A Generation Lost in the Bazaar (2012)
Cathedrals are beautiful. They represent the vision of one person or a very small group made real by the hard work of hundreds or thousands of skilled and semi-skilled workers over dozens of years.<p>Cathedrals are not, generally speaking, profitable. They represent the expenditure of lots of capital over a long period of time.<p>Bazaars don&#x27;t cost much to start. You can start quite small and have a functioning system that does useful things for people. They can grow quite large, and when they grow too large it becomes difficult to find exactly what you want without a really good map. But you can probably quickly find a bunch of things that are more or less close to what you want.<p>Cathedrals are not easy or cheap to repair, but the investment is so large that people usually prefer to repair them. A bazaar that doesn&#x27;t work out makes some local people sad, but they will go to another bazaar that is a little less convenient for them, and perhaps do better there.<p>It&#x27;s nice to have some cathedrals, because they feed the soul. But you need to eat every day, so there will always be bazaars, and if you need to make a choice, the bazaar is going to win unless you have a lot of resources stored up to fall back on.