[RKoutnik]

This reminds me of the Humbug in The Phantom Tollbooth, who is described as "[someone] who always managed to be the first with the wrong answer" and later tries to argue that it was the question itself, not the answer, that was wrong.

It's a shockingly good lesson that I seem to re-learn every six months or so. Being first is never a virtue in and of itself. MVPs that sacrifice quality for speed (instead of sacrificing scope) always end up as painstaking rewrites at best, and slow slogs to failure at worst.

Something I think most miss is that taking on this technical debt is ok when you don't know which direction to go [0]. Get something to market to learn, not to be "first" or "right".

[0] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pqeJFYwnkjE

[bitwalker]

As an aside, this reference makes me happy. The Phantom Tollbooth was one of my favorite books when I was younger, just brilliantly written. So many good lessons about life (the Humbug being a great example). Another great one that is somewhat applicable here is Canby, the regular visitor to the Island of Conclusions, who attempts to be as much as he can be of all things (hence his name), which leaves him not very much like any of them, instead of picking one thing and mastering it.