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The pg essay quote seems to have gone out of fashion here a bit lately, but there's a perfect one for this occasion: > So one way to build great software is to

The pg essay quote seems to have gone out of fashion here a bit lately, but there's a perfect one for this occasion: > So one way to build great software is to start your own startup. There are two problems with this, though. One is that in a startup you have to do so much besides write software. At Viaweb I considered myself lucky if I got to hack a quarter of the time. And the things I had to do the other three quarters of the time ranged from tedious to terrifying. I have a benchmark for this, because I once had to leave a board meeting to have some cavities filled. I remember sitting back in the dentist's chair, waiting for the drill, and feeling like I was on vacation. http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html http://www.paulgraham.com/hp.html

vdaniuk 11y ago
I quite disagree with the premise of this quote for the following reason. When commercial product is being built, external requirements and interests are imposed on founders and their aspirations to create interesting/innovative software will be subverted by the need to compromise. However, the essay addresses this problem. The engineers have the opportunity not to take outside investments and run their companies as they see fit. I believe that those bootstrapped companies would bring more social value than startups who are restricted by the boards, investment agreements, valuations and competition in high risk, high yield markets.
- s73v3r 11y ago
  You're missing the point: They still would have to run the business. Meaning, not do what they set out in life to do, namely engineering. Where they are, they can pretty much just focus on the problems at hand and do research. All of the other crap is done for them.
  - vdaniuk 11y ago
    As someone who transitioned from 100% business/marketing side to 25% business and 75% development, actually I am not missing the point. There are many upsides to running and owning a tech business and for some of the engineers those upsides can outweigh the negatives.
ojbyrne 11y ago
I've often had that feeling at the dentist. "Tedious to terrifying" just seems to be another way of saying "busy."

vdaniuk 11y ago

I quite disagree with the premise of this quote for the following reason. When commercial product is being built, external requirements and interests are imposed on founders and their aspirations to create interesting/innovative software will be subverted by the need to compromise. However, the essay addresses this problem. The engineers have the opportunity not to take outside investments and run their companies as they see fit. I believe that those bootstrapped companies would bring more social value than startups who are restricted by the boards, investment agreements, valuations and competition in high risk, high yield markets.

s73v3r 11y ago
You're missing the point: They still would have to run the business. Meaning, not do what they set out in life to do, namely engineering. Where they are, they can pretty much just focus on the problems at hand and do research. All of the other crap is done for them.
- vdaniuk 11y ago
  As someone who transitioned from 100% business/marketing side to 25% business and 75% development, actually I am not missing the point. There are many upsides to running and owning a tech business and for some of the engineers those upsides can outweigh the negatives.

ojbyrne 11y ago

I've often had that feeling at the dentist. "Tedious to terrifying" just seems to be another way of saying "busy."