37 Signals is selling an ebook, Getting Real, from their Signals vs. Noise blog. 37 Signals used the very same process that they wrote about in Getting Real, to launch Ruby on Rails and other web applications. Mark Bernstein sees the success of the publication of Getting Real as a watershed moment for self-publishing on the web. He notes that 37 Signals sold 1750 copies of Getting Real on the first day.

What is Getting Real all about, anyway? In the introduction to Getting Real (pdf), 37 Signals writes:

Getting Real is about skipping all the stuff that represents real (charts, graphs, boxes, arrows, schematics, wireframes, etc.) and actually building the real thing.

Getting Real is less. Less mass, less software, less features, less paperwork, less of everything that’s not essential (and most of what you think is essential actually isn’t).

Getting Real is staying small and being agile.

Getting Real starts with the interface, the real screens that people are going to use. It begins with what the customer actually experiences and works backwards from there. This lets you get the interface right before you get the software wrong.

Hmmm, I think I never got unreal, in the first place. I started with the interface out of necessity, since I started out designing web pages. I worked backwards from there, as I learned how to make web forms functional and how to make web data dynamic. I’ve only ever programmed very small web applications, each one intended for just one purpose. I’ve never been required to do more or learned how to do more. Could it be that everyone who starts programming on the web, in the first place, already naturally follows the Getting Real process, because they never learned how to do it any other way? Not sure, but the Getting Real book – and 37 Signals’ success with publishing it on their blog – are both very interesting.

I can’t help but wonder, if I read Getting Real, will I therefore be getting less real or more real? If I’m already real, and I then read Getting Real, I’ll be focusing on the representation, the text, of getting real. I won’t actually be getting real, during the act of reading. Subsequent to the act of reading, I could return to being real, or I could learn how to get real, for the first time. If I were already real, I would have gained nothing from the reading, other than a reinforcement of what I’m already doing. If I’m only partially real, I could improve. If I’m not real yet, I could learn how to get real. Yet, wouldn’t it be even more real not to read the book at all – to just do it? But what if I don’t know what I’m doing? So then I could help myself by turning to a representation of what somebody else is doing. But wait a moment. That’s a representation – just what I’m supposed to be turing away from, if I’m really getting real.