Steve Ells Quotes

Few ideas work on the first try. Iteration is key to innovation.

I think it's almost impossible to edit something to death. I think you can make things better almost indefinitely.

I love recreating, and I love elevating - anything I do I want do ten times better every time.

The hardest thing in the world to do is to take something everyone already knows and make it a little better.

Arts and sciences are not cast in a mould, but are found and perfected by degrees, by often handling and polishing.

I write a melody and then change it and change it until I get it the way I like it.

Part of creating is understanding that there is always more to do; nothing is ever completely finished.

You can always improve on something, the technology is different today, but I would leave it well alone. If there was something that was incomplete, that might be interesting... because I do that on my website.

People can come to me, and no matter how expert they are, I can virtually always see a way of doing something better.

Normal people … believe that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Engineers believe that if it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.

You don't always have to start over to create an emotional reaction to your product. It's always powerful to deliver a breakthrough, but there's also a true art to making something great even better.

I just try to improve every series.

The one thing you don't want to do is go off and keep rewriting. If something's not quite right, it's often about modulating what's already there.

Most work is not coming up with The Next Big Thing. Rather, it's improving the thing you already thought of six months - or six years - ago. It's the work of work.

Failing is part of my process. A new bit never works the first time. I figure I have to bomb 7 times to make it good. So I tweak it.

I mean, we're always trying to evaluate and tweak things and get better.

There's no good idea that can't be improved on.

I wouldn't say I'm a very original thinker, but if I have a good experience with something, I'll want to take it further or adapt it in some way.

In trying to make something new, half the undertaking lies in discovering whether it can be done. Once it has been established that it can, duplication is inevitable.

I just find things that work and embellish them.

Luxury, not necessity, is the mother of invention. Every artifact is somewhat wanting in its function, and that is what drives its evolution.

When you're doing a TV show, it's not like you just shoot for six weeks and you're in an editing room with all of your footage. It's like a guitar or a car, you have to fine tune things. You stop doing what's not working, you work on what is working and you add things that do work.

I always treat each take as a rehearsal for the next take. That way you can find stuff and keep adding and playing until they tell me to stop.

Life is pretty simple: You do some stuff. Most fails. Some works. You do more of what works. If it works big, others quickly copy it. Then you do something else. The trick is the doing something else.

Nothing is invented and perfected at the same time.