I really appreciate this post on Coinbase by Eric Newcomer . I have liked being a tech reporter but

I really appreciate this post on Coinbase by Eric Newcomer. I have liked being a tech reporter but I often find other tech reporters myopic. Obviously, skepticism is a critical part of the journalist's stance, and when people are raising $15 million for an Uber but for basketweaving or creating a "juice press" that only squeezes a glorified Capri-Sun bag, that's worth calling out. Fine.

But tech journalists don't have much of an eye for real innovation and it's tedious. The number of tech journalists I know who still disdain podcasting in baffling. That alone.

You'd think it would be obvious by now that journalists would understand that when some engineers and designers make something so weird that you don't even see what the point of it is, it might be time to sit up and watch. Real innovation is often hard to make heads or tails of, because it's new.

But it honestly seems most of the time that journalists look at everything as if it were Uber but for basketweaving and have no idea how to tell when this time it might be bitcoin.

I applaud Newcomer for at least looking back and admitting that he got it wrong.

For those looking for a heuristic: If it's derivative, it's worth mocking. Even if it makes money it's not creative. If it's barely comprehensible and particularly if it intentionally eschews all known pathways for getting work done, pay attention. You don't need to laud it but there's no need to make fun of it. You might end up on a constant loop on YouTube for the rest of history.