Last year, a Ruby programmer called why the lucky stiff disappeared. Not being part of the Ruby community, the whole story still fascinated me; see the posts Eulogy to _why and The Impermanence, Karma, and Bad Behavior of Why The Lucky Stiff for two opposing views on the subject.
The other day, I decided to see whether there had been any sign of him. Short answer: no. Long answer: no, there hasn’t. But in my travels, I noticed this tweet from him, which a lot of people seem to like:
“when you don’t create things, you become defined by your tastes rather than ability. your tastes only narrow & exclude people. so create.”
It’s such a deliciously seductive idea. And yet it’s so fundamentally wrong.