I usually learn from these essays, but I've always found them somewhat grating. Some perceive the style as confrontational, but I think that's unreasonable intellectual defensiveness that pg so often picks apart.
These deletions have helped me realize why these essays bother me, on a stylistic level. The cadence is very regular and robotic. It's easy to anticipate the switches from descriptions of conventional wisdom to a different way of framing the problem, and easy to anticipate that there will be a conventional wisdom to roast.
I haven't reread the edited version, but the draft is less grating to me than most of these essays (I read every essay). I can see why you deleted much of it, but the draft has some interesting detail that got cut.
The essays do have a lot of telling vs. showing, and maybe that gives them the feel of over-produced music. For instance, the paragraph about VC reactions to your suggestions in Why There Aren't More Googles would be way better as an anecdote with specific detail, imho.
These deletions have helped me realize why these essays bother me, on a stylistic level. The cadence is very regular and robotic. It's easy to anticipate the switches from descriptions of conventional wisdom to a different way of framing the problem, and easy to anticipate that there will be a conventional wisdom to roast.