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1121 points alokedesai | 10 comments | | HN request time: 0.211s | source | bottom
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aarontcheung ◴[] No.10467925[source]
I'm one of the founders of Homejoy. I'm still very passionate about the home service space. After leaving Homejoy, I started FlyMaids, where we're exploring a few different angles on the space.

We recently acquired the customer and service provider data from Homejoy.

We're a small team that has been focused on moving quickly while bootstraping. We tried to quickly test different approaches, but we realize now that we did so in an unclear manner. We recognize the need to use the data we acquired responsibily. As a result, we're taking the site down, and we're going to do a better job with our testing moving forward.

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1. iamcurious ◴[] No.10468007[source]
I'm starting to read "passionate about" as "wanting to make money of". I have to make an effort to read it in the classical sense. I fear the same will happen with "share". And when my kids talk about sharing at school I will only think of flooding with memes or of selling things.

Now, I'm not a native english speaker, so I can't say if aarontcheung is misusing the term or not. Is this change happening to the english culture as a whole? Or am I reading way too many silicon valley articles?

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2. johncolanduoni ◴[] No.10468079[source]
It is most definitely the latter, although SV isn't the only place this happens.
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3. huac ◴[] No.10468293[source]
Deutsche Bank's slogan is "Passion to Perform"
4. Retra ◴[] No.10468531[source]
I hear a lot of people using "passionate about" to mean "committed to" because it prevents others from trying to convince you that you're making a mistake.
5. throwaway2048 ◴[] No.10468539[source]
nah there is certainly a cheapening of the language when such bullshit is thrown around so freely.
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6. christop ◴[] No.10468558[source]
You're certainly not the only one to think that the term is somewhat misused:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bz2-49q6DOI

7. MC7447a ◴[] No.10468666[source]
Scott Adam's take on "passion":

http://www.businessinsider.in/Dilbert-creator-Scott-Adams-il...

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8. user_0001 ◴[] No.10468780[source]
just another bullshit marketing term. I cannot believe these type of people really think that those reading it will go "wow this guy really cares about some low paid worker cleaning my house well, I will go with them".

Just seems so contrived and fake to me :-\

9. sea2summit ◴[] No.10469187[source]
I bet Richard Branson did say that.
10. n72 ◴[] No.10483210[source]
A particularly good example of a delusional use of "passion" by homejoy's other founder here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8794956

"i can't be 100% sure but i think people choose to work here because they believe homejoy is not just another cool startup; it’s a mission; it's a passion. we're building things that enable and will change the way people live and work. this is not an overnight venture; we know it'll take a long time, and we’re all committed to it."

Yeah, that's not miopic, self-important and delusional at all.