Answers are for losers
Posted on April 12, 2010, under Other.
What do you want: questions, or answers? Most people want answers. There’s a problem you need to solve, and the answer’ll let you continue working. That’s fine. That’s valid.
But is it interesting?
I was talking with @ghuber about a new idea I had. Without going into details, it’d pigeon-hole me into That Answer Guy.
How do you solve X? Here you go! The answer’s ABC.
BOR-fucking-ING. If you’re That Answer Guy, you’re giving away valuable resources, but not actively facilitating much further discussion or innovation. Your community’ll appreciate the answer. Kudos to you. Thanks, Teach!
But it doesn’t make you interesting.
Instead, you want to ask questions. Lots of questions. Oddball questions. Edge-case questions. What happens if I turn this to 11? What if I mix lolcats with quantum theory?
Think of it this way: Who do you want presenting at a conference? Who do you want to shoot the shit with over a beer? Who thinks of wacky stuff? The guy who knows how to do X when you have Y, or the guy who asks interesting questions and ponders new ways of doing things?
The latter, damn it!
That Answer Guy is useful and appreciated. He definitely is. But the role’s limited. It confines you. It defines what questions you ask, and what problems you solve.
Ask more questions. Write more software. Pursue tangents. And talk about it.
