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I get that. Really, I do. But they keep saying it over and over again in a public forum. Who are they trying to convince: the reader, or themselves?

sree_nair 17y ago
There's Point. If they were So happy doing that, they don't have to keep on saying it.
ahoyhere 17y ago
It's a Cult of Personality. Benign, sure, and helpful even, but that's what you have to do to get your message across: repeat it, over and over, from a million slightly different angles. Only nerds -- and people with no persuasive skills (or influence) -- think that saying something "the right way," once, is productive.
- billswift 17y ago
  It's not benign or helpful when it drives, or excuses, attacks on successful companies.
  - abalashov 17y ago
    That depends on whether you agree with it.
  - ahoyhere 17y ago
    Of course it is. It's helpful for the people who've already bought into 37Signals' philosophy of doing business. For them, it's a reminder -- in-the-group signalling -- like a vaccination. If people nod and go, "Yeah! That's so true!" then they are confirming their group identity and commitment to the philosophy they've adopted. If you're not thinking about these things all the time when you're reading things, you're not getting maximum usefulness out of them. It's not just what people say, or what people read, but WHY.
abalashov 17y ago
Probably mostly the reader, perhaps a little themselves. Really, your question could be raised in response to virtually any person or entity with a clearly identifiable ideological stance of which they are frequent exponents. Just about anyone with a philosophical disposition and/or a discursive character - a tendency toward narration - is a candidate for, "Why do you keep saying what you think all the time?" I guess it's because that's what intelligent people or groups of them who conceptualise themselves to have some sort of intellectually coherent purpose do.

sree_nair 17y ago

There's Point. If they were So happy doing that, they don't have to keep on saying it.

ahoyhere 17y ago

It's a Cult of Personality. Benign, sure, and helpful even, but that's what you have to do to get your message across: repeat it, over and over, from a million slightly different angles. Only nerds -- and people with no persuasive skills (or influence) -- think that saying something "the right way," once, is productive.

billswift 17y ago
It's not benign or helpful when it drives, or excuses, attacks on successful companies.
- abalashov 17y ago
  That depends on whether you agree with it.
- ahoyhere 17y ago
  Of course it is. It's helpful for the people who've already bought into 37Signals' philosophy of doing business. For them, it's a reminder -- in-the-group signalling -- like a vaccination. If people nod and go, "Yeah! That's so true!" then they are confirming their group identity and commitment to the philosophy they've adopted. If you're not thinking about these things all the time when you're reading things, you're not getting maximum usefulness out of them. It's not just what people say, or what people read, but WHY.

abalashov 17y ago

Probably mostly the reader, perhaps a little themselves. Really, your question could be raised in response to virtually any person or entity with a clearly identifiable ideological stance of which they are frequent exponents. Just about anyone with a philosophical disposition and/or a discursive character - a tendency toward narration - is a candidate for, "Why do you keep saying what you think all the time?" I guess it's because that's what intelligent people or groups of them who conceptualise themselves to have some sort of intellectually coherent purpose do.