Good Enough

Years ago, my then boss asked me to find a good wysiwyg editor. After a bit of research, I found one that I thought would meet all of our needs.
It had even come in second in a ranking of CMS tools (by CFDJ, if memory serves). I told my boss my conclusion and even tossed in the part about it coming in second in this ranking (not a particularly heavy influence, but it helped my case). To this, I got an interesting response.
He said, "Second!? We don't want the second best. We want the best!"
It took me a second to respond to this. As it was, the product I was recommending was a wysisyg editor which met all of our needs and could be placed on any given web site for free (albeit with a somewhat limited - though still adequate - feature set). The product which had come in first was a much more expensive solution (if I recall correctly, a full-blown CMS system costing well upwards of $1000).
The thinking of my boss on wanting the "best" simply wasn't a helpful perspective. We just needed something that met our needs.
This is the concept of "Good Enough" and it actually has fairly wide applications.
This was brought to my mind by an article I just read in the latest CFDJ by Hal Helms. He made the point that (true or not) the branding of ColdFusion and its competitors (he mentions Java and C#) is that ColdFusion isn't as fast, secure, or scalable as C# and Java.
He argues that we should spend less time trying to defend against these attacks and more time promoting what ColdFusion is better at than its competition (quickly building quality applications that are easy to modify and maintain - resulting in a better user experience).
I think this is a good point. Is ColdFusion as fast and scalable (security is a developer issue) as C# and Java? Maybe not. Is it fast and scalable enough for the vast majority of projects? Yes. It is fast enough for now and unless your site is wildly successful (MySpace or better), it is fast enough and scalable enough for the future as well.
This reminds me of  a car add I saw years ago. The add pointed to the low-cost of the vehicle, its gas efficiency, and high safety rating. As to speed, the add said that the car would easily go as fast as the law allows. The point was, it certainly wasn't as fast as a sports car, but it was fast enough. The other features more than made up for its lack of extra speed.
I was reminded of this as well when I saw someone mention that they would like a list of the top 100 ColdFusion developers to help them when doing hiring. The thing is, you don't need one of the top 100 (and if such a list existed, it would make everyone on it an expensive hire). You just need someone who can do what you need. It may even happen that your particular needs aren't best met by the particular skills of someone on a "top 100" list.
Just some food for thought.