> Notch his success has nothing to do with being good at programming.

To me, being able to sell (not give away, charge) thirteen million applications that you write is a testament that you are good at programming.

Now, "programming" has many different dimensions, but Notch achieved something that very, very few developers will ever able to achieve in their lifetime (I'd argue he's actually the only solo programmer who's ever been able to achieve such a goal, beating even icons such as John Carmack).