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`0:20:29`

than what they were in the '90s. So shouldn't we be able to work in even easier ways? We should be looking back on the '90s ago, like, oh, that was way too complicated. Now we have more sophisticated technology that's way faster and it allows us to work in these easier to use ways…

`0:21:32`

which is the JavaScript scene. And I don't say that as someone who hate JavaScript. I mean, I often joke that JavaScript. It's my second favorite program language. It's a very distant second. Ruby is by far and away number one, but I actually like JavaScript. I don't think it's a bad…

`0:22:32`

to be able to use more modern ways of programming with a browser that was seen as stuck with an ancient version of JavaScript that no one actually wanted to work with. And that made sense to me, but it was also deeply unpleasant. And I remember thinking during that time, the dark ages, as I refer…

`0:23:37`

we had landed ourselves in. Why does everything break all the time? I mean, the joke wouldn't be just that the software would break, that would annoy me personally. But then I'd go on Hacker News and I'd see some thread on the latest JavaScript release of some framework. And the thread would be…

`0:24:38`

Some of it was an overhang all the way back from IE5. So IE5 essentially put the whole internet development experience into a deep freeze, because Microsoft won the browser wars in the mid 2000s, and then they basically disbanded their browser development team. 'Cause they're like, "All right, job done. We don't need any…

`0:25:38`

application development platform of all time. This was where all the money was being made. This was where all the billionaires were being minted. This was where the Facebooks and whatever of the world came to be. So you had all of this brain power applied to the problem of how to work with the web. And…

`0:26:41`

Oh yeah, well, I'm a front-end whatever engineer. And suddenly the web developer was no longer one person. It was 15 different roles. That in itself injected a ton of complexity. But I also wanna give it the bold case here, which was that some of that complexity was necessary to get to where we…

`0:27:44`

— This is one of the hardest problems in computing today is to parse the entire internet. Because thankfully for us as web developers, but perhaps not so much for the browser developers, every webpage that has ever been created minus the brief period with Flash still runs today. The webpage I did in ninth grade would render…

`0:28:46`

I've supported that project. I would encourage people to look into that. It's really a wonderful — Nice. — thing. It's staffed by a bunch of people who worked on other browser projects in the past. — Truly independent web browser. — We really need that. But I can hold that thought in my head. At the same…

`0:29:47`

to the web as a development platform. And they deserve an enormous amount of credit, I think for that. Even if it's entangled with their business model and half of Chrome is code that spies on you or informs targeted ads. And a bunch of things, I'm not a big fan of. I can divorce…

`0:30:49`

And I say that as someone who's been very sympathetic to the antitrust fight, because I do think we have antitrust problems in technology. But the one place where we don't have them, by and large, is with browsers, is with the tools we use to access the open web. First of all, we have…

`0:31:52`

Chrome is the last thing. And this is why I get so frustrated sometimes about the anti or the monopoly fight that there are real problems. And we should be focusing on the premier problems first. Like the toll booths on our mobile phones. They're far bigger problems. It's not the open web. It's…

`0:32:52`

when we think about legislation, when we think about monopoly fights is you may not like how things look today. And you may wanna do something about it, but you may also make it worse. The good intentions behind the GDPR in Europe currently has amounted to what? Cookie banners that everyone on the internet hates. That…

`0:33:53`

— So hell is the cookie accept button that you have to accept all cookies. That's what hell looks like over and over. You don't actually ever get to the web page. — Just on a human scale, try to imagine how many hours every day are wasted clicking that away. And how much harm we've…

`0:34:54`

It's complete failure on every conceivable metric. Everyone hates it universally, yet we can't seem to do anything about it. That's a bankruptcy declaration for any body of bureaucrats who pretend or pretend to make things better for not just citizens, but people around the world. This is the thing that really gets me…

`0:35:58`

It's winning in the fairway by just being better. — It is, if I was gonna steal man the other side just for a half second, people would say, well, maybe yes, most people do sort of begrudgingly agree that is a pretty good browser. But then they'll say the reason it got dominance was distribution…

`0:36:59`

but if you zoom out and you look at all the problems we have with big tech, Chrome is not it. Chrome won on merits. I begrudgingly have switched to Chrome on that realization alone. As a web developer, I just prefer it. I like Firefox in many ways. I like the ethos of it, but Chrome…

`0:38:00`

and from you learning how to program. So eventually, the big success story is when you built a bunch of stuff with PHP and you were like actually shipping things. And that's when the Ruby story came. So what your big love affair with programming began there? So can you take me there? What is Ruby…

`0:39:01`

It was very much a means to an end. I didn't fall in love with PHP. I'm very grateful that it taught me the basics of programming. And I'm very grateful that it set the bar for the economics. But it really wasn't until Ruby that I started thinking of myself as a…

`0:40:02`

And we started talking and then we started working. Which by the way, is a miracle of what the internet can allow. How can a kid in Copenhagen who's never met this guy in Chicago connect just over email and start working together? And by the way, we're still working together now 24 years later…