I think he also may have gotten caught in the trap of early success. If you view projects as something where you need to surpass your previous work, surpassing

I think he also may have gotten caught in the trap of early success. If you view projects as something where you need to surpass your previous work, surpassing something like Citizen Kane, which consistently is named one of the best movies of all time, seems daunting. I can see why that could lead to the same sort of paralysis or the same problem of "only working on Big problems/projects" that Hamming mentions in the repeatedly linked here "You and your Research". (http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html http://www.cs.virginia.edu/~robins/YouAndYourResearch.html)