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He isn't saying you shouldn't try to make an impact, just to acknowledge that what your doing is only going to really effect a subset of people. DHH himself ha

He isn't saying you shouldn't try to make an impact, just to acknowledge that what your doing is only going to really effect a subset of people. DHH himself has made a huge impact, by virtue of RoR, but this only changed the world for some thousands of developers. Maybe you can make the argument that this "trickles down" to the rest of the world, but all in all, your best chance at making impact comes from vastly improving the lives of what turns out to be a very small part of humanity rather than aiming for it all.

AndrewKemendo 9y ago
acknowledge that what your doing is only going to really effect a subset of people. That's a self fulfilling prophecy though, is it not? If you aren't somewhat delusional (aka optimistic) about the scale of what you set out to do, then the probability of major outcome - is going to be reduced. Basically, if you set small local goals then the chances that you'll even desire a global goal - let alone reach them - are likely an order of magnitude smaller than possible. Using his example, had Zuckerburg followed this advice he would have sold to yahoo having optimized locally. Instead he said, no I want to change the world (aka literally connect the world) so I am going to try and do that.
- dasil003 9y ago
  Watch out for the founding story narrative here, even Zuckerberg himself would tell you, he didn't initially set out to build Facebook, the megacorp. He just put one foot in front of the other. The fact that he got serious traction and it led to ever greater potential is what inspired the grand vision. By the time Yahoo made their offer in 2008, Facebook was already the biggest social network that had ever existed with an incredible growth curve. At that point it's not just some naive pie-in-the-sky dream, it's a calculated risk. This is very different from the thousands of wannabes that paint this grand vision in order to attract naive young talent. That's what DHH & co bristle against—the mythology of SV perpetuated by VCs to get the best and brightest to work 16-hour days to increase their wealth for a risk-adjusted return way below what they could get at a normal job. Personally with a couple decades of experience under my belt it's hard not to be a little cynical about the whole dog and pony show. I got into this because I liked to build things on computers, not because of some founder's charisma or promises of riches.

AndrewKemendo 9y ago

acknowledge that what your doing is only going to really effect a subset of people. That's a self fulfilling prophecy though, is it not? If you aren't somewhat delusional (aka optimistic) about the scale of what you set out to do, then the probability of major outcome - is going to be reduced. Basically, if you set small local goals then the chances that you'll even desire a global goal - let alone reach them - are likely an order of magnitude smaller than possible. Using his example, had Zuckerburg followed this advice he would have sold to yahoo having optimized locally. Instead he said, no I want to change the world (aka literally connect the world) so I am going to try and do that.

dasil003 9y ago
Watch out for the founding story narrative here, even Zuckerberg himself would tell you, he didn't initially set out to build Facebook, the megacorp. He just put one foot in front of the other. The fact that he got serious traction and it led to ever greater potential is what inspired the grand vision. By the time Yahoo made their offer in 2008, Facebook was already the biggest social network that had ever existed with an incredible growth curve. At that point it's not just some naive pie-in-the-sky dream, it's a calculated risk. This is very different from the thousands of wannabes that paint this grand vision in order to attract naive young talent. That's what DHH & co bristle against—the mythology of SV perpetuated by VCs to get the best and brightest to work 16-hour days to increase their wealth for a risk-adjusted return way below what they could get at a normal job. Personally with a couple decades of experience under my belt it's hard not to be a little cynical about the whole dog and pony show. I got into this because I liked to build things on computers, not because of some founder's charisma or promises of riches.