This guy doesn't really understand what "All else being equal" implies. The phrase has a very specific meaning in statistics. Any one of us can think of counte

This guy doesn't really understand what "All else being equal" implies. The phrase has a very specific meaning in statistics. Any one of us can think of counter-examples where a company which was late to a market ended up dominating it. This article's opening statement allows the author to deflect these repostes, saying "Ah but in that case, company x's execution was much better" or "Company b's marketing push came at a really bad time"; i.e. All else wasn't equal and so your counter-example doesn't detract from the author's point. This reasoning is problematic. Imagine the equivalent phrase: "If you have two Ferraris, identical in every single way except that one has a higher rate of acceleration than the other, then the faster Ferrari is better". In a vacuum, this statement is so obviously true that it doesn't need to be said. So the author starts with this statement. As every reader will intuitively agree with it, the author gets them "on side". They then go on to make unsupported claims, which the reader is now happilly innoculated to. The article's opening is misleading because, effort being a finite resource, all else cannot be equal when it comes to human endeavour. By focusing on speed you inevitably sacrifice time spent on something else such as the rollcage, the breaks, or the looks. The prediliction for speed and fast execution is systemic in the startup scene right now and it can be very damaging. Don't ignore that risk when pushing to deliver. We didn't put men on the moon quickly, we did it as safely as we could. Google didn't become the pre-eminent search engine because it was first (it wasn't), but rather because it was the best. EDIT: It has been pointed out to me that misuse of "All else being equal" in this manner is fairly common. That being the case, it is unlikely that the author was purposefully attempting to support an argument they knew to be weak (why would they do so, afterall). Apologies if the tone of the original comment was taken as aggressive :)