David Crane Quotes

The best way to figure out how something works is to try to build it from scratch.

The problem is, in software design, often the consequences of your decisions don't become apparent for years.

I have an architecture degree; that's what my college degree is in. And that sucked. I started doing Web and CD-ROM development really early on, and then that grew into being an art director and doing advertising work.

I don't understand computers. I've been unable to construct a working mental model of how they do what they do. I can break software by looking at it. I can blow anything up. Without trying. It's sort of like being a dowser. And this extreme elaborate clumsiness on my part is actually something people will pay me for. It's quite wonderful.

Macintosh felt like a system. As I learned more, I felt like I was able to guess how new things would work. I felt like the bugs in my programs were more my bugs and not things I misunderstood.

I originally had opened the studio in New York to combine my two loves, music and design. And we created videos and packaging for many musicians that you know, and for even more that you've never heard of. As I realized, just like with many, many things in my life that I actually love, I adapt to it. And I get, over time, bored by them.

I could never understand how to build a computer, but the best I could hope for is to understand the people that do.

I had almost rewritten all of the display code for windows, and that was when I gave up.

You can’t really understand the challenges involved with any major tech project until you start trying to build it.

My dad was an electrical engineer.

When things that normally work aren't working, you have to go to something else.

Modern PCs are horrible. ACPI is a complete design disaster in every way. But we're kind of stuck with it. If any Intel people are listening to this and you had anything to do with ACPI, shoot yourself now, before you reproduce.

Science can amuse and fascinate us all, but it is engineering that changes the world.

Whether driven by ambition or circumstance, every career gets disrupted.

We're at a moment where people are rediscovering their ability to design, to create (engineer)and in essence, to become a true maker.

If in physics there's something you don't understand, you can always hide behind the uncharted depths of nature. You can always blame God. You didn't make it so complex yourself. But if your program doesn't work, there is no one to hide behind. You cannot hide behind an obstinate nature. If it doesn't work, you've messed up.

You make alterations, affecting your pose, a new house, a new car, a new job, a new nose.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate these young [Israeli] designers. There's too much strife in the world. If we become united in our creativity, not only in what we wear, but what we do, we will change the world. It's truly an honor to be around such inspiration.

How good the design is doesn't matter near as much as whether the design is getting better or worse. If it is getting better, day by day, I can live with it forever. If it is getting worse, I will die.

Engineering is the application of scientific principles toward practical ends. If the engineering isn't practical, it's bad engineering.

Professors typically spend their time in meetings about planning, policy, proposals, fund-raising, consulting, interviewing, traveling, and so forth, but spend relatively little time at their drawing boards. As a result, they lose touch with the substance of their rapidly developing subject. They lose the ability to design; they lose sight of what is essential; and they resign themselves to teach academically challenging puzzles.

I'm ex-player, ex-technical director, ex-coach, ex-manager, ex-honorary president. A nice list that once again shows that everything comes to an end.

I'd dropped out of college to start design thing.

I'd had a belly-full of being subservient. I had to find something else to do, and I did. I went to the animation houses. I went to new fields.

We will have to decide today whether we will design the future or resign ourselves to it.