Here's the winner of my (newly created) Best Quote Of The Week Award:

The best designers and the best programmers aren’t the ones with the best skills, or the nimblest fingers, or the ones who can rock and roll with photoshop or vim, they are the ones that can determine what just doesn’t matter.

From Signal vs. Noise, 37signals' blog.

Deep Resonance here - I could list a ton of examples from past projects, and the current trend towards Simpler Systems That Work makes me really happy.

I've been lucky to work for projects with hard deadlines (exhibitions, TV shows, etc.) where being (a bit) rushed helps in throwing irrelevant things out of the window.

But sometimes, despite all your efforts, some customers still keep their focus on the things that just don't matter. What's one to do then? Running away as soon as you can might be your best defense ;-)