It’s Always Something. Always. “It’s useful when reading this kind of essay to find out what the author is selling, although it usually isn’t this obvious.” – John Shutt
Fermenting the Web “The message is simple and exciting. When the time is right, a very small number of people with a clear vision can build something with huge impact. I’m not talking about making huge numbers show up in their bank accounts.” – Dave Winer (I like to think of this as fermentation)
No Sale I don’t know about you, but I can’t imagine founding a company for freedom and control, and then downgrading to a job — a job YOU CAN’T LEAVE. It’s the opposite of everything about the dream of owning your own business. – Amy Hoy
Even VCs are Noticing. “There’s some magic peace that comes over me when I’m not constantly looking at my iPhone. I really noticed it after two weeks of not doing it. After a few days of withdrawal, the calm appears. My brain is no longer jangly, the dopamine effect of “hey – another email, another tweet” goes away, and I actually am much faster at processing whatever I’ve got on a 27″ screen than on a little tiny thing that my v47 eyes are struggling to read.” – Brad Feld
Updating Just to Stay in Place “I’m always feeding the Update Beast. How often have you looked at Non-Technical Friends phone and showed them how they need to update their apps? All the time.” – Scott Hanselman
Not (Yet) The Worst We’ll Do “Did our high-frequency trading program have flaws that lead to our company losing 450 million dollars? (that is a tough one to beat, IMHO). Collect your own! It’s fun!” – Dan Milstein “Exactly. It’ll be like, ‘You thought *yesterday* was bad? Well, now you have a enormous metal chicken to deal with. Perspective. Now you have it.'” – Jenny Lawson
My Apologies, ‘Users’ is Accurate. I was riding the LIRR the other day from Queens to Manhattan, and everyone around me was staring into the screen of their smartphone, tapping, typing, clicking. I watched the faces. They looked like the people sitting around in the system lab at the UW Comp Sci Dept in 1978. Same damn thing. Except now instead of a handful of misunderstood geeks, now it’s everyone. BTW, they didn’t look ‘engaged’ or entertained, or even aware of what they’re doing. Most of the time we spend pecking and nibbling at stuff on the net we sort of wish there was something more interesting to do. But there isn’t, so we keep nibbling and pecking. – Dave Winer
