None of my principled arguments against “only care about big projects” have convinced anyone, but in practice Google reorganized around that exact policy (“don’t start a project unless it could conceivably have 1b+ users, kill if it’s ever not on track to reach that”) and they haven’t home grown an interesting thing since.
My guess is the benefits of immediately aiming high are overwhelmed by the costs of less contact with reality.
None of my principled arguments against “only care about big projects” have convinced anyone, but in practice Google reorganized around that exact policy (“don’t start a project unless it could conceivably have 1b+ users, kill if it’s ever not on track to reach that”) and they haven’t home grown an interesting thing since.
My guess is the benefits of immediately aiming high are overwhelmed by the costs of less contact with reality.