>[!abstract] >A best practice is a method or technique that has been generally accepted as superior to alternatives because it tends to produce superior results. Best practices are used to achieve quality as an alternative to mandatory standards. Best practices can be based on self-assessment or benchmarking (Wikipedia, 2025). >[!note] >We should not limit ourselves to aiming for best practices, nor to rejecting what has been unsuccessfully attempted in the past, because changing conditions can also change the outcomes of those experiments, something that previously didn’t work suddenly does, it doesn’t necessarily mean the people who tried it first were wrong. > [!quote] > "I am not particularly anxious for the men to remember what someone else has tried to do in the past, for then we might quickly accumulate far too many things that could not be done. > > That is one of the troubles with extensive records. If you keep on recording all of your failures you will shortly have a list showing that there is nothing left for you to try – whereas it by no means follows because one man has failed in a certain method that another man will not succeed. > > Hardly a week passes without some improvement being made somewhere in machine or process, and sometimes this is made in defiance of what is called “the best shop practice.” > > They told us we could not cast gray iron by our endless chain method and I believe there is a record of failures. But we are doing it. The man who carried through our work either did not know or paid no attention to the previous figures … a record of failures – particularly if it is a dignified and well-authenticated record – deters a young man from trying … I cannot discover that any one knows enough about anything on this earth definitely to say what is and what is not possible." ([[Ford, 1922]]). > [!quote] > "All of the ideas that people had in the 1990s were basically all correct. They were just early. > > One thing that’s happening is now enough time has passed that enough kids are coming to the Valley who don’t have a memory of the crash. They were like in 4th Grade when it happened. We get in these weird conversations where we’re telling them cautionary tales of what happened in 1998, and they look at you like you’re a Grandpa. We have a new generation of people in the Valley who say, ‘Let’s just go build things. Let’s not be held back by superstition." (Andreessen, quoted by [[Housel, 2021]]). >[!related] >- **North** (upstream): — >- **West** (similar): [[Curse of knowledge]] >- **East** (different): [[Shoshin]] >- **South** (downstream): [[Einstellung effect]]