Time and money

Time is not money - you can convert time to money, but not the other way around.

How artists settle

When an artist stops experimenting and settles for a specific type of content and aesthetics, critics say that it is because they “matured” and “found their voice”, “developed a unique style” etc.

AFAIK, in most cases it’s because they lost their inspiration, became lazy, and decided to only do low effort remixes if the project that sells best.

And the reason why critics (both professional and self-proclaimed) and regular consumers like settled artists so much is because it make THEIR job easier - why get into a new thing every time and wonder how to react, when you could be just reading variations of the same old thing over and over again.

Normal and non-normal people

Viewing people as merely normal and non-normal is like viewing drinks as alcoholic and non-alcoholic.

The point of life

• I am so confused! If only I knew what is the point of my life!
• Well it’s relative, but it probably has to do with being good, making a positive impact for the people around us, doing meaningful work having meaningful relationships etc.
• Nah, I am pretty sure that’s not it.

Emotions

The fact that someone does not feel the same emotions as you, that does not make them less emotional.

Doing things poorly

One of the best pieces of advice that I got:

“Anything worth doing is worth doing poorly”

And conversely, everything that is not worth doing poorly is not worth doing at all.

Banality of evil

I think that the principle of the banality of evil is also valid in the other way around: not only that evil is banal, but all banal things are evil (i.e. banal <=> evil)

Mathematics in daily life

We don’t use maths in our daily life because other people have solved all hard problems for us and the solutions are encoded on the tools that we use, however not knowing math means that you will be forever a consumer, bound to use those existing tools and solutions.

Disclaimer: my definition of mathematics is much broader than the usual ones

The meaning of life

Who came up with the idea of “the meaning of life”.

Why does it have to be one meaning? Even a book has multiple meanings.

This desire to simplify things is what gets us in trouble.

The best

Everyone wants to be the best, noone wats to question the criteria that determine what the best is.

Borko’s principle

People often claim to come up with a new idea, instead of recognizing prior art and using a name that is already there, because they are eager to attach their names to something, out of sheer vanity.

I call this “Borko’s principle”

Metahumour

The only type of humor that doesn’t offend anyone is the one that makes fun of itself (meta humour). Incidentally this is the only type of humor I find truly funny it’s like the opposite of “cheap laughs”.

On being self-critical

My focus for the next year or so is to stop being so self-critical. No reason whatsoever to beat yourself for stupid shit, and it destroys your self-esteem, allowing you to be exploited by egomaniacs who don’t even know what self-criticism means.

My fear has always been that not being critical of myself will make me into one of those assholes, but actually there is no way for this to happen, as long as your intentions are good.

Genius/idiot

Doing math leaves me feeling like a genius 10% of the time and like a complete idiot for the other 90%.

Bezos in space

I don’t have any problem with Jeff Bezos going in space, the only thing I dislike is that he came back.

Learning programming

When learning programming it’s important to write a lot of code and also to read a lot of code. Writing is to understand you are retarded and reading is to understand everyone else is retarded as well.

Code comments

Types of code comments by how useful they are:

3 Comments that literary describe what the code does: // Check if the user has 18 years

2 Comments that summarize the way a given function is intended to be used // Checks if the user is eligible for an account and throws an error if they aren't

1 Comments that make fun of colleagues and their mess ups: // Bill is a complete idiot that indexes in his objects start with 0 other than one, so we have to check for this here every time

Cars

It’s amazing how oblivious people are to how dangerous and harmful cars are to people - any life-threatening thing in the city, such as an hanging cable, open vent etc is big news. Cars - people get murdered every day and they don’t even report it.

Banality of evil

I think that the principle of the banality of evil is also valid in the other way around: not only that evil is banal, but all banal things are evil (i.e. banal <=> evil)

Inspiration

The only legit way to combat the writer’s block and lack of inspiration that I have discovered: take a hour off, leave your work in front of you and start start reading some random book, or doing something else entirely, untill something in what you are reading/doing reminds you of your work.

Hokusai

I consider Hokusai the greatest artist of all time, because he contributed to the two most prominent genres in visual art - landscapes and porn.

Notes

Keeping notes is a good idea if you want a very large quantity of mediocre ideas.

Writing Tutorials

Unpopular opinion: Art and writing tutorials that teach you how to find your audience, and say that commitment is the most important thing about art and that if you write/draw every day you would create great stuff etc. are fake, stupid and self-serving and they are part of the reason why 99% of all art is boring, mediocre and useless.

I think I will write a writing tutorial about how you should not listen to writing tutorials. Oh, wait…

Simplicity

I am getting weary people’s almost religious devotion to simplicity and briefness. “Use simpler language” “Can’t you say the same thing in fewer words?” Well, if I say it with fewer and simpler words, it won’t be the same thing, would it? What if I am crazy and I believe that all that matters? If the practice of summing human knowledge into short and accessible sentences worked, then everyone today would be brainiacs. And you are free to decide on your own to what extend that is true

Advice to my 20-year-old-self

This is the only thing that I wish I could give to my 20 year-old self: you deserve respect not because you are smart/good at stuff etc., you deserve respect because you are a human being and you are doing your best to be a good person.

Impressing others

Don’t try to impress others - they don’t care.

The people

Nobody cares about the average person’s opinion, but everyone is deeply concerned what “the people” think.

«««< HEAD

======= f someone does not feel the same emotions as you, that does not make him less emotional.

More stuff

Buying more stuff will not bring you closer to happiness, just like living longer years will not bring you closer to immortality.

The army

Indeed, people who haven’t served in the army are not real men.

Because is there anything more masculine than being proud of something that ABSOLUTELY ANYONE in your age and gender also accomplished, which was also not your decision at all?

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