An Open Letter to Scott Hanselman

Hi Scott,

My name’s Jason, you don’t know me, we’ve never met.

I was inspired by your honesty and openness when talking about your experience with cancer to say the following:

Thanks.

I don’t think that there has been a single week in recent years where I haven’t either read some of your words or heard your voice on one of your many audio endeavours (This Developers Life is hugely inspiring by the way).

There is a lot of meanness on the internets. The way you handle yourself is an antidote to that. It inspires me to try and always be kind, or at the least not to respond to meanness with meanness.

Maybe in our industry we have a greater number of introverts, we work with logic and code, sometimes we forget that we and others are human beings too…

Putting yourself out there is a daunting thing for most of us: there is a huge fear of being wrong or looking foolish. I almost didn’t write this because of a fear of looking too “soft” or “touchy feely” or sounding like an “ass kisser”, but I decided to go beyond that fear and write anyway.

Thanks for the continued inspiration.

Thanks for the knowledge.

Thanks for promoting kindness.

It is my sincere wish that kind words such as these become more common on the Internet, and that the above words contribute in some small way to help you, your family and friends through this difficult time.

Best wishes,

Jason.

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