> “Computers aren’t the thing; they’re the thing that gets us to the thing.”

I used to be overly pedantic about the kinds of things programmers often obsess over—like micro-benchmarks, the whole “I use Arch, by the way” attitude, and other obnoxious quirks. But this quote stuck with me and helped me move past that shallow, one-upmanship view of computers. Great show to ones who haven't watched yet.

It's a great line. I think our current tech industry has forgotten this. You can't make a product for everyone but you can make an environment for everyone. Something that can be adapted for (almost) anyone.

Take the phone industry. They're happily gouging developers, taking large sums of app sales. But at the same time, a smart phone isn't a smart phone without apps. Everyone has different ones installed and ones they highly depend on that aren't from Apple/Google. It's the program that makes the tool.

But this kind of thing is happening more and more and can only happen because consolidation. It maximizes profits for today but at the cost of higher future profits and better products. It's funny how there was a strong counter culture early on but it feels like that was lost.