4 ms·

I more or less like FB as an application (and I have no idea whether I should like Zuckerberg or not). But MFABT is different as a formulation: it articulates b

I more or less like FB as an application (and I have no idea whether I should like Zuckerberg or not). But MFABT is different as a formulation: it articulates broken things an imperative rather than a side effect that needs to be persevered through. There's also context to it that matters -- everything from the great documentation diaspora from a decade back where they blew away a developer wiki that represented years of community effort to describe how to use the various APIs without having anything remotely like an adequate replacement, to changes a few months ago which temporarily had access to the "Friends Lists" features unavailable which made managing privacy settings more difficult. There's a lot of things FB does right too, but when looking at blunders, it's easy to have the catchy phrase come to mind and wonder if maaaybe someone overconfidently strode forward MFABT in mind when more caution might have been warranted. You can't make an omelete without breaking a few eggs, as they say, but if you say that often enough, you start to get some people who think cracking a few open means breakfast is ready.

jasode 7y ago
>But MFABT is different as a formulation: it articulates broken things an imperative rather than a side effect No, it only looks like a desirable "imperative" if you read it with a hyper-literal interpretation. MZ's aphorism is just using the rhetorical device of taking something undesirable and acknowledging it. Yes, the literal words might appear like an "imperative command" but the underlying meaning of the message is actually "failures are the path to success". The rhetorical language is a form of reverse-pyschology. Another similar example is salespeople or romantic suitors trying to get "yes" instead of "no" from prospects. The "no" is undesirable but rejections are inevitable in the process. Thus, one reverse-psychology approach is to frame it as, "How many _rejections_ did you get today? Only 10? Go make some more phone calls until you get 50 more rejections!" It still doesn't mean rejections are the real goal. We're just humans playing with language to get past the fear of rejections holding us back.
- wwweston 7y ago
  > No, it only looks like a desirable "imperative" if you read it with a hyper-literal interpretation. "Break things" is objectively an imperative. There's no hyper-literal or otherwise careful parsing necessary to arrive at that realization. It's the default. Careful thinking is actually what you need to arrive at the more useful non-literal understanding. And unfortunately the phrase itself doesn't encourage that. Something like "Move fast, even if there's risks" or "Prefer momentum over risk aversion" would be the face-value formulation. > We're just humans playing with language And being played with by language. If language is powerful enough to orient someone on the benefits of preferring momentum over risk aversion, it's powerful enough to distract from the threshold where there's inadequate anticipation of consequences. Any given formulation may do one job better than another. MFABT is not an optimal expression. There are better ones.
  - jasode 7y ago
    >"Break things" is objectively an imperative. I wrote desirable imperative. You are focusing on grammar (objective interpretation). I was talking about the meaning ("imperative" as synonym for "importance"[1] instead of grammar). Likewise, "go get more rejections" is also an imperative (via objective lens of pedantic grammar categorization) ... but that's not what the underlying message means. >MFABT is not an optimal expression. There are better ones. It may have been fine as an internal mantra within the walls of Facebook when it was a smaller private company. The engineers would know what it really meant. But then MZ publicized it in an investor letter before the IPO which opens itself to misinterpretation by the outside world like journalists, bloggers, etc. [1] https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/imperative https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/imperative
- myhf 7y ago
  Facebook's business model is to "move fast" (to outmaneuvre the competition) and "break things" (to disrupt the incumbents). It's clearly intended as a desirable imperative.
edmundsauto 7y ago
If you don't set failure as an explicit goal, people will naturally try to avoid it.

jasode 7y ago

>But MFABT is different as a formulation: it articulates broken things an imperative rather than a side effect No, it only looks like a desirable "imperative" if you read it with a hyper-literal interpretation. MZ's aphorism is just using the rhetorical device of taking something undesirable and acknowledging it. Yes, the literal words might appear like an "imperative command" but the underlying meaning of the message is actually "failures are the path to success". The rhetorical language is a form of reverse-pyschology. Another similar example is salespeople or romantic suitors trying to get "yes" instead of "no" from prospects. The "no" is undesirable but rejections are inevitable in the process. Thus, one reverse-psychology approach is to frame it as, "How many _rejections_ did you get today? Only 10? Go make some more phone calls until you get 50 more rejections!" It still doesn't mean rejections are the real goal. We're just humans playing with language to get past the fear of rejections holding us back.

wwweston 7y ago
> No, it only looks like a desirable "imperative" if you read it with a hyper-literal interpretation. "Break things" is objectively an imperative. There's no hyper-literal or otherwise careful parsing necessary to arrive at that realization. It's the default. Careful thinking is actually what you need to arrive at the more useful non-literal understanding. And unfortunately the phrase itself doesn't encourage that. Something like "Move fast, even if there's risks" or "Prefer momentum over risk aversion" would be the face-value formulation. > We're just humans playing with language And being played with by language. If language is powerful enough to orient someone on the benefits of preferring momentum over risk aversion, it's powerful enough to distract from the threshold where there's inadequate anticipation of consequences. Any given formulation may do one job better than another. MFABT is not an optimal expression. There are better ones.
- jasode 7y ago
  >"Break things" is objectively an imperative. I wrote desirable imperative. You are focusing on grammar (objective interpretation). I was talking about the meaning ("imperative" as synonym for "importance"[1] instead of grammar). Likewise, "go get more rejections" is also an imperative (via objective lens of pedantic grammar categorization) ... but that's not what the underlying message means. >MFABT is not an optimal expression. There are better ones. It may have been fine as an internal mantra within the walls of Facebook when it was a smaller private company. The engineers would know what it really meant. But then MZ publicized it in an investor letter before the IPO which opens itself to misinterpretation by the outside world like journalists, bloggers, etc. [1] https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/imperative https://www.lexico.com/en/definition/imperative
myhf 7y ago
Facebook's business model is to "move fast" (to outmaneuvre the competition) and "break things" (to disrupt the incumbents). It's clearly intended as a desirable imperative.

edmundsauto 7y ago

If you don't set failure as an explicit goal, people will naturally try to avoid it.