I think the culture is one of 'we are doing this for all humankind' and when you get just a few smart people bought in on that level of commitment and they're trying to be lean (and also for sure underpaying themselves compared to what they might make at Big Tech) then you can get impressive results.

▲

sshine 12 hours ago | parent | next [-]

I look at the 1990s picture of Brewster Kahle and think: He surely didn't get paid as much as me, but what did I do? Play insignificant roles in various software subscription services, many of which are gone now. And what did he do? Held on to an idea for decades.

The combined value of The Internet Archive -- whether we think just the infrastructure, just the value of the data, or the actual utility value to mankind -- vastly outperforms an individual contributor's at almost every well-paying internet startup. At the simple cost of not getting to pocket that value.

I wish I believed in something this much.

▲

fragmede 7 hours ago | parent [-]

If you think that's fucked up, do you know how little we pay teachers? Especially preschool-K? Clearly money is just a metric for how much moneying the money had been able to money. Goodhart out it another way: "When a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

	▲	sshine an hour ago \| parent \| next [-]
		I was a CS teacher for the past two years, so yes. I did it for quality of life reasons while my son learned to walk. But I almost doubled my salary going back to being a software dev.
	▲	toomuchtodo 2 hours ago \| parent \| prev [-]
		1k teachers in Arizona have quit in the last six months because of this. Over 1,000 Arizona teachers resigning plays a part in shortage - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46728151 - January 2026

▲

miki123211 9 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

You can trade off cloud costs for developer time.

AWS is priced as if your alternative was doing everything in house, with Silicon Valley salaries. If your goal isn't "go to market quickly and make sure our idea works, no matter the cost", it may not be the right fit for you. If you're a solo developer, non-profit, or another organization with excess volunteer time and little money, you can very often do what AWS does for a fraction of the cost.

	▲	storystarling 7 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I've found that for data-intensive workloads it isn't just a trade-off—the markup on egress and storage often makes the business model mathematically unviable. I'm bootstrapping a service with heavy image generation and the unit economics simply don't work on AWS.

▲

exe34 12 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

aren't we told all the time though, that a board of directors beholden to shareholders and a god given edict to make numbers go up are the only way to do things efficiently, to be lean and productive? are you telling me that when people find there's a need for something to happen, they make it happen? for the good of mankind? no billionaires?

▲

votepaunchy 11 hours ago | parent [-]

No, literally no one says that. But if all we needed was to hold hands and sing kumbaya then Africa would be Wakanda.

▲

exe34 8 hours ago | parent | next [-]

it's literally the BS we're given for privatisation. Here in the UK, the train network is shittier than ever and there's no competition. the water companies are literally pouring shit into the sea while paying themselves billions in dividends and putting the companies in massive debt.

we were told the profit motive and competition would make them efficient.

▲

komali2 7 hours ago | parent | next [-]

> we were told the profit motive and competition would make them efficient.

They believe their own propaganda unfortunately.

	▲	exe34 5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		I just find it odd that people would still defend them like this. They don't seem to realise you can buy boot polish in tins nowadays. but maybe they like the fresh taste of dirt on it.

▲

abanana 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-]

Indeed, this was taught to me in the late-90s in A-level Economics as absolute undisputed fact. The path forward had become clear whereas it hadn't been understood previously. It annoys me now, looking back and knowing it's such an incredibly naive take on how capitalism works. Was it naivety on the part of the teacher, or propaganda slipped into the curriculum? I don't know.

A separate issue worth mentioning is that the water companies (as opposed to trains, gas, electricity, Royal Mail, etc) don't fall under this because they were privatised as regional monopolies. The government didn't even (pretend to) attempt to create competition.

	▲	exe34 a minute ago \| parent [-]
		the thing is, even the rail companies don't usually have competition - they each carve up one part of the country or one particular line and all the prices are exhorbitant. it shouldn't be cheaper to fly across the country.

▲

fragmede 7 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

They have! They're way more efficient at making their owners rich. Before, there was this whole "having to provide a service" thing that cost money and drove down the efficiency of moving money from the public to their wallets. Now, it's way better!

▲

delusional 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

> But if all we needed was to hold hands and sing kumbaya then Africa would be Wakanda.

Are you of the impression that the problems African nations are facing is that they're holding hands and singing too much? Are the Africans just lazy?