Originally Posted by Runner 1

Haha, good one! With 10,000 hours I could design my own language, write an interpreter, write a JIT compiler, document it, optimize it, write a book about it, and still have 9,000 hours left.

Seriously though, I believe that at the very highest levels of talent (world-class) there is a genetic component.

However, I've come up with my own rule that I have never found to be false: any person of average ability can become better than 99% of everyone else simply by hard work.

For the remaining 1% you may need some talent, but until that point, it's all hard work.