I also took away a different bottom line. I think the focus was that, by allowing programmers to have access to the machine for long periods, they could stay "

I also took away a different bottom line. I think the focus was that, by allowing programmers to have access to the machine for long periods, they could stay "in the zone", and thus you completed the work much faster. I think it's also important to realize that Brooks' project had to succeed, or IBM would go out of business. The company was nearly done for, and Brooks tried to write down what he learned because those lessons saved IBM.