c. scott andreas

37Signals has a brilliant post on their blog called “I Wonder.”

My son loves toy catalogs. He’ll turn the pages and just imagine. He drinks the koolaid, and loves every minute of it. I love to watch him.

I hope he never gets to the point where he thumbs through a catalog and scoffs. Where he reads the descriptions and cynically dares them to be true. I want him to always retain his sense of wonder, his desire to believe the best.

What has happened to our optimism?

I tried with all of my might to conjure up this sense of wonder while watching Teh Steve’s WWDC Keynote…but it was just so tough. I’m not really exited. I want to be – I want so badly to believe.

I want to believe in iPhone, too. But with no SDK, no support for Flash, and limited availability at present…I can’t. It’s an amazing phone - positively groundbreaking…or “revolutionary” as I’m told to say. But I just can’t do it.

And I want to believe in Coda by the amazing guys at Panic who work a few blocks away. But without great support for content management-based development, I can’t shell out.

I admit that there is a cynical spirit at work in me. But at the same time, I feel let down by these amazing companies to whom I’ll gladly surrender my bank account in exchange for outstanding hardware and software.

The developer in me still has faith. I’m working on a project that has me tremendously excited at the moment - a project that could revolutionize the way churches come together and actually serve their local communities. May you find a project to ignite your undying work-til-3-am-and-sleep-til-7 passion as well.

The bar has been set really, really high, and the web has never been better than it is right now. But that’s no reason to stop making really great tools. I hope. We can keep this up.

Because underneath all of this beautiful code lies the passion.

 UPDATE:  I just bought Coda.  Played around with it for awhile.  It’s cleverly.  Thanks, Cabel and co.  Enjoy my $79…and maybe a cup on me in a couple weeks.