rc3.org

Strong opinions, weakly held

Month: August 2004 (page 8 of 8)

Yet another torture post

Digby has a post on the torture that took place at Gitmo. Difficult to stomach, but important not to ignore.

Great hackers

Eric Sink’s response to Paul Graham’s essay on the care and feeding of great hackers is worth the read. His point is that if being a great hacker means that you’re a prima donna, then many software companies are better off without great hackers. James Robertson’s response is also worth reading.

What’s up in Iraq

Jeanne D’Arc posts a useful update on what’s up in Iraq these days, at least based on media accounts. I also read an account of Robert Fisk’s three weeks spent in Iraq today, but I didn’t link to it because I was too depressed after I read it. Finally, I was talking to a real live person today who has been in Iraq for the past four months, working on IT issues for coalition forces in Iraq. He lives at the coalition base near the ruins of Babylon, and travels around south central Iraq working on satellite uplinks and that sort of thing. He said flat out that he didn’t see any way for Iraq to turn out OK after having been there. (Those aren’t his words, he said something equally plain but I can’t remember what it was.)

Update: here’s a link to the Fisk article. I’m never sure whether Robert Fisk’s talent is in making things seem more dismal than they actually are, or just as dismal as they actually are.

This one goes out to the Bush administration

I’d like to dedicate this song to Tom Ridge, George W Bush, and the rest of the Bush administration in light of this weekend’s terror warning.

Technorati mea culpa

Technorati CEO Dave Sifry has posted an apology and a promise to do better on his weblog in response to the deluge of recent criticism.

James Robertson responds

I said something kind of ugly about James Robertson and he responds here. Here’s his response:

It’s not a matter of hating C# or Java – I recognize them as rather large scale improvements over C++, the programming language from hell. What I’d like to see is less auto-decision making going on. Instead of “well of course we’ll use Java”, I’d like to see people actually think. I’ve seen people using EJB and three tier set ups for problems that could best be solved by Access, for instance. What I mostly object to the sheer volume of hammer/nail thinking in the IT industry.

It’s hard to argue with that.

The value of a computer

How does Sun figure out how the market values their computers? By selling them in no reserve auctions on eBay. That’s fascinating.

The case against Bush

This weekend Tim Bray posted a link to an Esquire article by Ron Reagan, The Case Against Bush, and after reading it, I feel like I no longer need to bother writing up my criticisms of the President. Reagan surveys President Bush’s record and behavior over the past four years, and forges it into a devastating indictment. So from now on when I encounter anyone speaking about Bush in a positive light, I can just send them a link to this article and save my energy for something else.

Newer posts

© 2025 rc3.org

Theme by Anders NorenUp ↑