpaid Labor and the OSS Community . It’s a detailed, well-researched take-down of the seemingly quite popular myth that open-source contributions are a useful way to screen candidates for…
210
Resigning as Asahi Linux project lead
May 2026 update This post was written at a time of significant turmoil in my life, when multiple correlated events happened in quick succession. What I wrote in the post below is true, but a lot was left unsaid, as some things were still being investigated. At the time when I wrote the post, despite resigning from my…