"We don't know what we're writing until it just comes out. We don't sit around crunching numbers"
About this Quote
The second sentence is the tell. “We don’t sit around crunching numbers” isn’t merely anti-math; it’s anti-committee, anti-focus group, anti-executive note. It implies that the people closest to the work are not, and should not be, the ones optimizing it for the market. That’s a pointed stance in late-20th-century TV culture, where “what works” is constantly measured, tested, and sanded down into familiar beats.
Subtextually, it’s also self-protection. If the work fails, it failed honestly; if it succeeds, it wasn’t engineered cynically. Diamond is drawing a line between authenticity and calculation, selling the messy mystery of making something people feel. Even if the industry is counting everything, he’s insisting the human part can’t be reduced to metrics.
Quote Details
| Topic | Writing |
|---|---|
| Source | Help us find the source |
| Cite |
Citation Formats
APA Style (7th ed.)
Diamond, Dustin. (2026, January 17). We don't know what we're writing until it just comes out. We don't sit around crunching numbers. FixQuotes. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-dont-know-what-were-writing-until-it-just-66973/
Chicago Style
Diamond, Dustin. "We don't know what we're writing until it just comes out. We don't sit around crunching numbers." FixQuotes. January 17, 2026. https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-dont-know-what-were-writing-until-it-just-66973/.
MLA Style (9th ed.)
"We don't know what we're writing until it just comes out. We don't sit around crunching numbers." FixQuotes, 17 Jan. 2026, https://fixquotes.com/quotes/we-dont-know-what-were-writing-until-it-just-66973/. Accessed 12 Feb. 2026.

