Software engineer and writer, known online as patio11. Ran the small software business Bingo Card Creator and Starfighter, then worked at Stripe; writes about the mechanics of money at Bits about Money and wrote for years at Kalzumeus about careers, negotiation and the business of software.
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Their wordsThe dominant reason for this is that suggesting a concrete action to you gets you off the phone faster, and the call center aggressively minimizes time to resolution of calls and recidivism, where you call back because your problem is not solved.
Their wordsBecause you radically overestimate the likelihood that your startup will succeed and radically overestimate the portion of the pie that will be allocated to you if the startup succeeds.
Patrick McKenzieSoftware engineer and writer, known online as patio11people who write professionally about money-including professional advocates for financially vulnerable populations-often misunderstand alternative financial services, largely because those services are designed to serve a social class that professionals themselves do not belong to, rarely interact with directly, and do not habitually ask how they pay rent, utilities, or phone bills.↗The gift card accountability sinkbitsaboutmoney.com · 19 Dec 2025All korrents from this piece
Their wordspeople who write professionally about money-including professional advocates for financially vulnerable populations-often misunderstand alternative financial services, largely because those services are designed to serve a social class that professionals themselves do not belong to, rarely interact with directly, and do not habitually ask how they pay rent, utilities, or phone bills.