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break things

Colloquial
/breɪk ˈθɪŋz/phrase (evasive)

Etym.From the imperative popularized in Silicon Valley startup culture, notably a 2010 internal memo titled 'Break Things', cited in Porter, Startup Ethos (2014).

A managerial slogan that rebrands negligent product launches as principled experimentation, thereby obscuring risk, accelerating release schedules, and deflecting accountability.

'Break things, then iterate' - Engineering All-Hands, Q2 2013

Appears in 2 haikus