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by Paul Vick.
Original Post: Yes, coding *is* a zero-sum game, Robert...
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Scoble questions whether greater community engagement really takes away from time that developers have to spend on other things like fixing bugs. I would have to agree with John Cavnar-Johnson on this one: from personal experience, blogging and other community engagement like the newsgroups does suck time away from other activities that I could be pursuing like designing new features, writing new code or fixing bugs. I don't think Scoble is totally off base with his “all work and no play makes Jack a very dull boy” thesis, but I think that that model only really applies to the creative end of development which is only one part of the overall work it takes to get a product out of the door. A huge chunk of the product development cycle is, indeed, one-step-after-another work where you just have to get the damn work done. And if you're busy blogging, you're not doing that.
That being said, I am reminded of the famous Churchill quote, “Democracy is the worst form of government except for all the other forms that have been tried.” As in, yeah, it sucks that community engagement takes time away from other things, but what's the better alternative? Robert has it right that community engagement provides valuable insight to both us and the community, and so even if it's a zero-sum game in terms of developer time, I still think everyone comes out ahead.
Which, I suppose, was Robert's original point. OK, I guess it's time for me to go back to doing something useful...
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