I'm Unprofessional ...

(A Rant)

Really, I am unprofessional. I've been told by friends and people I respect that my website is terrible. Unprofessional. Ugly. How dare I have a website without CSS?

None of those people have a website

My blog is hosted at blogspot. Gosh. Awful. I should have my own viritual host (I do) and manage my own subdomain under mod_perl so that I could have blog.xndev.com. After all, that's the right way to do it.

None of those people have a blog

I'm doing things in the wrong order. First, I need to write a book, then I need to do public speaking. Why, by then, the companies will come to you, Matt! Stop wasting time on your blog; nobody reads it anyway.

None of those people have written a book, or presented at a major conference

What's going on here?

Two hundred years ago, Voltaire said "The Perfect is the Enemy of the Good"

Twenty Years ago, Richard Gabriel wrote "Worse is Better"

Right about now, Matt Heusser is writing "Good enough is the enemy of done"

Or, to put it another way - I value working software over comprehensive design; I like to deliver working software often, and improve it incrementally.

////----Rant off

I do intend to improve my website. Eventually, I would like to get Creative Chaos hosted somewhere else. The fundamental difference is one of approach: Instead of a Diamond-Like Jewel - that is never finished - I intend to release systems that are good enough and improve them incrementally.

If you are not convinced, that's fine. To each his own, but I wanted to get this down. Still, think about this: When the 37Signals guys released the first version of basecamp, the radically successful web-based project management tool, they didn't have any billing system in place.

They didn't care, because the only thing you could sign up for was a 30-day trial membership, which was free.

They figured that gave them 30 days to write the billing and payment system.

How ... unprofessional.

Wait, aren't they like, multi-millionaires now?