This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Ruby Buzz by Obie Fernandez. Original Post: The Power of the Marginal Feed Title: Obie On Rails (Has It Been 9 Years Already?) Feed URL: http://jroller.com/obie/feed/entries/rss Feed Description: Obie Fernandez talks about life as a technologist, mostly as ramblings about software development and consulting. Nowadays it's pretty much all about Ruby and Ruby on Rails. Latest Ruby Buzz Posts Latest Ruby Buzz Posts by Obie Fernandez Latest Posts From Obie On Rails (Has It Been 9 Years Already?)

I'm such a fan of Paul Graham's essays and it was delightful to hear him deliver the latest one in person, as one of the Railsconf 2006 keynotes. He essentially read it to the crowd word for word, which made the talk feel more like a recital. While he was delivering it though, there were a couple of extemporaneous comments, as well as a bunch of controversial statements, followed by a comical "well, this part is not going in the online version."

Later, I was told that Paul is extremely introverted and that explains the reading of the speeches and his obvious nervousness in front of the crowd. Indeed, Paul was in a huge rush to get out of there when it was all over, but did take a few minutes to shake hands and sign autographs.

That speech/essay is now posted online, titled The Power of the Marginal . It's kind of long, but worth reading. Towards the end I was on the verge of busting out with spontaneous applause at the end of every paragraph (and quite dorkily did once!) I'll leave you one of my favorite passages, from the conclusion. If you know me or you've been reading my blog for awhile, you'll probably understand why I liked it so much.

If you make something and people complain that it doesn't work, that's a problem. But if the worst thing they can hit you with is your own status as an outsider, that implies that in every other respect you've succeeded. Pointing out that someone is unqualified is as desperate as resorting to racial slurs. It's just a legitimate sounding way of saying: we don't like your type around here.

But the best thing of all is when people call what you're doing inappropriate. I've been hearing this word all my life and I only recently realized that it is, in fact, the sound of the homing beacon. "Inappropriate" is the null criticism. It's merely the adjective form of "I don't like it."

Priceless.