The cost of bad takes

There is no cost to being wrong on the internet. Pick a bold take on Twitter, LinkedIn or any other social network. For example this one:

There will be no programmers in 5 years.

There are no repercussions to the author or any damage to their credibility if in 5 years there are still programmers. However, if indeed there are no programmers in 5 years, they will be cheered as a visionary. People have a short memory for bad takes, or foresight. The more takes are made, the higher the chance of one being right. This affects the incentives of being conservative about predictions. If there’s no downside of being wrong, one might as well have as many takes as possible. Eventually one will be right.