"Zed Shaw thinks he's cool, and that's all the credibility I need."
This is a very dangerous way of thinking. You should judge people by more than "X says ..." . There are any number of competent people who think Obie is mostly blowing smoke and leaching off rails's popularity.
Obie essentially gave Zed a job when he needed one. You will never catch Zed say Obie isn't cool after that.
If you know someone at Thoughtworks, where people actually worked with him (and from where Obie left under a cloud ), talk to them to get a different opinion.
of course, the best way to judge someone is to look at their code/work with them for a while than "X says Y". You can get people saying anything about other people if you look hard enough. I wouldn't want to bet my company (or 30,000 $ for that matter) on such flimsy evidence.
And even if Zed really means it when he says "Obie is cool" , that doesn't make it right for your to bet your company on him. Quotes are no substitute for doing your own research.
I can't educate my guesses that much. Like you, I'm not in a position where betting 30K on some dude I read about makes any sense. However, some people are in that position. Big companies regularly pay consulting companies like McKinsey hundreds of thousands and even millions for projects. The pay hundreds of dollars an hour for IBM coders. People who pay these prices may well be better served with a 30G project from Obie and a 14G website from Electric Pulp than with whatever IBM and McKinsey charge.
NB: I don't know the numbers. However, I recall the ballpark as being around 300 dollars an hour for a software engineer, and 400K for a study on the return on investment of a marketing campaign for a retailer. The first number is according to Joel Spolsky, and the second is according to Steve Levitt. I'm aware I'm risking arguments from authority here, too.
I can't educate my guesses that much. Like you, I'm not in a position where betting 30K on some dude I read about makes any sense. However, some people are in that position. Big companies regularly pay consulting companies like McKinsey hundreds of thousands and even millions for projects. The pay hundreds of dollars an hour for IBM coders. People who pay these prices may well be better served with a 30G project from Obie and a 14G website from Electric Pulp than with whatever IBM and McKinsey charge.
NB: I don't know the numbers. However, I recall the ballpark as being around 300 dollars an hour for a software engineer, and 400K for a study on the return on investment of a marketing campaign for a retailer. The first number is according to Joel Spolsky, and the second is according to Steve Levitt. I'm aware I'm risking arguments from authority here, too.
This is a very dangerous way of thinking. You should judge people by more than "X says ..." . There are any number of competent people who think Obie is mostly blowing smoke and leaching off rails's popularity.
Obie essentially gave Zed a job when he needed one. You will never catch Zed say Obie isn't cool after that.
If you know someone at Thoughtworks, where people actually worked with him (and from where Obie left under a cloud ), talk to them to get a different opinion.
of course, the best way to judge someone is to look at their code/work with them for a while than "X says Y". You can get people saying anything about other people if you look hard enough. I wouldn't want to bet my company (or 30,000 $ for that matter) on such flimsy evidence.
And even if Zed really means it when he says "Obie is cool" , that doesn't make it right for your to bet your company on him. Quotes are no substitute for doing your own research.