Really, it's that hard to understand what he means by ruthless in the context of a nice person?
I know plenty of doctors who are wonderful people, and who are ruthless in their work, meaning they will see it that a task gets done no matter what convoluted channels he/she must use. They're not mean people. They're not assholes, but they're serious about their responsibilities. For a founder, it could mean being ruthless in getting a meeting with an important person, or being ruthless in managing finances, or being ruthless in getting investors on the phone.
You can be ruthless in seeking success while being a nice person. The two aren't mutually exclusive, and it's not hard to see that that's what the OP was getting across.
tl;dr - In plain terms, ruthless here means being unforgivingly persistent.
No. Without knowing a priori what the writer was trying to say, his use of the word 'ruthless' /was/ confusing, because he used it in an uncommon (and possibly incorrect) way.
And yet, @kyro and I and I suspect many others were able to understand perfectly well what @sama meant. The original comment
> what does "ruthless" mean nowadays in valley newspeak? or did i miss a memo about "nice"..?
reads as if the commenter didn't even attempt to understand what @sama meant. Instead, it appears as if he saw that what @sama wrote was technically inconsistent and glommed onto that without actually engaging with the essay. If the commenter was simply offering up copyediting advice, well, he could've left out the color ("valley newspeak", etc.).
As it stands, the comment is utterly boring and, I suspect, reflects the attitude @kyro meant to highlight with the phrase "forced stupidity." "Technically correct" is not actually the best kind of correct (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hou0lU8WMgo).
I know plenty of doctors who are wonderful people, and who are ruthless in their work, meaning they will see it that a task gets done no matter what convoluted channels he/she must use. They're not mean people. They're not assholes, but they're serious about their responsibilities. For a founder, it could mean being ruthless in getting a meeting with an important person, or being ruthless in managing finances, or being ruthless in getting investors on the phone.
You can be ruthless in seeking success while being a nice person. The two aren't mutually exclusive, and it's not hard to see that that's what the OP was getting across.
tl;dr - In plain terms, ruthless here means being unforgivingly persistent.