Derek Sivers

Presentations → Rails Conf Keynote

Length: 44 minutes. Date recorded: 2010-05

Short stories about programming, accents, quirks, delegating, confabulation, instinct, etc.

I aspire to be a great programmer. So when RailsConf asked me to be the keynote, I had to say yes, but I was terrified. What do I say to a room full of my heroes?

They wanted me to talk for 45 minutes, but I had nothing I could talk for 45 minutes about. So instead I told a dozen short stories.

Some were well-practiced talks I'd done at other conferences. Some were new stories I was trying out. Some only applied to people who know my history with Rails and PHP.

Overall, I felt this was a TERRIBLE unfocused presentation, but some people have told me it's not so bad.


Download the video here