It helps to think that a person is not their ideas. An idea might be very successful and innovative. It might catch on and do very well. It means little to the person who realized the idea, except that they were the one to have it and make something happen with it.

It is kind of encouraging. It lets you remember that it's not that these people are magical forces that the best ideas come to. It's more that there are some people who, when the right idea comes to them, can make the most of it. That anyone might have a great idea, they just have to be able to work with it.

DrawQuest wasn't a great idea. He did it anyways. You don't always know what is going to be the best idea until you try it. If someone were to propose 4chan, without foreknowledge of how it would turn out I would expect it to be a flop. If Chris thought the same way, he might have never bothered writing it. Taking those risks means you don't lose $3.6 million making DrawQuest, but it also means you don't make 4chan.

He's not that innovative. He cloned 2chan. Just sayin.

The real achievement is not blinking in the face of the craziness he unleashed.

4chan was based off Futaba Channel (2chan.net), which was in turn a based off 2channel (2ch.net).

So it's not like there wasn't a precedent.

If you check the footer on 4chan, you'll see it links back to Futaba Channel. I seem to remember Futaba linking back to 2channel as well at some point, but it doesn't look like it does now.