Short stints cap you at modifying existing things, not creating new ones
You've identified a critical constraint in how you approach problems: short timelines force you into refinement rather than creation. When you only spend eighteen months on something, the best you can achieve is making existing solutions fa…
If you only spend a short time on a problem, the most you can do is modify an existing solution: make something faster, cleaner, cheaper, more polished. That's useful work, but it's not new.
Genuine novelty demands a different kind of compounding, accumulating toward creation rather than endless refinement of what already exists. That accumulation doesn't fit inside eighteen-month cycles.
When AI is compressing the time it takes to execute, this matters more, not less. When powerful tools can handle more of the building, the bottleneck shifts to knowing what to build and why. That kind of judgment comes from years of accumulation, not a weekend with a new model.
Source claim: Short project timelines limit you to modifying what already exists; genuine novelty requires the kind of compounding that only comes from staying long enough to go past modification.
Related notes
- Taste and judgement become the constraint when production is freecraft
- Judgment, relationships, and expertise only pay off past a time thresholdtime horizon
- Avoiding stupidity produces more long-term advantage than seeking brilliancecircle of competence
- Cheaper cognition expands cognitive demand rather than contracting itinnovation
- Your mind can't flag its own failures because the alarm runs on the failing partsystems thinking