For a while I have been trying to figure out how to articulate this idea that we need to be better people and care more. By "we", I mean technologists. We are again having this conversation, so it seems like a good time to get it out of my head. I find that many who take technology as a practice---an approach to life, work, anything---are of better character than those in the industry. The virtues of the hacker are, well, virtuous: they espouse a way of living that is good for the individual and good for the collective. But technology-the-industry is dominated by ideologies of outcomes. We think it needs must, because that is the only way you get the kind of extreme growth and scale that modern technology-the-industry demands: by doing it at all costs. The ends justify the means. In a competitive environment like technology-the-industry, such an approach will inevitably lead to the means rotting. Rot shows as a lack of integrity. We tolerate low integrity on a lot of scales in technology-the-industry and technology-the-culture. In the technology social set, duplicity is quite accepted, though certainly not ubiquitous. In technology startups, it is entirely normal to set fake targets, lie to investors, and sell visions that are, quite simply, not real. I am optimistic that this now seems to be falling apart. Why does this matter? Because technology is the most important industry in the world. It is how we bring the future closer. It is the dominant force in the modern western economy. It is a significant political power base. It is both the culture and the counter-culture. As Stewart Brand once wrote, "we are as gods and we might as well get good at it." How do we get good at it? I think it starts by seeing that there can be virtuous winners in tech and that virtue both takes and imparts strength. The greatest leaders have powerful virtues to match their great faults. Many of our most prominent current technology leaders have significant virtues: long-term thinking, generosity, mistrust of authority, anti-credentialism, incredible willpower and resilience. These are not soft qualities! In the fullness of time, virtue persists because vice is expensive, even if vice is the faster to start. In the fullness of time, we can be our better selves.

god i love startups. i love the momentum. i love the chaos. i love how productivity compounds in a group and how the clock speed of the org builds with the right people. it’s delicious.