Reflection and refraction

I want to preface this by saying I really didn't want to have to write this post.

For the last couple days, I've been reading "The Lexus and the olive tree" by Thomas Friedman. Yes, the guy who was wrong so frequently they named a unit of measurement after him.
For the lazy, the Friedman Unit is "six months from now. And then six months after that. And then six months after that, forever." In reference to when America would win our war against Terror. Any day now!
I need to take regular breaks from the book, because I've been trying to decide if Friedman is a a really shitty writer, or just plain ol' dumb.

The problem I'm running into is that some of his viewpoints are actually . . . pretty good. Stuff I agree with. Things that seem to make sense. And then he runs right off the rails and starts telling half-baked stories about imagined conversations with nation states or world leaders, and I hate everything to my eyeballs. At the very least, being presented the Easy Reader version of global finance does Not fill me with confidence about the depth of this man's thought on the subject matter.

Since the book is from 1999, a few chapters are morbidly hilarious in retrospect. Like when he spends much ink praising establishments such as Moody's as regards to issuing ratings, and lambasting governments that do not allow such hallowed institutions to deliver Judgement upon their financial products. Because Moody's will Obviously perform their function in a fair and accurate manner in all instances. Capitalism and globalization are the way to infinite prosperity! So to join the global community, you must get their stamp of approval.
Capitalism forever!

One other side effect of globalization is driving down wages for unskilled labor. Stuff that can be outsourced will be . . . well, outsourced. Friedman is OK with this, as he imagines a world where the now unemployed will take the time to train up and learn more advanced skills to get higher paying jobs.


No. This will not happen.

I understand that I'm about to shit right in the the American Dream, but I'm not being paid enough to lie to you people. Right now, I could take a job as a janitor. I have had this job before, and I rather liked it.
If some janitor magically saved enough cash to get a couple years of schooling, there is next to zero chance that they can become a programmer. Sorry, them's the breaks. That janitor, after several years of schooling, is most likely to be, at best, a shitty programmer. Those are the ones who get fired for "not meeting expectations." This isn't just a programming thing, they're likely not going to be a surgeon, engineer, physicist, or anything else. They'll just be chronically unemployed.

If this sounds dickish or arrogant, here's something to make that worse: I get at least a couple job offers a week. I'm not even looking. I am an Average programmer. There are so few people that can do this kind of stuff that I've never in my adult life had to seriously worry about employment. I am extremely grateful for this kind of freedom, but I've also worked enough shitty jobs that I know what it's like to be one paycheck from getting evicted for several years on end. If it Can be outsourced, it Will be.

Hell, call center and IT jobs are just sort of starting to come back to the U.S. and we had it easy. If I was a welder or worked in manufacturing I would be even more pissed about this trend. But I don't think it's going to change.

So, if the jobs are getting shuffled around, everyone's wages are going into the toilet, and re-training isn't a reasonable option for enough people, then what's next?

I'm not sure. Universal income sounds somewhat appealing, but I haven't done my homework there yet. Socialism is still a Very Naughty Word in America, so that's right out. Maybe some good old fashioned rioting in the streets? I could be up for that.

The three questions. With answers!

Almost every person I am introduced to on a casual basis eventually ends up asking me the following 3 questions. If you don't want to read the whole thing, the answers are "probably", "yes", and "why?"
I Know Stuff about computers. I have been known to work as a programmer, and on the occasions when I get to talk shop with other nerds, it seems like we're all getting variations of these questions from a lot of people.
So! As a public service, here are the questions a lot of you people have, and my|the answers.

Question 1) Can you fix my computer?
Probably? This is actually a really, really complicated question, and it's loaded like it's auditioning for the next Expendables movie. Part of the problem is that civilians have no idea whatso-fucking-ever how or why computers work. Seriously. The kids who have grown up all their lives with the things aren't really much better than grandma in the nursing home when it comes to understanding how their laptop does Stuff. This makes any repair work a shit-ton more difficult, because the patient can't give you much useful information (if any.)
Whatever's going wrong could be hardware, could be software, could be a virus, or could be a couple programs engaged in a pissing match that is breaking how things are expected to work (I am looking at you, Chrome and Kaspersky Antivirus.) Also, the user is a fucking liar, every time, whether they know it or not. "Have you been going to shady porn sites?" The answer to this one is always "No!" So I don't bother asking anymore.
"Have you done any software updates recently?" The answer to this is always "Uhh?" and here's where I get to spend 10 hours dicking around trying to figure out what has changed or what could be causing any problems. Basically, unless you dropped the thing, you can't tell me anything useful, so I get to play computer detective to piece together what went off the rails. And! If I can't figure it out, users assume that I don't actually Know About Computers. Hey slapnuts, if you had been able to tell me that the wi-fi LED on your keyboard wasn't working, I could have figured this out a couple days ago. I'm not even a hardware dude, half of that stuff is a mystery to me too. I just learned enough to have a general idea of what questions to ask and where to get the answers.

Question 2) Can you hack things?
Whenever someone asks this, they always have the same expression as someone telling a nigger joke in a neighborhood where a black person may be present. Shifty eyes, slightly guilt-ridden, like a kid with their hand in the cookie jar. They want to know if I have the ability to Take Over their Shit. Hacking is some top level skill that is only possessed by elite code grinding motherfuckers. If I can do this, I am a Badass.
In short: you have been lied to by Hollywood. Hacking a system or computer isn't some super-secret code ninja task, all you do is call Janine in H.R. and tell her you're in I.T. and doing some network testing so you need her password. Log on as her, and you're in. BAM! You are now a hacker.
Sorry, it's less sexy than all the movies made it seem.
There's more to it, obviously, but seriously people, stop asking me if I'm a criminal.

Question 3) Why aren't you rich?
After being around people for a while, they see the computer knowledge and assume that I should be focused on maximizing my dollars per hour, and that does not seem to line up with how I spend my money and time. If you are reading this, there is a very good chance that you've used some stuff I wrote, or it's part of a thing you use all the time. It follows that I should then own several islands and have girls in hula skirts bringing me drinks at all hours of the day.
Well. The second part is obviously true. If I had to boil down the answer to this, it's that there are a very limited number of positions that pay crazy-town money for code, and I don't want to work at most of those places. Right now, I make enough money to do whatever the hell I want, whenever I want to, so, what would I use more money for? Money is something you trade for stuff you want, and I've got what I want. I have enough extra left over to take care of just about anything that comes up, so I don't feel a need to stockpile the stuff. I get to spend more time with my friends and learning other cool things, rather than grinding away on some startup project for 80 hours a week or beating my head against the wall solving some machine learning problem that I don't find interesting in the least.
It's an ongoing thing. If my job becomes awful, I can get another one. If I'm interested in some side project, I'm happy to throw some time at it. The money isn't what it's about, if I need more, I can make more, but right now, I'm very happy with what I have and where I am. More cash ain't gonna change that.

I sincerely hope you all paid for this

By request, the preface to my non-existent memoirs.

Hello monsters.
If you are reading this, I would like to take this opportunity to mention a few things up front.
1) All this stuff did happen. I am not James Frey. I do not need to tart up a lifetime of Poor Impulse Control and bad decisions with falsehoods to appear interesting. I am arrogant enough to know damn well I experienced things others will wish to read about without resorting to Bullshit.
2) Names and certain details have been modified to obscure the identities of persons living and dead. I don't want others to suffer retribution for being associated with me, and I most definitely do not want any of those assholes receiving accolades or free drinks. I'm the one doing the writing here.
3) If you are familiar with proofs and/or logic, and have noticed the contradiction in the above two items, and intend to complain about it; award yourself a Pedantic Dickweed badge, and then kill yourself.

In the event that I am still alive, I will endeavor to do better in the future. Probably.
In the event that I am now dead, you have missed your opportunity to be a Participant. You may atone for this in the manner of your choosing.

The events that follow are the result of a particular mixture of: a high pain tolerance, fondness towards alcohol, and a burning desire to answer the question "I wonder what that's like?" It necessarily follows that the events which I record here for posterity are occasionally illegal, immoral, unkind, or just plain ol' dumb. The only cautionary note I can leave are the words of Hunter S. Thompson: "I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me."

Chapter 1: Necrophilia becomes a felony offense in my home state, and I am very sad about this.

History, ashheaps, resignation

A view I've talked about with increasing frequency as of late is, what I sincerely hope to be viewing at the moment: the demise and dissolution of the Republican party in America.

From where I'm standing, it appears that without some large-scale restructuring of the party, the Republicans are caught between a rock and a dumb place, and this will provide increasingly smaller returns for their investment until they are (finally) regulated to a position of being mute, irrelevant, and shuffled from the political state. Or something like that. The hysteric thrashing of the Tea Party jerkoffs provides a strong signal that some for of change is required within, but my money is solidly behind the theory that being louder and more crass is not a winning combination. Cannibalizing the party with ideological purity tests where the losers are thrown out for being insufficiently vile isn't going to bring more voters into the big tent. Rather than win a race against a Democrat to pick up a seat, a vocal chunk of the right wing is now getting people ostensibly on their side tossed out of office, and replaced with rabies-infested lunatics.

This strongly mirrors the "Red Queen" scenario oft-cited by people who do not understand evolutionary biology, and which we get to view whenever a longstanding institution is sufficiently threatened to the point where the goons in charge lose their fucking minds and do whatever it takes to "win" by destroying an opponent, rather than relying on their own merit. I've seen first-hand evidence of the tactics the right now must resort to: collecting donations for "progressive causes" that are then funneled to the NRA, misrepresenting their causes in attempts to steal credibility, and just outright fucking lying to everyone who can hear them. These are not methods employed by an organization that expects to win on the strength of its ideas.

This is a process that is dreary and familiar to science, to the point where a new theory is generally accepted once all of the old guard has had the common courtesy to finally just die off, and a new generation grows up unhampered by the follies of their elders' viewpoints.
Or, to put it more bluntly: stupid fuckers are going to keep being stupid fuckers, and will fight to the bitter end to defend their backwards ideas. They money shot from that article, by the way is the following: "Thurmond never explicitly renounced his earlier views on racial segregation. [...]  'When Strom Thurmond ran for president, [Mississippi] voted for him. We're proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn't have had all these problems over the years, either.' Lott was ousted as Senate Majority Leader." Usually, you just have to wait for the old sons of bitches to die. They ain't gonna see reason.


Seeing more vocal screeds and overly dramatic action by an increasingly smaller population of 'conservatives' looks to me very much like the final collapse of a wounded beast thrashing at anything within reach.

Girls can't compete in sports

Uh, unless you're Kacy Catanzaro. I'm a fan of Ninja Warrior for the same reason I like the Dark Souls games: I enjoy stuff that is difficult and will crush the spirit of the vast majority of people who attempt it.
Kacy completely fucking wrecks the Ninja Warrior course, which regularly destroys professional athletes, overzealous amateurs, and people at the height of physical fitness. And she's like 5'0". Watch this, it is awesome:



Kacy's performance is so good, it made me attempt to fix the stupid default widths that clip the edges of embedded YouTube videos which resulted in a new template thanks to Blogger being brain dead. The view works fine on my laptop, I'll get around to checking non-widescreen stuff . . . eventually.

By request, a diatribe on technological acumen as opposed to an MBA

This, I feel, is a natural reaction to the silly horseshit startup brogrammer culture, and, if I am lucky, a potential heads-up to young nerds lest they defile themselves unnecessarily with Nonsense.

During my regular media baths, I have come to conclude that one of the more lucrative and valuable job skill sets currently available is "MBA + technical programming ability." On paper, this sounds fantastic from an H.R. standpoint - you can hire someone to do business things, who can also add value to your software-product with sagelike recommendations and helping out by writing a fair bit of code at crunch time. A perfect natural fit for a Project Manager or Product Manager type position, allowing your company to dominate the market and devastate the balance sheets of any competing product/service.

To be sure, any tech oriented business would be delighted to hire such an individual, and a startup would be pleased indeed to have another 0.5 developer on board.

And therein lies the problem.

I am an adequate programmer. This is as close as you fuckers will get to modesty from me, but I will begrudgingly allow the point to stand. I know many devs that are far more talented than I am, and do not have the time/motivation/financial incentive to hone those skills further at the moment. That said, I have made a lot of companies and people a shocking amount of money over The Internet with the skills that I have.
On the other hand, being "adequate" by my standards, is apparently a much higher bar than it is for the rest of the semi-retarded jackasses programming for money these days. If you doubt the Truth of that statement, find a programmer, and ask about the quality of any code they've seen from any other developer. Alternately, wait until you see the next hacking or "website does not work" story on the news.

The skills it takes to write a properly functioning algorithm for a piece of software Do Not translate well to the field of Business. The Business wants a new product to sell. Out the door. Now. A Programmer, would like (ideally) to produce a perfect piece of software, one that functions without bugs, runs quickly, and satisfies all needs of the user.
Here, we see the problem writ large: Programmers will immediately see the clusterfuck implied by the above paragraph. Business people will Not.

There is no way to resolve this.

Some Clever Dicks in the audience may use Fog Creek as a counter example here, and to them I say "get fucked." They are a very rare software shop, and that is why they are notable. Look at every other program or app you have installed or use, and note the percentage that is Fog Creek stuff.

Fundamentally, we are looking at a different set of skills. MBA people have learned how to work in and maintain a business. Programmers know how to optimize algorithms and write FizzBuzz (hopefully.) As a Product Manager, I've released stuff that has bugs in it, with the reasoning that "no one should notice this" because we needed to Ship. As a programmer, I got very drunk that night, because I hated myself, my job, the entire industry, and anything that would put me in the position to add to the mountain of shit that constitutes all software.

So, we Released an update. And people used it. And some people complained. But the business made (more) money, so it was the Right Thing To Do.

We come to the synthesis of the piece: This is why being an MBA + technical skills is an incredibly valuable skill set. Very, very few people have both. There needs to be a person to release new stuff when it's perfect (to satisfy the Programmers. Which will never happen.) and can be released yesterday (to satisfy the MBAs. Which will never happen.) Perfect cannot happen yesterday, and neither goal is attainable. Being able to strike the balance between the unattainable, and have the extensive knowledge of both sides to be certain you're right? That's the billion dollar skill set. On the whole, I would rather advise people to concentrate their efforts into one field or the other, and do well in an arena that they enjoy.

A collection of short things

1) Google, stop being a bitch about the browser I use. You have millions of dollars and many developers. I have a preference for a much better browser than Chrome. Live with it, and stop throwing up passive aggressive warnings. Everything works well enough in Opera. I am not a moron, and can deal with the things that do not do so out of the box.

2) I was going to write something up on Brendan Eich & Mozilla during that short lived shitstorm, but I am lazy and didn't get around to it. Suffice it to say that the dude supports some ignorant bullshit, and I am completely OK with people shitting on FireFox once he got the top spot at Mozilla.
Seriously. If the story had come out that Eich was against miscegenation, he would have been shown the door immediately. It's not OK to hate gay people. It is not OK to throw money at campaigns to deny them the same rights as other people. When you get caught doing stuff like this, then you really do deserve an awful response from the public.

3) Mozilla doubles down on stupid fucking ideas! Every time I see something pop up about Rust, I get a tiny hit of sweet, sweet schadenfreude. Write code is hard. Working on a large scale project is also hard.
Throwing away years of bug fixes is fantastically stupid. Not learning your god damned lessons the first time around is borderline retarded. There's a reason that Joel article is titled "Things you should never do". For a quick example, do this exercise: list all of the 1.0 versions of software that were awesome, bug free, and worked well out of the box.
I will helpfully provide the answer: that number is zero. More galling is the fact that those goofballs managed to lose the last browser war by doing this exact same thing. And now, they're going to use a  new language to rewrite a chunk (or all) of their browser? Jesus christ.

4) Moar bitcoin suicides plz. People hanging themselves over fake internets money puts the biggest smile on my face.