Feral Upstarts

Austin Kleon in Show Your Work:

Because they have little to lose, amateurs are willing to try anything and share the results. They take chances, experiment, and follow their whims. Sometimes, in the process of doing things in an unprofessional way, they make new discoveries.

and

Robin Sloan Surrendering to the Surface re: Jony Ive & Sam Altman:

(In all other respects, I agree with Jason Snell’s assessment: with sincerely all credit where due, this is not the team to figure out the successor to the smartphone. Now is the time for feral upstarts, not designers emeritus.)

and

Anna Wiener Does Tech Need a New Narrative?:

An earlier Silicon Valley mythology of post-counterculture nerds in electronics-cluttered garages grew sleeker, slimmer, and better capitalized.

The thread through all three: the people with the least to lose (amateurs, upstarts, outsiders) are often the ones who find what’s next, while incumbents polish what already exists.

Paths from here

• Building Things Here: human-scale building, not moonshots
• Limitation as driver of creativity: making more with less
• Bespoke Software: the home-cooked app