A pitfall of "Inventing on Principle", one which I believe Victor himself later noted, is that the talk is really a modest statement on what bringing some philosophy into your work could do, but it has an overwhelmingly engaging demo. Everyone tried to copy the demo in a kind of "wave of the future next gen programming" hype cycle instead of taking home the concept and trying to put that into work they were already doing.
And, having been one of those impressed with the demo, now I look back on it thinking "this business of software is cargo-culting the whole way down, isn't it."
And, having been one of those impressed with the demo, now I look back on it thinking "this business of software is cargo-culting the whole way down, isn't it."