"Paul Graham argued that people burn through most of a new medium’s possibilities within its first couple of generations."
Graham really did make the provocation I'm pushing against - his essay says new media are often explored so eagerly that most of their possibilities get burned through in the first couple generations, and he thought hacking was in that phase. + “So while I admit that hacking doesn’t seem as cool as painting now, we should remember that painting itself didn’t seem as cool in its glory days as it does now. What we can say with some confidence is that these are the glory days of hacking. In most fields the great work is done early on. The paintings made between 1430 and 1500 are still unsurpassed. Shakespeare appeared just as professional theater was being born, and pushed the medium so far that every playwright since has had to live in his shadow. Albrecht Dürer did the same thing with engraving, and Jane Austen with the novel. Over and over we see the same pattern. A new medium appears, and people are so excited about it that they explore most of its possibilities in the first couple generations. Hacking seems to be in this phase now.” (Paul Graham, Hackers & Painters, Location 574)
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