I tend to agree, but there are major exceptions in open source software:
- Guido van Rossum wrote the first line of Python in 1989 or so (started)
- He released the first version on Useset pretty quickly ("finished" the MVP)
- He worked on himself for four years or so (maintaining, improving)
- Then other people started contributing for 25 years or so (leading)
So I would say he's able to do all 3 things, plus lead the team, which is even harder.
I think you can also say the same about Linus Torvalds, probably the leaders of similar projects like Ruby, Perl, Tcl, Richard Hipp of sqlite, etc. (without much of the leading part, since sqlite is relatively closed to contribution.)
One exception might be Stallman. Although Stallman's achievements are great, what I learned from reading his autobiography is that he started with existing pieces of code for GCC and Emacs.
In other words, he tries NOT to start from scratch. That's probably what enabled him to be productive enough to start so many projects simultaneously.
He also tends to be pretty good about handing over maintainership. That is, he is relatively good at recruitment to the cause.
Anyway, I guess this is why we hold such people in high regard! Because they're able to do things that most people cannot do -- that would normally take huge teams of people and/or entire companies.
- Guido van Rossum wrote the first line of Python in 1989 or so (started)
- He released the first version on Useset pretty quickly ("finished" the MVP)
- He worked on himself for four years or so (maintaining, improving)
- Then other people started contributing for 25 years or so (leading)
So I would say he's able to do all 3 things, plus lead the team, which is even harder.
I think you can also say the same about Linus Torvalds, probably the leaders of similar projects like Ruby, Perl, Tcl, Richard Hipp of sqlite, etc. (without much of the leading part, since sqlite is relatively closed to contribution.)
One exception might be Stallman. Although Stallman's achievements are great, what I learned from reading his autobiography is that he started with existing pieces of code for GCC and Emacs.
In other words, he tries NOT to start from scratch. That's probably what enabled him to be productive enough to start so many projects simultaneously.
He also tends to be pretty good about handing over maintainership. That is, he is relatively good at recruitment to the cause.
Anyway, I guess this is why we hold such people in high regard! Because they're able to do things that most people cannot do -- that would normally take huge teams of people and/or entire companies.