
Paul Buchheit: "Perfect" is the enemy of "good enough" (also, the future of entertainment) - paul
http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2007/04/perfect-is-enemy-of-good-enough-and.html
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gibsonf1
Interesting point. I agree that the biggest procrastination inducing
disincentive to _starting_ creative work is the preconception in the creator's
mind that "this will be a great thing - I will make it perfect", etc. I
learned while designing in architectural school that the key to good design
was to strip away all preconceptions about a problem before starting - which
is dramatically harder than it sounds. The preconception of a quest for
perfection before starting is the most important one.

However, once you have "programmed" your conscious mind with the problem,
allowed your subconscious to crunch on it and give you the first draft of a
solution to the problem, the quest for making it as good as possible is key to
actually having it be good. With that first solution, you can then refine it,
with the idea of making it increasingly better. The question then is when do
you stop (or go live) - a very important point. The beauty of web development
is that you can think of the project as an evolution toward being very good
from somewhat humble beginnings. This makes it that much easier to come to the
good-enough point faster than in the past stand-alone application days, but
then continue improving as long as the project continues to be exciting. The
"lets make it better" drive is a really important motivator, at least it is
for me.

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JMiao
Enjoyed the post, Paul. I recently sat in on a discussion with Jen-Hsun Huang
(NVIDIA Founder/CEO) where he placed very substantial emphasis on the threats
of "good enough." Coming from the chip business, he's got a point.

From brain surgery to semiconductors, it sounds like the importance of "good
enough" is relatively context-sensitive.

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vlad
He's right. In July, I promised someone I would do a video on YouTube before
the end of August 2006. And, it was easy and fun. There was no pressure to be
perfect.

