Occasionally, old posts from years ago are re-discovered and give us insights into the perspicacious minds that shaped the present. Twitter founder’s startup advice from 2005 is one such post.

Dragon-slaying

Do Hard Things // Inspirational essay. Quoting Gruber: “If you don’t feel that you’re now in a position to do the best work of your entire career, to look back and say, ‘This was the time, I was there, I did this, I helped make this thing a reality’, then you need to find a new position. This chance will never come again. And we are lucky, we’re so unbelievably, incredibly lucky that it even came this once.” Yep, that’s the plan.

Fight the Dragon // Followup to previous essay. Become the dragon-slayer: “So when you find yourself in one of these nervous meetings where the work is being divided up, look for the part that everybody’s afraid of being given.”

This is the time

Ten Rules for Web Startups (Nov 2005) // Twitter co-founder Evan Williams with advice he went on to put into practice himself. It worked. (via Nathan Kontny)

On making a ruckus in your industry // Seth Godin proffers 9 vectors of disruptive innovation.

What It Cost Eight Women Writers To Make It In New York // Fascinating glimpse into the lives of writers seeking to make something of themselves in Gotham, and how they got by. Quoting Janowitz: “I was in my twenties and felt embittered that I had missed the Real Thing—the Real Scene—by more than a decade”.

Creating

John Cleese on the 5 Factors to Make Your Life More Creative // Besides organizational factors (Space, Time, Time) he points out the importance of personal factors Confidence and Humor. “Nothing will stop you being creative so effectively as the fear of making a mistake.”)

User Experience is Not Enough // “A great product experience can only be crafted in an environment that encourages collaboration, iteration, and risk. Working in unison, having patience and long-term vision, and being willing to fail are key factors to success.” (emphasis mine; compare with the John Cleese quote above.)

Time and taste // Marco Arment: “People who naturally recognize tasteful, well-designed products are a small subset of the population. But people who can create them are a much smaller subset.”

Skeumorphism & Storytelling // Tobias Bjerrome Ahlin: “The functionality of Paper and Brushes are basically the same, yet the perceived purpose is totally different.”

App of the Week

SpellTower // Addictive Tetris–Scrabble mash-up, nicely made. Indie game creator Zach Gage’s stunned reaction to the game’s crazy success: wow.