Your opinion of yourself is only surpased by your monumental display of mastery of the English language.
sln On Sun, 25 May 2008 16:25:33 -0700 (PDT), "[EMAIL PROTECTED]" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: >For about the past 10 years, i have been concerned in the programing >community's level of education in social issues. > >I have found that recently, a news that would be of interest to >programers. > >There was a bet at longbets.org (run by Long Now Foundation) regarding >the importance of blogs. The bet was made in 2002. The prediction has >a resolution date in 2007. > >In 2008, the bet is resolved. See > >Decision: Blogs vs. New York Times (2008-02-01) by Alexander Rose > http://blog.longnow.org/2008/02/01/decision-blogs-vs-new-york-times/ > >I'd like encourage, for many of you, who have lots of opinions on >technical issues or social issues surrounding software, to make use of >longbets.org. It can help shape your thoughts from blog fart to >something more refined. In any case, your money will benefit society. > >here's some examples you could try: > > I bet that Java will be out of the top 10 programing languages by >2020. > > I bet that the top 10 programing languages in 2015 (as determined by >requirement from job search engine), the majority will be those >characterized as dynamic languages (e.g. php, perl, python, >javascript, tcl, lisp. (as opposed to: C, Java, C++, C#, F#, >Haskell)). > > You bet that Linux as a desktop system will or will not have a >market share of such and such by the year xyz. > >(I'm not sure the above predictions are candidates on longbets.org, >since one of their rule is that the predictions should be socially >important. Looking at existing entries on their site, the social >importance of the above items pale in comparison. (however, many of >their existing predictions are somewhat fringe)) > > * * * > >Note, in almost all online forums where tech geekers gather (e.g. >newsgroups, slashdot, irc, etc), often they are anonymous, each fart >ignorant cries and gripes and heated arguments, often in a >irresponsible and carefree way. > >One of the longbets.org's goal is to foster RESPONSIBILITY. > >In recent years, i have often made claims that the Python's >documentation, it's writing quality and its documentation quality in >whole, is one of the worst. > >Among all the wild claims in our modern world, from the sciences to >social or political issues, my claim about Python's technical writing >quality or its whole quality as a technical documentation, is actualy >trivial to verify by any standards. When presented to intellectuals of >the world at large, the claim's verifiability is trivial, almost as a >matter of fact checking (which are done by interns or newbie grads of >communinication/journalism/literature majors, working for journalism >houses). However, when i voiced my opinion on Python doc among >programing geekers online, it is often met with a bunch of wild cries. >Some of these beer drinking fuckheads are simply being a asshole, >which are expected by the nature of online tech geeking communities (a >significance percentage are bored young males). However, many others, >many with many years of programing experience as a professional, >sincerely tried to say something to the effect of in my opinion it's >good, or voice other stupid remarks to the effect of why don't you >fix it, and in fact find my claim, and its tone too fantastical, to >the point thinking i'm a youngling who are bent on to do nothing but >vandalism. (the tech geekers use in-group slang for this: troll.) > >The case of the Python doc is just one example. I have also, in the >past decade, in _appropriate_ online communties (e.g. newsgroups, >mailing lists), voiced opinions on Perl's doc, emacs's doc, criticism >on lisp nested syntax, software engineering issues (e.g. OOP), >various issues of jargons and naming (e.g. currying, lisp1 vs lisp2, >tail recursion, closure), emacs's user interface issues, criticism on >the phenomenon of Open Source community's fervor for bug reporting, >criticism on IT industry celebrities such as Larry Wall and Guido von >Rossum, opinions on cross-posting, ... and others. Some of my claims >are indeed controversial by nature. By that i mean that there is no >consensus on the subject among its experts, and the issue is complex, >and has political implications. However, many trivially verifiable, or >even simple facts, are wildly debated or raised a ruckus, because the >programers are utterly ignorant of basic social knowledge, or due to >their political banding (e.g. a language faction, Open Source) or >current trends and fashions (e.g. OOP, Java, Patterns, eXtreme >Programing, ... , OpenSource and Free software movement, ...). > >I think, the founding of Long Now Foundation with its longbets.org, >shares a concern i have on the tech geeking communities. In >particular, tech geekers need to have a broader education on social >sciences, needs to think in long term, and needs to foster personal >responsibility, when they act or voice opinions on their love of >technology. (note: not reading more motherfucking slashdot or >motherfucking groklaw or more great podcasts on your beatific language >or your postmodernistic fuckhead idols) > >(One thing you can do, is actually take a course on philosophy, >history, law, economics, in your local community college.) > >Disclaimer: I have no affiliation with Long Now Foundation. > > * * * > >See also: > >Responsible Software Licensing (2003-07) by Xah Lee > http://xahlee.org/UnixResource_dir/writ/responsible_license.html > >On Microsoft Hatred (2002-02-23) Xah Lee > http://xahlee.org/UnixResource_dir/writ/mshatred155.html > > Xah > [EMAIL PROTECTED] >? http://xahlee.org/ > >? -- http://mail.python.org/mailman/listinfo/python-list
