So what would your quote be, if you were being interviewed by a business magazine about how it is that your company has been so successful even though none of your management team has a background in business?
"We've made some good choices, I think, and we've been fortunate. This is a new area, both in our experiences, and in the broader business context, but I think we're learning quickly. Ideally we won't be repeating any mistakes."
And that's a nice way of trying to dress up "we made lucky guesses" and "we're still trying to figure out what we're doing," but I don't see that as building confidence in the business world since it still admits those not-so-flattering truths. Particularly with that last sentence, which reeks of uncertainty in its tacit admission that not only were mistakes made, but that you might still repeat them.
I could point out that it's pretty typical PR speak, and the interviewers in those magazines aren't typically looking to gotcha-trap interviewees, and it has advantages of being humble and honest, and the mistakes mentioned in the last sentence could just as easily be someone else's mistakes. But I think I'll leave you to your false dichotomy, hope you enjoy it.
Thinking about this, it's actually not a terrible day at the plate for Gygax. He's one for three with a single: gamers are competitive. Reading the book, I did get the sense that, if there were prestige or money at stake, Gygax and Arneson would have fought over just about anything were they to have to share it. If they were allowed to split $0.05 for every cat without a tail in the Midwest, they would've argued over (with each other and through proxies) what a cat was, how much of a tail needed to be docked for it to be docked, and what states were really in the Midwest. I also suspect that Gygax would've gone out docking tails in his spare time while this argument was ongoing. They're both kind of vicious and petty. Which is, I suppose, just to say I found a lot of the book deeply unpleasant.
I'll go ahead and point out that the "we" in the "hopefully we won't be repeating any mistakes" owns the mistakes (i.e. you're speaking as a group rather than as yourself), so we can easily dismiss the rather baffling "someone else's mistakes" idea. Likewise, your idea that the business media is somehow forgiving of the people it interviews is...well, what can I say except that you're a sweet summer child. Doubly so for the idea that "humble" is an advantage in marketing without "-brag" at the end (and as for "honest," Gygax's original statement is just as honest in that it's his opinion, the same as yours, so I don't know what points you think you're earning there).
I wish I could go back and read the 3 books (so far) for the first time again.
I liked Faded Sun better than Cyteen, it was less opaque
It expanded, so now it's going to be 4 books, Alecto, the alleged final book, arrives
