Best of 2023

The blog posts Hacker News loved most in 2023. 83 posts.

Startups
11

It's okay to make something nobody wants

产品看起来是给用户用的,但我觉得这可能是一种假象,它实际上更像是一种自我表达。 许多表达被不同的人创造出来,经历了自然选择后,存活下来的那一个,是用户喜欢的那个。 我的意思是,这个过程是这么发生的:你做一个东西,不是“我觉得他们可能需要这个”而做,而是“我觉得这个有点意思”而做。然后,别人在使用你的产品时,感受到了与你相同的那种感受,这时他说:“我觉得这个有点意思”。 从这个角度来说,产品就像一种情绪的存储器,作者存进去,复制一千份,用户从产品中取出来。 你不能自己不含任何情感,却期望用户使用后带有情感。 我觉得即使做了个没人想要的东西,也没关系。你唯一需要做的是确保你已经完整呈现了你的情感。…

15

Why to start a startup in a bad economy (2008)

October 2008 The economic situation is apparently so grim that some experts fear we may be in for a stretch as bad as the mid seventies. When Microsoft and Apple were founded. As those examples suggest, a recession may not be such a bad time to start a startup. I'm not claiming it's a particularly good time either…

18

I bought back my acquihired startup

I wrote about my language learning startup, Readlang , back in 2014 , and then again in 2016 , both times attracting attention on Hacker News, where my story of a struggling one-man startup seemed to resonate. Well, it’s now 7 years later, and a bunch has happened since, so it’s time for an update…