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by David Heinemeier Hansson.
Original Post: A better model for the future?
Feed Title: Loud Thinking
Feed URL: http://feeds.feedburner.com/LoudThinking
Feed Description: All about the full-stack, web-framework Rails for Ruby and on putting it to good effect with Basecamp
Paul Graham is right on the money with The Venture Capital Squeeze. Not so much because he labels me "a better model for the future" (though flatter always helps), but because he once again highlights that the future of software is not to accept that status quo and just throw more resources at it — neither labor from India or capital from the VCs:
During the Bubble, a lot of people predicted that startups would outsource their development to India. I think a better model for the future is David Heinemeier Hansson, who outsourced his development to a more powerful language instead. A lot of well-known applications are now, like BaseCamp, written by just one programmer. And one guy is more than 10x cheaper than ten, because (a) he won't waste any time in meetings, and (b) since he's probably a founder, he can pay himself nothing.
You can gain even more productivity by simply routing around the mainstream technology choices and go for something simpler. And that can give you a real edge. I love the fact that Rails is contributing to that edge for companies willing to partake. But at the same time it makes me a little bit ambivalent about the future growth of Ruby on Rails.
Some part of me actually enjoys the vision that Rails would never become mainstream. That it would remain available only to the smaller, agile teams, and thus give them a sustainable advantage to compete against the big guys with.
Which in terms would lead to a celebration of the big honking ships continued use of heavy-weight frameworks and environments as well as their liberal use of outsourcing. The further your competitors go down that route, the easier it will be to use your edge to win big.
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