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"But large organizations will probably never again play the leading role they did up till the last quarter of the twentieth century." I suggest retracting this
by cool-RR 18y ago
"But large organizations will probably never again play the leading role they did up till the last quarter of the twentieth century."
I suggest retracting this statement. What idea do you have of how the world will look 50 years from now? This may be remembered as your "640kb will always be enough" quote.
- harpastum 18y agopg isn't prescient, but based on his argument this isn't much of a stretch. It may not turn out to be true, but it would be an even worse idea to cripple the conclusion to your thought because you're worried about embarrassment. . "The best way to predict the future is to invent it." - Alan Kay YC is definitely working to prove pg right.
- tsetse-fly 18y agoYou missed the point of the essay. It was written to support that claim. Also, the 640k quote attributed to Bill Gates is folklore. http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Misattributed http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Bill_Gates#Misattributed
- cool-RR 18y agoIt looks like the article is saying there's a trend towards small organizations. That's a different thing than saying that the era of large organizations will never return.
- tsetse-fly 18y ago"This doesn't mean big companies will disappear. To say that startups will succeed implies that big companies will exist, because startups that succeed either become big companies or are acquired by them. But large organizations will probably never again play the leading role they did up till the last quarter of the twentieth century." http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=384690 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=384690
- cool-RR 18y agoI did not think that pg said that big companies will disappear. He is saying they will never again have such a leading role. I think it's an exaggeration to think that just because start-ups have been doing well for a few decades.
- tsetse-fly 18y agoHe substantiates his claim with historical evidence and observation of current trends. Do you have anything other than your personal opinion? "A few decades" is not a short amount of time. I don't think it's naive to believe that this trend is lasting.
- cool-RR 18y ago"He substantiates his claim with historical evidence and observation of current trends." He can substantiate all he want with as much evidence as he wants, there is just not enough information to know how the state of large organizations will look like in 50 years from now. If a very intelligent person in 1908 tried to predict something about the economy in 2008, do you think he would have gotten it right? "Do you have anything other than your personal opinion?" I have not stated much... ""A few decades" is not a short amount of time. I don't think it's naive to believe that this trend is lasting." How do you get from a few decades to an indefinite future? I believe in start-ups, but it doesn't mean that start-ups are the ultimate sort of company forever. Maybe, and this is just an example, maybe in twenty years from now, corporations will finally learn how to identify smart people, and give them what they need, and to quantify their performance, and all the other things that they're lacking, and start-ups will not have many advantages on them. In summary, even though start-ups are great now, we shouldn't become fixated on start-ups.
- pchristensen 18y ago1) he hedged by saying probably 2) what fun is being visionary if you can't say anything bold for fear of being proved wrong?