Ah, Hamming. Definitely a role model for anyone who wants to get out there and accomplish things. This is probably old hat to folks here, since it was mentioned in one of pg's essays, but I remain fond of this part:
I went over and said, "Do you mind if I join you?" They can't say no, so I started eating with them for a while. And I started asking, "What are the important problems of your field?" And after a week or so, "What important problems are you working on?" And after some more time I came in one day and said, "If what you are doing is not important, and if you don't think it is going to lead to something important, why are you at Bell Labs working on it?" I wasn't welcomed after that; I had to find somebody else to eat with!
This quote has taunted me from the back of my head off and on for years now, but I don't listen to it as often as I should.
This whole weekend (including Halloween!) I have been stressing about a paper I need to write on a topic I am not remotely interested in. This reminded me that I need to both relax about the unimportant stuff and make sure that when I am done I look for the most valuable next step.
Truly, an excellent quote, and an excellent article.
Funny - there was a whole stack of these lying in the 3rd floor lounge of Stanford's CS building last week. I just happened to pick one up, It's the first time i've read it, and here it pops up on Hacker News!
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=229067
http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=852405
http://searchyc.com/you+and+your+research+hamming