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Favorite Quotes of My Own

Posted by microtodd on Tuesday December 06 2016, @08:02PM (#2161)
7 Comments
/dev/random

I used to have a whiteboard by my desk, and whenever a particularly witty and insightful comment was made I would write it down. Here are some of my favorites:

  • Sometimes you just need to write the dang if statement!

    (Wasn't until a few years later that I saw Ken Thompson's quote about brute force)

  • Ugly code is ok, as long as its wrapped and hidden in the library modules.

  • Once you document a kludge, its no longer a kludge.

  • The most dangerous thing to say during a project is, "Wouldn't it be cool if..."

Then of course, some of my favorite quotes, that I actually ascribe to, even to this day:

  • The first attempt is always wrong. You must iterate towards the best possible solution, not try to get it on the first try.

    — Matt Bilotti

  • A cardinal, fundamental law of programming: It’s harder to read code than to write it.

    — Joel Spolsky .... which leads us to:

  • Debugging is twice as hard as writing code. Therefore if you write code as cleverly as possible you are not smart enough to debug it.

    — Brian Kernighan

  • Speed of iteration beats quality of iteration.

    — John Boyd ... which leads us to:

  • Move fast and break things. Unless you are breaking stuff, you are not moving fast enough.

    — Mark Zuckerberg

Trump and Duterte's Drug War Bromance

Posted by takyon on Sunday December 04 2016, @01:52AM (#2158)
6 Comments

Favorite Quotes from Memorable Books

Posted by microtodd on Saturday November 19 2016, @02:51AM (#2149)
10 Comments
/dev/random

The most memorable quotes from books that stick out in my mind, the ones that literally caused me chills or to gasp out loud:

"They're dirty, they're all dirty. The entire Five Squad."

"Fire." Enough energy shot out the side of the dreadnought to destroy a small moon, and Battlecruiser Division One ceased to exist.

She did not know what was more satisfying: the sound of a dozen swords drawn as one or the look on his face.

What are some of yours?

Retrospective

Posted by microtodd on Wednesday November 16 2016, @09:51PM (#2142)
3 Comments
/dev/random

Ever look back at your comment history and think, geez why was I being such an asshole?

Some BBC Election Stories

Posted by takyon on Tuesday November 08 2016, @05:04PM (#2130)
18 Comments

Oculus VR vs ZeniMax

Posted by takyon on Monday October 31 2016, @10:55PM (#2122)
0 Comments
Business

Oculus VR made "factually inaccurate" statements in ZeniMax lawsuit, forensic analyst says

A recently-granted motion in the lawsuit between ZeniMax Media and Oculus VR suggests that the case could be about to get very interesting, and not in a way that's good for Oculus. The motion to "permit disclosure of any 'demonstrably inaccurate' representations made to court," as reported by Polygon, indicates that an independent expert investigating the case found sworn statements that are "factually incorrect," and that "critical log files" on one of John Carmack's hard drives were deleted prior to its collection as evidence.

I'm too lazy to give this one the research needed to produce a coherent submission, since I haven't been following the case.

Sasha Disses Barack on Snapchat

Posted by takyon on Thursday October 27 2016, @05:02PM (#2119)
4 Comments
/dev/random

I'm taking away your Air Force One privileges.

President Obama ridiculed on Snapchat by daughter Sasha

The president also mentioned that his own iPhone was limited to receiving emails and browsing the internet, and would not take photos, play music or make calls. "My rule has been throughout my presidency, that I assume that someday, some time, somebody will read this email," he said. "So, I don't send any email that at some point won't be on the front page of the newspapers."

US election 2016: Indians' verdict on Donald Trump's Hindi

An uncanny mixture: God, alcohol and even cannabis

A Stray: Finding and filming the real Somali immigrant experience

The Skype sex scam - a fortune built on shame

In pictures: Living off-grid

Posted by takyon on Tuesday October 25 2016, @11:27PM (#2117)
11 Comments

John Oliver Pinpoints Fake Opioid Crisis Statistic

Posted by takyon on Tuesday October 25 2016, @07:52AM (#2115)
0 Comments
News

John Oliver Pinpoints A Fake Statistic That Fueled The Opioid Crisis

In John Oliver’s latest segment on opioids during Last Week Tonight, he pulled up one of the key statistics pharmaceutical salespeople used to market prescription opioids to doctors in the 1990s: Less than 1 percent of patients taking opioids become addicted to painkillers. That figure is completely inaccurate, of course, and as Oliver points out, it has a disturbing origin story.

Facebook Employees Argued for Censorship of Mr. Trump

Posted by takyon on Saturday October 22 2016, @09:58PM (#2112)
6 Comments
Digital Liberty

Somebody got triggered.

Facebook Employees Pushed to Remove Trump’s Posts as Hate Speech

Some of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s posts on Facebook have set off an intense debate inside the social media company over the past year, with some employees arguing certain posts about banning Muslims from entering the U.S. should be removed for violating the site’s rules on hate speech, according to people familiar with the matter.

The decision to allow Mr. Trump’s posts went all the way to Facebook Inc. Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg, who ruled in December that it would be inappropriate to censor the candidate, according to the people familiar with the matter. That decision has prompted employees across the company to complain on Facebook’s internal messaging service and in person to Mr. Zuckerberg and other managers that it was bending the site’s rules for Mr. Trump, and some employees who work in a group charged with reviewing content on Facebook threatened to quit, the people said.

Facebook employees argued Trump's posts should be banned as hate speech