Ask HN: How bad should the code be in a startup?

Re:Ask HN: How bad should the code be in a startup? by ealexhudson on Sunday June 07, 2020 @11:27AM (#23448045)

I'm not sure about that either, tbh. Once you're in the process of managing a successful product and have a well-defined value prop; sure - pareto efficiency is interesting. Before that point, I don't think it is - at least, not in any meaningful way.

When you're building out product and figuring out where it fits and what it should do, you want to retain a lot of optionality. If you don't have the ability to change the product quickly in an agile fashion, your development process way well end up being more pareto-efficient overall but your potential customer base would be much smaller. Better to be less efficient and grow a much bigger base.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Ask HN: How bad should the code be in a startup? by unishark on Monday June 08, 2020 @02:05AM (#23454023)

I think the pareto curve still covers that idea. You want to be farther along the curve towards speed.

Also you may be thinking in terms of a different optimality criterion for quality, which as the above poster noted may be unclear, e.g. a lot of effort in one direction that seems like the best decision in the short term but actually hinders needed flexibility in the long term. This just means the short term improvement wasn't really towards optimal after all.

[ Parent | on HN ]