> If you email 4 software studios for a quote and 3 say “Sure, here’s a quote” but the 4th says “Hm, we certainly could build it but we can’t be sure about cost

> If you email 4 software studios for a quote and 3 say “Sure, here’s a quote” but the 4th says “Hm, we certainly could build it but we can’t be sure about cost without knowing X and Y, and here are some other concerns we’d have” then the 4th is going to seem like they give a shit. I usually end up responding like that, having started to think about the problem and approach. But I just know what the takehome message will be for some. Now it'll be someone's CRM startup feature: responds to RFQs with an LLM prompted to give the appearance of thoughtful consideration of the problem. Because, one time, a blogger said you should ask questions like that, to make a better impression, was the takehome message they got. Or it'll become a mnemonic for remembering the mix of kinds of questions on an RFQ you should ask, for the sake of appearances, and you'll fail an interview for not hitting each letter of the mnemonic exactly once, and in order. ("Sorry, bro, I was really hoping you'd pass, but you forgot the R in SCROT. You're not Amazoogle caliber yet, but take some more interview prep classes, and you can try again in a year.")