I like Graham's points about overconfidence, peer groups and (judicious amounts of) ignorance, all of which he champions quite strongly. But drilling deeper on "rate of change" is an undervalued element that deserves a closer look.<p>The best innovators are really good at taking Version 1.0 and figuring out what rework will turn it into a better 2.0, and then 2.1, 2.2, 3.0, etc. This is an identifiable skill! It can be cultivated. Once you've got it, the failings of Version 1.0 do not ruin your self-esteem. You just get to work on fixing them. And not enough people think about this systematically.<p>One of my favorite museum stops of all time was the British Library, where a glass case held Paul McCartney's first draft of "Yesterday." You could see, cross-out by cross-out, how a somewhat awkward ballad got turned into a pop classic.<p>I'll submit that almost everything that looks like genius from a distance is a lot of step-by-step craft when viewed more closely. I did some consulting at Facebook in 2008 and it was quite amazing seeing how rapidly and incessantly Team Zuckerberg was not just adding features, but also rejiggering the way the feed worked; the layout, the everything.<p>Once you develop the ability to iterate your way to greatness, or at least to have a fighting chance of doing so, you're much more willing to crank out dodgy Version 1.0s and see what you (and your allies) can turn them into.
There are two places where it is possible to see early, "lame" work. One is YouTube - most channels with well-made videos would retain their earliest works, and the first few dozen can be quite instructive.<p>Second is GitHub - the first few hundred commits of many successful open-source projects. It is a wonder to see sprawling codebases starting at its first commit, and plodding its way over years before gathering momentum.
I had one thought forming while reading this piece, then read to Carmack's quote in the footnote which encapsulated it. I learned how to program modding games as a teenager, and as an adult now looking back on it, I realize how rough and ready the game engines were in 1996-1998, and how that rough and ready state, combined with my teenager's imbalance between time and money, led to a bunch of what Graham is calling early work where my bad 3d modeling skills, terrible art sense, and ability to sling values around in text files and use tools that other community members made, allowed me to make an entire faction for Total Annihilation that was clearly lower quality than the originals, but really not that much worse. Contrast that to about 2017 when I looked into what it would take to make a very small mod for XCOM, and boy oh boy, so much more work. What advantages I gained from being in that place at that time...
Related: Ira Glass on "The Gap": <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91FQKciKfHI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=91FQKciKfHI</a><p>> Nobody tells people who are beginners — and I really wish somebody had told this to me — is that all of us who do creative work … we get into it because we have good taste. But it’s like there’s a gap, that for the first couple years that you’re making stuff, what you’re making isn’t so good, OK? It’s not that great. It’s really not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has ambition to be good, but it’s not quite that good. But your taste — the thing that got you into the game — your taste is still killer, and your taste is good enough that you can tell that what you’re making is kind of a disappointment to you, you know what I mean?<p>> A lot of people never get past that phase. A lot of people at that point, they quit. And the thing I would just like say to you with all my heart is that most everybody I know who does interesting creative work, they went through a phase of years where they had really good taste and they could tell what they were making wasn’t as good as they wanted it to be — they knew it fell short, it didn’t have the special thing that we wanted it to have.<p>> And the thing I would say to you is everybody goes through that. And for you to go through it, if you’re going through it right now, if you’re just getting out of that phase — you gotta know it’s totally normal.<p>> And the most important possible thing you can do is do a lot of work — do a huge volume of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week, or every month, you know you’re going to finish one story. Because it’s only by actually going through a volume of work that you are actually going to catch up and close that gap. And the work you’re making will be as good as your ambitions. It takes a while, it’s gonna take you a while — it’s normal to take a while. And you just have to fight your way through that, okay?
I've always told people interested in startup to "start a project, not a company." I haven't been able to verbalize why yet until this:<p><i>But there is another more sinister reason people dismiss new ideas. If you try something ambitious, many of those around you will hope, consciously or unconsciously, that you'll fail. They worry that if you try something ambitious and succeed, it will put you above them. In some countries this is not just an individual failing but part of the national culture.</i>
> Of course, inexperience is not the only reason people are too harsh on early versions of ambitious projects. They also do it to seem clever.<p>It's ~100x harder to create than critique. I find it's often much more important to ask "why might this work" than "why won't this work?" People will freely tell you the latter, but rarely the former.
I think removing frictions from starting new things & automating the mundane things like project setup, doc setup etc. goes along way to cross the bridge from 'wanting to build something' to 'building it'.<p>As well as ability to track things being worked on sorted by priority. I currently do that part in Notion. (<a href="https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/ideas" rel="nofollow">https://wiki.nikitavoloboev.xyz/ideas</a>)<p>Working in public on anything is very useful too as there is a long time inbetween making something and 'truly releasing' something. I remember the talk on how <a href="https://github.com/webtorrent/webtorrent" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/webtorrent/webtorrent</a> started off as a simple readme. Got lots of interest & comments and only then was the idea validated and got built on, already with community.<p>Here is the great talk about it: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqnvKP1DYRI" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aqnvKP1DYRI</a>
This ties in with the theme of this newsletter <a href="https://leveragethoughts.substack.com/p/take-the-role-and-prove-yourself" rel="nofollow">https://leveragethoughts.substack.com/p/take-the-role-and-pr...</a> about Nikola Tesla and starting your first job in an industry you're new too.<p>"Many a-times, brilliant young people join an organisation and want to start right at the top or at a glamorous role. They get aggrieved when they are not given the shiny, glamorous role that commands respect or gives social proof. This tends to result in them doing a poor job of whatever role they have been given.<p>I posit that we can learn from the Tesla story described above. Take the job and prove yourself once an opportunity presents itself. It might not be what you envisioned last year before the pandemic and lockdown. It’s important to get into the door and then set the standards to where you believe you belong."
> But the most conspicuous feature of Theranos's cap table is the absence of Silicon Valley firms. Journalists were fooled by Theranos, but Silicon Valley investors weren't.<p>Not really a good defense of Silicon Valley, considering that Tim Draper was Theranos's first investor and a pretty big proponent of them <a href="https://twitter.com/RebeccaJarvis/status/974435962930548736" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/RebeccaJarvis/status/974435962930548736</a>
"It also helps, as Hardy suggests, to be slightly overconfident."<p>You do not need to cultivate this personality trait in our culture. Far more people go too far with this than not far enough, myself included.<p>Overconfident people believe they know more than they actually do, so they are more eager to criticize your novel idea. This is the type of thinking Graham says he wants to avoid in earlier paragraphs.<p>Instead of cultivating overconfidence through the deadly sin of pride, we should cultivate increasing true confidence through the cardinal virtue of courage. You can build your confidence by taking greater and greater courageous action. Courage is the choice to confront pain, ridicule, and the unknown all for an uncertain reward.<p>Graham says, "being slightly overconfident armors you against both other people's skepticism and your own." Acting courageously does this much, much better. In fact, it wouldn't be surprising if Graham agreed. The rest of the essay does a pretty good job explaining how to go about acting courageously, just without using the word.
> t also helps, as Hardy suggests, to be slightly overconfident. I've noticed in many fields that the most successful people are slightly overconfident. On the face of it this seems implausible. Surely it would be optimal to have exactly the right estimate of one's abilities. How could it be an advantage to be mistaken? Because this error compensates for other sources of error in the opposite direction: being slightly overconfident armors you against both other people's skepticism and your own.<p>I disagree. Being overconfident compensates for the amount of <i>luck</i> you need to succeed. If 100 people are overconfident, and 5 of them succeed, it paid off for these 5 to be overconfident - because when you have that kind of luck, overconfidence is the appropriate level of confidence.<p>For an excellent demonstration of the importance of luck: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LopI4YeC4I&vl=en" rel="nofollow">https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LopI4YeC4I&vl=en</a>
Humans naturally think linearly. This is because our lizard brains have evolved over millions of years in environment where linear processes were the most important to understand for survival. When we see a lion that is 1 mile away we know that we have 2x the time to run away than when the lion is .5 miles away.<p>So when we see a crappy project that took a few months to create, we naturally assume that it will be slightly less crappy in a few more months. We can't even imagine what it would look like if it was 100x more useful in 9 months. Even PG and other great early investors only have a slight notion of what that would look like.
There is creating new work and there is judging early work. One hack I’ve used for both is to realize that your brain is different at different times of day and in different levels of exhaustion/sleep/context etc. You are almost a different person as time passes. That novelty gives you new perspectives and new ideas with time. So always document new ideas (i have even built a new tool to make that as fast as possible) and then live with them for a bit. A good one will haunt you in that it will keep showing itself and resurfacing in other contexts. If the regret of not having it is heavier than the effort to put it together just use a weekend to put it together.<p>For judging ideas, you should pay even more attention to regrets. Your choice is a psychological anchor, so if you chose poorly you may not know it as your brain will automatically try to justify your choices, but if you find yourself angry at past rejections you’ve made on an idea, that’s probably regret talking to you, and that means you’ve been subconsciously haunted by something you should be paying more attention to.<p>Now I’ve learned to note what upsets me about an idea and at times dig in deeper and consider it extra points towards the idea.
An example of tricking oneself came to mind:<p><i>"I'm doing a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones."</i> -- Linus Torvalds on comp.os.minix in 1991
A couple of decades ago, I set forth to create something every day. It could be as simple as a bit of prose, writing some code, or as involved as a birdhouse. I haven't succeeded in creating every day since, but I did successfully create a habit of behavior that I cannot break. I've built games, websites, apps, written blogs, filed patents, built siege engines, been published, painted, carved wooden toys, remodeled houses, and much more. I've also started a couple of companies, one of which went through YCS17 and is still growing.<p>It's sad that there exists any cynicism around creation at all. Our ability to create might be the most human of our qualities. We literally make the world we live in.<p>The creations that excite me most are those that enable people to create even more. I really appreciate what PG is saying here, what he believes, and the dream factory that is YC.
I wonder if a good hack would be to think in terms of how I would react if a (my) child showed me something they made? Children are often doing something for the first time. I've noticed this breaks down my barriers to what I consider impressive.<p>Founders are in a similar situation, but since they're almost universally adults, we tend to apply adult prejudices to their work.
So much of the advice I see from YC (PG in this case, I know he isn't YC, but it's all cut from the same cloth) is about how to change your outer circumstances to accommodate inner impediments, such as Fear. They'll offer hacks or "mind games" to trick yourself into moving past the fear, as PG talks about here:<p>"But it's a bit strange that you have to play mind games with yourself to avoid being discouraged by lame-looking early efforts."<p>Unfortunately, I don't see anyone over there talking about conquering fear permanently, such that these issues fall away and what is left is boundless creativity.<p>One tool offered here is to "switch polarity", which means to take the other side of the argument. Fine, but real wisdom comes from transcending polarity.<p>Another tool offered is to tap into the motivation of curiosity. That's great as "early work" on the inner game, but there are much more robust ways to conquer fear when one looks at cutting edge work on consciousness evolution, such as Integral Dynamics, or studies Eastern traditions like Vajrayana or Zen.<p>I look forward to the day where YC elevates this discussion toward awakening themselves and their network to more transcendental tools.
One reason why I believe TikTok took off so fast is that they made it ok for videos to not be very good. They're not supposed to be overly polished and perfect. On Instagram, what you post is a reflection of you and how you want the world to see and judge you. TikTok is the opposite: videos are ephemeral, fun little things that you don't have to take seriously.
If you aren't embarrassed by your previous work, then you're not growing.<p>Don't let little things like failure or poor quality stop you from trying. This is normal. Embrace it, learn, and keep doing things.
Obligatory Ira Glass quote:<p>“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
"To start a painting saying that it's just a sketch, or a new piece of software saying that it's just a quick hack. Then you judge your initial results by a lower standard. Once the project is rolling you can sneakily convert it to something more"<p>Another reason to have lower standards initially is so you can properly measure the intensity of a problem. The harder your product is to use, the better the gauge for how much people truly want it.<p>Either
a) people use your product despite its shoddiness or
b) people complain about what more they want<p>And if people don't do either, well then it was just a "quick hack" to keep iterating from.
Scholars of literature sometimes speak of "juvenilia", the work a writer does when beginning. This can be quite readable--Jane Austen's are very funny--but not up to the standard of the mature work.
<i>The reason many hope you'll succeed is that they hope to rise with you. With investors this incentive is particularly explicit. They want you to succeed because they hope you'll make them rich in the process.</i><p>I'm more cynical. Investors benefit from the <i>illusion</i> of success, whether it is real or not. They can invest in something they don't think will succeed if PR and marketing can increase the valuation.
Why do certain days seem better suited to doing good work?<p>Most days, I feel like doing nothing. But some days, the computer calls to me, and it would be foolish to ignore it. If I’ve done anything impressive, it’s during those days.<p>But why? And can those days be maximized? Is it strictly a product of one’s environment? It can’t be; the institute for advanced study showed that you can have a perfect environment but make no progress.
> "<i>The right way to deal with new ideas is to treat them as a challenge to your imagination — not just to have lower standards, but to switch polarity entirely, from listing the reasons an idea won't work to trying to think of ways it could.</i>"<p>OK nothing happens without optimism and work and cynically excluding everything will leave you with nowhere to go, but the solution to that can't be optimistically including everything. If you want to lose lots of money, look at the penny stock market and think of all the ways those companies <i>could</i> become massive instead of looking for reasons they won't. Think of all the reasons alterntive cancer treatments <i>could</i> work, all the reasons UFOs <i>could</i> exist, all the reasons giving money to the local mega-church <i>could</i> be a good idea.<p>It's way to easy for most of us to convince ourselves of the happy path of a bunch of nonsense, and it's cynicism which keeps us away from the worst excesses of woo and hype and being conned or abused.<p>It's easy to think of reasons online grocery delivery "could work" during COVID19 in 2020, but if you were doing that in 1999 and investing in Webvan you'd have lost everything. Webvan "could work" and you could have thought of many reasons why, and you would have lost all your money. The people thinking why it couldn't work saved their bacon. Boo.com online fashion in 1999, the people thinking why it couldn't work saved their money and time and effort, even though online clothes shopping totally could work and does today.<p>Or that thinking of reasons why you could learn painting is irrelevant if you don't want to spend your time painting. You may as well rule it out first instead of challenging yourself all the ways you could become good at it and fit it into your life.
<i>The right way to deal with new ideas is to treat them as a challenge to your imagination — not just to have lower standards, but to switch polarity entirely, from listing the reasons an idea won't work to trying to think of ways it could.</i><p>An easier way than seeing them as a challenge is to method act the ideas. The source of new ideas is often a new, lived experience. I think of how AirBnB was in the beginning: links from CraigsList to a website where host and guest could message. Payment was in person and in cash! The lived experience of being your own BnB rather than going through all the bureaucratic and government hoops was there, it just needed to be coded.
> One of the biggest things holding people back from doing great work is the fear of making something lame.<p>I see this more concisely written as:<p>One of the biggest things holding people back from doing great work __is the fear is fear itself__<p>Anyone have some examples? I have some.<p>* For example, not taking a job upon offer, for fear of failing.<p>* I witness some mananger's/companies inducing fear, rather than embrace failure as one of the options. Without enabling high risk, high reward, people settle for safer low risk and mediocre results.<p>I think some of the best works also results from beginners. They add the new perspective needed & creative flair as new source of input.
I don't disagree with the point on overconfidence but it is a bit exhausting to be surrounded by 10,000+ overconfident CEOs of 3 person companies in Silicon Valley, most of whom will never succeed. It contributes to a culture that can be toxic and alienating for other personality types. Maybe that is the price we pay for innovation.
I think there is a kind of blind spot, if not contradiction, in the essay. It could be a good kind of paradox like the immovable object vs irresistible force thing.. it’s the paradox of lisp, of bel, of Julia, of mit style hacking.. they MIGHT aspire to be good jokes but as far as I can see they are at best, some kind of inside joke.. it’s a special kind of lame.. maybe we shouldn’t ask whether jokes can be ambitious but whether ambitions can be truly hysterically funny
The two paragraphs in the middle about how it gets harder as you get older is exactly the problem I'm having right now. Your standards rise, which is generally good, and you have fewer long blocks of time. Both of these problems are from success both professionally and personally e.g. good career and happy family.<p>The only trick I've found that helps with this 'problem' is only do one new thing at a time.
> One of the biggest things holding people back from doing great work is the fear of making something lame.<p>Any evidence to back up this claim? Maybe it's true for SV where there are a lot of angel investors. For me, the biggest blocker for starting a "lame" idea is money. Ideally, Fuck-You Money + capital to prove the business model.<p>An example of lame idea: A new footwear company. The main goal would be to optimize for minimal waste. Shoes designed to last 10x the time. The would cost more to purchase, but the cost per month would be the same - so something like a subscription model would need to be in place.
> One of the biggest things holding people back from doing great work is the fear of making something lame.<p>No, the biggest thing holding people back from doing great work is resources. Everything else is a distant concern.<p>Remember what Y Combinator does? It connects people with resources, to people who claim they'll do great work.<p>Good, boring, mundane redistribution of resources from old rich people to young capable people. Good, do more of that and please spare us your 'wisdom' - it leads to bullshit artists whose sole skill is 'appreciating' your 'wisdom' to insert themselves into the process and ruin the whole thing.
Has paulgraham.com never had TLS or is it just more obvious now because of Chrome UI changes? I find the old-school style & minimalism helps focus on the content, but shouldn't he at least have a LetsEncrypt cert up there or something? Or is the argument that because the site has no interactivity, it's not a big deal?
Why doesn't <a href="http://paulgraham.com/" rel="nofollow">http://paulgraham.com/</a> redirect to <a href="https://paulgraham.com/" rel="nofollow">https://paulgraham.com/</a>? And why doesn't <a href="https://paulgraham.com/" rel="nofollow">https://paulgraham.com/</a> have a valid SSL cert? I expect better from PG.