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Rah-PM 2012

Michael Vick was able to do his time, pay his debt to society, and return to a productive life. If some people had their way, he shouldn't be allowed that opportunity...which is the situation most people find themselves in when coming out of jail. They can't get a job, can't return to society, end up becoming repeat offenders and go back to jail.

September 19, 2010 - Comment - Like - Share

Carlton Hackett, Steven Perez, ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆ and 19 other people liked this

The system is entirely broken. Society rejects them and turns them right back. - Aaron Hood

153 more comments

Oh...and they probably hurt/negatively effect at least one other person's life in the process. - Rah-PM 2012

I'll never be a fan of Mr. Vick's. That said, yeah, he did his time. As long as he never owns another dog or has anything to do with dogs, then I say leave him be. - iTad

Yup, I'm with Tad on the no-dogs thing. - ☆ Mellyboo ☆

I still say the pro leagues should have a character clause that prevents folks like Vick and other convicts from getting rehired. Playing at that level is a privilege, and it's a crying shame that he's allowed to remain a role model. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

I could get with that. No ex-felons in the NFL. Doesn't sound unreasonable to me. - iTad

He's a role model because he makes a bunch of money. - iTad

...Vick was "allowed" to return to productive life because he has a skill that could/can be exploited by those who took the chance on giving him another opportunity, after all, the Eagles are selling tickets, and jerseys with 7 on it, no? the "system" is isn't broken. the system is all about maximizing financial profit. don't like the system? change it. - .LAG liked that

Hence our proposed no convicted felons NFL clause. - iTad

Which one? - iTad

Being famous, making millions and being splashed all over tv definitely helps with the whole "hey kids! This is the good life" thing, so yes, he's a role model. I didn't say he was a good one. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

I'm not saying it's right or a good thing, but I'm not sure what other reason there could be for anyone to look up to him? Excellent athlete maybe, but there's tons of those who aren't making that much money... - iTad

...Old Buxom: in this society? YES - .LAG liked that

Momo, that's the way of life, it doesn't mean that they're a good role model. Why do you think parents flipped shit over MM. - Jimminy, CoG of FF

Woah - I didn't mean that he SHOULD be a role model because of that!! - iTad

Not down with the role model thing. It's not his fault he is a role model. That's not part of his job. Also, if your kid is looking up to Vick for anything other than his athletic abilities (ie. planning to start dog fighting) That's *definitely* a YOU deal. - Rah-PM 2012

...who is a role model, in this culture, who's poor? - .LAG liked that

Being famous is a vehicle for influence, yes. And if the league was really interested in cleaning up that influence, they'd create a clause forbidding folks like him playing in it. The fact that folks discount that influence is what drives me nuts. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

...the NFL is interested in making money, first, foremost, and only. - .LAG liked that

All businesses are, and they must be. - iTad

Tad..true. It is a tautology. - .LAG liked that

...it's not just because they run fast, or hit a ball far, it's that they're always in our faces, on TVs, billboards, advertisements, etc. - .LAG liked that

...omnipresence makes you a role model... apparently - .LAG liked that

I think in this case, the NFL would still do just fine if Vick retired to another profession. - iTad

Tad, maybe, but back to Rah's initial proposition: Vick made his reparations: 2 years in the hole... many others, for worse and for greater crimes have too: why aren't they given "second" chances? - .LAG liked that

As long as the NFL doesn't have a no ex-felons clause then I don't care if he continues playing. We just shouldn't make him a hero. - iTad

I agree Mo, but I'm not sure we can do anything to change it. Drug dealers are role models too for a lot of kids. - iTad

Momo, I completely agree that our society's idea of who is a role model is in serious need of a refurb. That's why I posted this last night: http://friendfeed.com/vicster... - vicster

Guys like ^^him^^ should be our role models. (edited for clarity) - vicster

Buxom ...but yet, in a media-driven culture, that's EXACTLY what happens. they're beamed into millions of homes, daily. it's unavoidable - .LAG liked that

Why does getting a second chance mean he has to keep working? Doesn't he have enough to get out of our faces and live happily ever after? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Minimage... actually, Vick was deeply in debt when he went to jail. He has to keep working to pay off his MAJOR bills, and no other job pays as well. It's like Brett Favre, if you have a job where they'll pay you $20 million for 5 months of work, why would you stop, for practical reasons? - .LAG liked that

True, but I'd be just as happy if he never played another game. Not our fault that he seems to only have one marketable skill. - iTad

As to the OP, I do not like Michael Vick one tiny bit. The cruelty he inflicted on those dogs, for which he has shown little to no remorse, goes beyond comprehension and, IMO puts him beneath contempt. That said, he did his time and he has a right to return to his job and (I hope) become a productive member of society. And I have a right to not support any team he plays on, the NFL in general, and any companies that sponsor him and hold him up as a role model. - vicster

Ok, fine, I suppose I won't begrudge him his ability to make a living through football, if he didn't bother to get a real education. I'd like him to get his five and twenty and get off the tv, though. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

...but what's the point of an education? to make a better living, no? Vick "educated" himself enough for his tastes, apparently. - .LAG liked that

We're each responsible for ourselves and our own ways of making a living. If he only learned one marketable way, that's no one's fault but his. That said, as things are now he's still free to play. I'll just root for the other team every time and try not to pay him any more attention. - iTad

If he was too stupid to have a backup plan, that's not my problem. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Tad.... well, the irony of Vick may be: the more he succeeds on the field, the harder it will be to avoid him in the media, because he'll just get more and more and more exposure. he went from 3rd-string 'experiment' to NFL starter in about 14 months, and McNabb, who was there for a decade, got shipped out. And the other guy, Kolb, is the other guy. nameless. faceless. stay tuned. - .LAG liked that

Michael Vick was a role-model becuase he accepted money from compaines to use his name and image in sponsorship deals. His sponsors included Nike, Reebok and trading card companies Donruss and Upper Deck. Also, he had deals with Coca-Cola's Powerade, EA Sports, Hasbro, Kraft Foods and Rawlings... If you don't want to be a role model, don't accept coin from people wanting to use you and your image to sell stuff... lots of which is aimed at kids... - Johnny

I can't believe what you guys are saying here. How many degrees do you all have? If you were suddenly blackballed from your current career, you're telling me you have a backup? - Rah-PM 2012

If you get paid a shit ton of cash in a sport that has a 10 - 12 year self life at best but don't have a backup plan or investments, that's foolish - Johnny from iPhone

Johnny ...but was he trying to be a role model, or just wanting to make a lot of easy money? Something people seem to forget is that most of these guys are REALLY young, and maybe they're not thinking through the ramifications of their decisions, especially when the choices offered to them come with millions of dollars attached - .LAG liked that

No, not all businesses are concerned with making money, making money is purely a byproduct of the goods or services that they provide. Even one of the founders of Ben and Jerry's understands this. - Scoble, Alex Scoble

How did he pay his debt to society? If that means jail time don't say it twice. If it means he actually had some repayment, time or money, towards animal welfare or something ok. And how is being a role model *not* part of his job? He went into the NFL to be anonymous and never get any media attention? I'm sorry, anyone who gets endorsement deals has to face backlash from doing bad things. He chose to break the law and get in debt. He can take a job doing something less public and not get flack. - <3Heather<3

He went into the NFL to play football. Not to raise your kids. - Rah-PM 2012

LAG, that's a bunch of crap. If he took millions of dollars for people to use his image but have no concept of what that actually means, that's no excuse. Trading Cards. The dude was sponsored by trading card companies. If you take one cent of money for your image and DON'T think that makes you a role model, sorry, no dice - Johnny from iPhone

Heza ...Vick forfeited about $70 million in base salary, another $25 million in endorsements, and spent 2 years in Leavenworth, one of the hardest-core prisons in the US penal system. I'd say he paid a pretty significant price. Some, however, believe, it's not enough for what he did - .LAG liked that

Johnny... have you ever seen Vick interviewed? He does not come across as a "deep" thinker. Dude was/is all about getting paid, and nothing else. Period. - .LAG liked that

Then that's HIS fault, not anyone else. You sign the line, you accept the consequences. - Johnny from iPhone

He was on the damn Wheaties Box in 2004... - Johnny from iPhone

Johnny, true, but he doesn't strike me has the kind of guy that thinks that far ahead. OTOH, he carried a lot of his old buddies, and his family with him, so to a lot of people, he was a hero. - .LAG liked that

Ok, so he served time. I'm not expecting him to go back to jail, and I think jail is the least of the issue. I don't know what you mean by "forfeit", he was in jail so he shouldn't get paid then and if it was to pay his debt, well then it's nothing special. I'm referring to "his debt to society" from the OP. Did he do community service in a dog shelter? Work on anti-animal abuse/fighting campaigns? Donate money? That would be a way to deal with society. - <3Heather<3

...his "debt" to society is the 2 years in the hole... it was a federal prison - .LAG liked that

btw, I'm not defending Vick. what he did was seriously f-ed up. but the dude paid a lot back, and, moreover it was a dogfighting RING -- DOZENS (if not hundreds) of other adult men were involved in it. what more do you want from this one guy? - .LAG liked that

Seriously. Also, why should he be thinking about anything more than getting paid? This is his JOB we're talking about. All of these opportunities he had come because of that. He doesn't *have* to be a role model. It's not in his contract. Juts because he's on TV and used as a marketing tool does not make it his fault. Again: Don't hate the player, Hate the game. - Rah-PM 2012

I'd be happy if he were banned from playing in the NFL. Let him make money a different way. That would be honorable. - iTad

well Tad, I guess that *is* my point: there's no other job for this guy. - .LAG liked that

Ok, I thought I explained why I think jail isn't paying debt. But thanks for totally ignoring that, it wasn't important to the point I was making or anything. - <3Heather<3

And I'm still waiting on someone to tell me what career path they can immediately switch to once they get black-balled from their current career choice. Just because his career might only span 10 or 12 years, does't negate the fact that his "shit ton" of money balances it out. - Rah-PM 2012

After all, even Kevin Mitnick is allowed to make money in his specialty now. Why not Vick? - Scoble, Alex Scoble

Heza ...well, I'm not ignoring your point: what else do you want him to do? pay? - .LAG liked that

Actually, I said what I want already. - <3Heather<3

+1 Alex - .LAG liked that

As far as I'm aware, Vick has made himself fully available for any initiative demonizing his actions. Didn't he go on tour or something when he got out? He did a whole reality show talking about how much of a dumbass he was. - Rah-PM 2012

...and to Alex's point: Michael Milken is TEACHING economics and business ethics, after being maybe the biggest crook in business history, allegedly - .LAG liked that

It's simple: the athlete/celebrity gets to vie for the best contract he can get. The athlete/celebrity audience can pass whatever opinion/judgement they want against him and/or the organizations that underwrite him. Isn't that fair? - Micah

Micah... I believe the Eagles have sold out their season tickets this year... (edited to add: ...in THIS economy) - .LAG liked that

Then season ticket holders have to weigh their opinions accordingly. - Micah

I don't think diehard NFL fans (as an aggregate) think much beyond whether or not their team will contend for a Super Bowl. politics, social conscience and winning NFL games don't necessarily mix, imho - .LAG liked that

Good point, .LAG. I don't even follow the NFL and only know of Vick because he played in ATL, he went to jail, and he spawned 2 reality shows (his own, and DogTown). If NFL fans actually gave a crap about this stuff, it wouldn't continue. - Rah-PM 2012

So, I'd be happy if the NFL barred felony convicts from ever playing in the NFL, regardless of whether they served their time. I also don't care if said player didn't think far enough ahead to have a back up plan. I have a back up plan. They can too. - iTad

Tad... well, what about the Rams' Leonard Little? He got drunk, got in his car, KILLED a high-school kid while driving. Served 6 months, manslaughter. Resumed his NFL career. The parents of the man he killed protest the Rams every day (was even on "60 Minutes")... where's the outrage for that? Vick oversaw and ran a ring that bred, fought, and killed dogs. this whole things is incredibly f-ed up and distorted. I think it all sucks. I have no answers, but I also have no pat solutions. - .LAG liked that

I can immediately switch to at least two different career paths if I am ever blackballed from being a financial analyst. I have the education and the background for both computer programming and network engineering, as well as a degree that puts me squarely in line for a job with the Federal government (Forest Service or BLM). And if worse comes to worst, I can use my journalism degree... more... - Hookuh Tinypants

Good lord Tiny, your resume must be impressive 0.0 - Chris Topher

I intend to play professional football when my FF habit gets me canned from the libary. If that doesn't work out, there's always dogfighting. - Your Neighbor Steve

And you think everyone on the planet should have the same type of education and experience? I'm pretty sure you're an outlier. A very very talented and experience outlier. - Rah-PM 2012

Everyone on the planet should be able to do more than one thing. Given the chance, we all CAN do more than one thing. - iTad

...but for millions of dollars? and mega-exposure on all media? - .LAG liked that

I am a jack of all trades. I know how to do a lot of shit. That doesn't mean I have work experience with any of it or that I could convince someone to pay me. Also, see .LAG's comment above. - Rah-PM 2012

I don't think that everyone should be like me. But I think people should always keep a backup plan in mind. Always look for learning and growth opportunities. Most of my experience comes from branching out from my normal routine. I think where people get caught in the spokes is when they only look at making craploads of money rather than providing themselves and their family with a... more... - Hookuh Tinypants

But how many people graduate college without a specific career in mind? Everyone always calls athletes stupid because they go with what they are good at, but who DOESN'T do that? You find out your strengths and you follow them. Just because your strength is in athletics, this is supposed to change? Does everyone lead their life fearing the one thing they're REALLY good at will disappear tomorrow? - Rah-PM 2012

Since we like to argue as if Vick is a regular blue-collar guy: If a trainer at my kid's sports club gets arrested and goes to jail for soberly beating up his wife (now that's the important distinction. Vick wasn't drunk, under the influence etc... He started dog fighting of his own free will so don't treat him like a victim). Can I not be concerned and question if this person should go... more... - Johnny

Rah... Seriously, I have a backup plan. NO ONE is a one trick pony... anyone who thinks they can be is a fool. In sports, there is always that guy 2 years younger and just a little faster - Johnny

Why does it even matter if he has a back up plan or not? - <3Heather<3

Because everyone wants him out of the NFL. So WTF is he supposed to do for a living, Heza? - Rah-PM 2012

NO ONE is a one trick pony? http://friendfeed.com/rahshee... - Rah-PM 2012

That's his problem. He's an adult. It's no ones responsibility to figure out but his. - iTad

...but he IS in the NFL. and that's why people are pissed. some feel he doesn't deserve the second chance. my question is still: what else is he supposed to pay back? - .LAG liked that

But no one has a good reason why he shouldn't be able to play in the NFL. Again, see .LAG's comment above this one. - Rah-PM 2012

Again, I'd be happy with a rule stating no one convicted of a felony could play. As is, there's no such rule. - iTad

I never said I wanted him out of the NFL. I only answered the one question that nobody else wanted to answer, that's all. I think Rah has a good point in his original post. Believe it or not, I have zero opinion on whether or not Vick should be allowed to play. So many other athletes have been given a golden pass for things like drug use, spousal abuse, gambling...why not Vick? And LAG,... more... - Hookuh Tinypants

For the record, I think Vick was shut out when he tried to volunteer on behalf of animal rights organizations. - Rah-PM 2012

People have good opinions why he should play again. The problem with those is everyone has one and they all differ... Just becuase he can't do anything else is no reason that he should continue doing what he was. - Johnny from iPhone

...actually, after he served his hard time in Leavenworth, he had an additional 6 months of community service doing, for the HUMANE SOCIETY, doing EXACTLY that: community service: he had to go around to counsel kids on why messing with dogfighting was wrong...so, again, what else is he supposed to do? pay back? - .LAG liked that

Thanks for the facts, .LAG. I know I saw him on TV talking somewhere :) - Rah-PM 2012

...this guy is one of the most scrutinized "celebrity" felons of modern times, and yet, it's not enough... and again, I'm not condoning anything he did... all of it was seriously twisted and wrong. but he can't go on with his life? - .LAG liked that

Why not, Johnny? Let's assume he can take any job he wants. What's the benefit of making him switch? - Rah-PM 2012

@LAG Ok, I didn't know he actually did community service with a humane society. You never said that when I asked you directly if he had. I'm glad he did and it helps my opinion of him. - <3Heather<3

105 comments in and I still don't understand why people want this man to be out of a job upon coming out of jail. Do you wish the same on everyone else who does time? How many fry cooks do you think McDonald's needs? - Rah-PM 2012

Rah, I'll try again. This guy is paid for a) playing football and b) having an image that companies use to sell goods and services. It says a lot about a company like Nike that after what this person did, they still deem him worthy of a brand they want to use sell shoes. When the guy is on a Wheaties box, is his there for more than his ability, it's his character. When you look a shoe... more... - Johnny

Here is the deal. A) He got his job back B) Nike and probably other brands still want to pay the man to represent their brand. This means that the people that are against these things happening are in the minority. I don't know if Vick has any other skills and don't think he should get his job back simply because he may not have other skills, just saying he served his time. No matter... more... - Rah-PM 2012

Rah, yes it is. THE GUY WAS ON THE WHEATIES BOX!!! Accepting endorsement deals then playing the 'I'm not a role model' card is bullshit - Johnny

If you just wanna play football, play football. Don't take money from anywhere else. When you take the step from football player to representative, all bets are off. Don't want the fame, don't want the responsibility, don't sign the contract. - Johnny

Well, that's where we disagree. Holding the individual responsible doesn't solve anything. If his face is being used as a marketing tool, it's because that's what people want to see. That's not his fault. - Rah-PM 2012

He should be able to earn a living. But he shouldn't be celebrated for anything. Period. And it's not at all clear to me that he's either remorseful or really thinks he did anything wrong other than get caught. - The original Kevin

He did a reality show to give insight into how things got where they did, but people were too pissed that he had a reality show to bother listening to what he had to say. - Rah-PM 2012

Who cares if Vick can't get another job making millions? I'm saying it's fine for him to get a job. He may be a one-trick-pony, but that would be his own fault. Ernest Dixon was selling cars when he stopped playing in the NFL. People often can't get their dream jobs when they become felons; why should Vick be any different? I'd rather not see "I think Vick did this or was rejected for... more... - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

He did his time. Why are people still acting pissy about him being able to get his job back? How many pounds of flesh do people need? You say "why should VIck be any different?" and my answer is he shouldn't. Everyone should be able to serve their time and get on with their lives. It's pretty screwed up that they can't. - Rah-PM 2012

I asked why he should be different from any other felon; why did you dodge that? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Vick can certainly go about his business and do what he likes with his life. I choose not to be party to it, not pay attention to him, nor support any team which associates itself with him. I used to be an Eagles fan. After they signed Vick last year, I dropped the team, and any support I have for them. Largely for the NFL on the whole, as well. - Mike Nayyar

I didn't dodge it. I addressed it directly. I even quoted you. - Rah-PM 2012

To clarify...Vick shouldn't be the exception. People are pissed because a jailbird has a nice job, but I don't think *anyone* that does time should *also* be banned from ever having a decent life and that is pretty much what happens most of the time. - Rah-PM 2012

What if Vick was a politician? - Johnny from iPhone

Than he would need one hell of a mouth piece to get the public back on his side. - Rah-PM 2012

Exactly. - Johnny from iPhone

Rahsheen, do you think most felons can go back to their dream jobs? I don't think so. To hand him that privilege with no questions asked would be making him different from other evildoers. [sue me; I like comic boks, especially ones touched by Stan Lee] - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Ooh, I love the idea of giving people more penalties after they've served their sentence. "You're speeding, the fine is $500." "Here's $500." "Thanks, now you need to mow my lawn before I'll let you go." Especially without all the tedium of a judge or jury. Much more efficient that way. - I like big Botts

There were questions asked. He went to jail and served his time as ordered by a court of law. No one that does so should automatically be marked after they return to the streets. America might be a better place if people could serve the punishment and go back into the world, but they can't. We hold grudges. We treat them like outsiders. - Rah-PM 2012

We get pissed if they end up becoming successful. - Rah-PM 2012

Serving time != Sorry for actions. Most of the time it's sorry for getting caught. As you said, one hell of a PR campaign to recover face/trust - Johnny from iPhone

Yep. To be able to achieve all of that despite horrible actions while denying that slot to someone who managed to keep clean - I *do* have a problem with that, with being able to pick up at the highest levels of society/fame with no repercussions. I *dont* believe you should be unmarked by it. *shrug* Maybe it'd make all these athletes and other uppercrust folks think twice if they knew they'd lose something other than a bit of their time. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

There's some truth to that. It is natural for honest, law-abiding citizens who don't go around harming innocent creatures for sport to be annoyed that someone who could be so cruel and so evil should go on to live a life of luxury. So let's just say that his evil is in the past; you still didn't tell me if we could cut him off, if he screws up again. Would you give him a pass every time he gets a slap on the wrists for harming other beings? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Repeat offenders are an entirely different story. No, they shouldn't get a pass every time. Repeating the same offense pretty much shows you have a more serious mental deficiency. What business is it of anyone's if he's sorry? That shouldn't have anything to do with it. The goal is for the offender to never offend again. Just because he is in that slot doesn't mean he is denying anyone. In Vick's case, he is there because no one else can exactly fit in that slot. This is athletics, after all. - Rah-PM 2012

I'm getting the feeling that forgiveness isn't a big thing in this thread. We're also not just talking about rich folks. The same rules should apply to everyone. Everyone who has done their time should have a chance to turn things around. - Rah-PM 2012

Again I ask, how much punishment does someone have to suffer before they are forgiven? - Rah-PM 2012

I can't forgive people who have never said they're sorry. - Stephen Mack from iPhone

To me? Serving time is not enough; I do think you should be limited as to what you can do afterward, particularly if it's a felony. But I's also prefer to run society as a meritocracy, and that'll never happen either. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

Rah, it sounds like you believe that folks should come out clean and right at the same societal rung they were on when they left, only having lost some time. I have serious problems with that. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

It's really up to the fans, team owners, and sponsors to decide if they are ready to have him back. It doesn't take much in this case because he's one of the most talented athletes in the league. If Vick carries the Eagles to the Superbowl, people will be cheering for him, no doubt. People won't forget what he did but if the team is winning, it doesn't matter much. - Rodfather from Android

Just because Vick is still above most people, doesn't mean he is on the same rung he was before. - Rah-PM 2012

I think everyone deserves a second chance. People are not perfect. We don't always know why someone did what they did. If someone does their time and tries to become a productive member of society, they should have that chance. What benefit is it to our society if we hold them back for no apparent reason? We may as well just put all criminals to death. - Rah-PM 2012

It's beyond the cap I'd place on felons. I *do* think you should be permanently stained for a felony. You screwed up big time. And it *should* be taken into account as people judge you for things dependent on character - whether it be a job or an apartment application - in the future. I also happen to be a huge fan of the death penalty for violent crimes that demonstrate you're not safe to be integrated into society. *shrug* Happily for most of the world, the law & most folks disagree with me. - ωαřмaiden ☆TeamOtto☆

When Vick came back, the 49ers announced there's no way they would pick up Vick because they know the fans and surrounding liberals wouldn't like it at all. Philly felt different and I haven't heard much backlash from Eagles fans. - Rodfather from Android

Most folks don't disagree. That's why it's a vicious cycle that just helps generate bigger and badder criminals. Can't get a job. Can't get a place to live. What else can you do? People already see you as a criminal as soon as you hit the door. Doing time might even seem like a load off your back at that point. - Rah-PM 2012

Let the taxpayers shell out millions to pay for your room and board. Fund your cable. Pay for you to build those scary looking prison muscles and learn how to be a better criminal while your perception of right and wrong continues to go downhill. (yes, dramatic, but pretty much 100% truth) - Rah-PM 2012

I believe that a person must repent and ask for forgiveness before one receives it. To be fair, I don't know if he did those things, because I've been ignoring him, but since it's been argued that whether or not he's sorry is irrelevant, do I need to even consider forgiving him? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Vick apologized and repented 3 years ago http://www.youtube.com/watch... - Rah-PM 2012

Here, he addresses the fact that he screwed up, recognizes his profession as privilege, talks about helping animal rights organizations, and even touches on the fact that he is basically starting from scratch, not returning at the same "rung" he was on http://www.youtube.com/watch... - Rah-PM 2012

Ok, fine, he can have another chance, even at the millions. Just remember that most serial murderers started out being cruel to animals. Those groupies had better beware. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Just for the record: Don't know Vick. Don't follow football. I just see a guy getting a lot of hate directed his way and know that hate only hurts the ones directing it. Damn, I feel like I've already had this conversation here. That was probably about Chris Brown, though. - Rah-PM 2012

HA! You outted yourself, Rah. :p - Micah from Android

Not really, It's all out there on the web somewhere. You could probably find it if FF search wasn't screwed all the time :) - Rah-PM 2012

I think it also has to do with the fact that he could see he was causing suffering to those creatures, and he couldn't figure out for himself that it wasn't cool. Oh, no, the law had to tell him it was wrong. If he hadn't been caught, he'd probably still be doing it. I suppose many people wonder what other stupid activity he'd fund with his new dollars. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

That just goes back to people making mistakes. I don't know if this is accurate, but I believe he was raised thinking that dog fighting was ok. It takes a bit of a wake up call from someone outside your family/circle to change what you've been taught all your life. - Rah-PM 2012

Just because he screws up once, it's assumed he will do something else illegal or immoral? - Rah-PM 2012

Once = lots of maimed dogs over many years? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

I think it's kinda bs to use how he may have been raised as an excuse. Lots of people are raised in families where abuse is the norm, but they still know it's wrong. - ☆ Mellyboo ☆

Interesting comparison. I think we know from statistics that the abused tend to go on to abuse their loved ones. Correct me, if I'm wrong. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Yes, Mini. Once. It was one event. Some people escaping cycles of abuse, poverty, drugs, racism, or whatever make them the exception, not the rule. I'm pretty sure stats support that statement. How can you know something is wrong if that is all you're taught? Some people call all Spanish speakers Mexicans or use derogatory terms for women and haven't a clue what they're doing is wrong until you say something. - Rah-PM 2012

While Vick refuses to put any blame on his "friends" (as he shouldn't) they do provide a feedback mechanism. None of the people you're around are saying anything , so why would you think you're doing something wrong? - Rah-PM 2012

Do you think it was possible for him to engage in those activities for years without knowing that the powers that be frown upon them? Do you think he had no idea that he would be punished if caught? - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

I thought we had moved on to him knowing the morality of the situation as opposed to just the law. I'd assume that he probably had an idea it was illegal and possibly had no idea how much trouble he would be in if caught. I'd equate it to someone who smokes weed, knowing it's illegal, and just doesn't realize how much trouble they would be in if caught. - Rah-PM 2012

MM, yes, some do go on to become abusers, but they usually do so knowing it's wrong. - ☆ Mellyboo ☆

For me, it's usually black and white. The law generally follows the codes of morality (and, yes, I know there are exceptions). Besides, it's just common sense to know that causing creatures to be maimed/killed isn't the act of a compassionate being. Most moral folks don't want to risk funding stupidity/cruelty. Anyway, I've said he can have his second chance, but I know that "I didn't know any better," is an excuse many people use, even when they did. - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Tim O'Reilly

On web standards: "We should be getting to the point where people can’t tell how a site was built." http://www.alistapart.com/article... via @simonstl

March 9, 2010 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

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Peter Norvig

Bill Gates: Why We Need Innovation, Not Just Insulation - http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-ga...

January 24, 2010 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

StreamAfrica, Iphigenie, Jimminy, CoG of FF and 21 other people liked this

Bill Gates gets it right... - Peter Norvig from Bookmarklet

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tsk first thing we should do is what we already can do,...everything else is just blabla. the usa needs to get their stuff together and start modernizing. - Chris Hofmann

I'm going to go out on a limb here and disagree with both Bill Gates and Peter Norvig. First of all, it's vastly oversimplifying things to say that "the key one to achieve is 80% by 2050." What matters is not just the long-term rate of CO2 emissions but the amount of CO2 accumulated in the atmosphere. If we don't achieve a 30% reduction by 2025, we'll need to achieve a 90% reduction by 2050 to make up for it. (Numbers are completely made up, but you get the idea.) - Jim Norris

Second, the relevant innovations are not likely to be in the form of zero-marginal-cost Windows service packs. Both transportation and electricity generation are hugely capital intensive, so there's going to be a long lag time between when some new approach gets discovered in a lab and when the last coal power plant is replaced by a magical midichlorian-fueled plant. Any efficiency improvements on the usage side will dramatically shorten the time it takes for new technologies to replace old ones. - Jim Norris

"My point is not to denigrate efficiency. Slowing the growth of CO2 ppm is of course a good thing. And there are of course lots of cheap, and in many cases self-funding efficiency gains to be made. We should at the least fix market barriers and dysfunctions that prevent these gains from being realized. " - Mona Nomura

Third, innovation in power generation doesn't appear to have a constant rate of progress a la Moore's law—there's no clear reason to expect it to happen by 2050 but not by 2025. In fact, a lot of the necessary technologies (renewable electricity generation, plug-in hybrid cars) are already around today, and I think it would be a mistake to not pursue them because something better might... more... - Jim Norris

And I find it hard to believe that Huffington Post articles would be a better way to "make it clear to people what really matters" and avoid the danger that "people will think they just need to do a little bit and things will be fine" than actually investing in things that make a concrete difference today, or implementing a cap-and-trade or carbon-tax system that aligns economic... more... - Jim Norris

So what exactly is Gates arguing for, and against? He's for a "distributed system of R&D with economic rewards for innovators and strong government encouragement" but against talk about "renewable portfolios[…] and cap and trade", the kinds of distributed systems and government encouragements that would make investments in innovation actually pay off? He's afraid that "people will think... more... - Jim Norris

It just sounds like he's shooting down a straw man and putting up a deus-ex-machina in its place. Maybe it just sounds that way to me though. As with plug-in hybrids, your mileage may vary. - Jim Norris

I don't know about you, but I always get my science advice from the HuffPo. Especially medical science. - Mr. Gunn

HuffPo just reposted from gatesnotes http://www.thegatesnotes.com/Thinkin... ...and at this point, awareness is key. Publishing on HuffPo and the public sharing the pieces across respective networks is better than nothing. Especially, when we take into account the US' participation towards an international political framework; specifically, G8. - Mona Nomura

Gates didn't say "no insulation", he said "not just insulation". I took his argument to be an instance of Amdahl's Law: if we want to get to an 80% improvement, don't concentrate on an area that only accounts for a small percentage of the overall problem. - Peter Norvig

From my perspective, which is objective and unbiased, Gates sees environmental advocates pushing solutions like home insulation and proper tire inflation as not particularly helpful and distracting from the bigger problems. I've never gotten the impression anywhere that we were concentrating on insulation as a big part of the solution; rather it's a technologically simple remediation... more... - Jim Norris

But it's not the 80% solution, and I don't know of anyone claiming that it would be. Beyond those low-or-negative-cost 20% measures, the possibilities are less certain. I think there's a pretty broad consensus that we'll need both short-term/cheap/safe/incremental and long-term/expensive/risky/innovative measures. I think Gates has a point that we need to be concentrating on the latter... more... - Jim Norris

Since we have and we'll need both short- and long-term efforts, if Gates thinks that we're taking the wrong approach for the 2050+ date, it would make a lot more sense for him to criticize our current long-term strategy that he wants to change, rather than the short-term strategy that is mostly irrelevant. Maybe we focus on the short-term because that's what we can watch being done now... more... - Jim Norris

His "bold new plan" boils down to "a distributed system of R&D with economic rewards for innovators and strong government encouragement". That is rather vague but useful starting point. Right now we have at least one system that works this way: the so-called free market, wherein people are endowed with the right to take their own pursuit of ecological happiness, and successful... more... - Jim Norris

Is that what he's advocating? Or another approach that involves government funding of various large research projects investigating the underlying science and technology and commercializing useful inventions developed therein, like Google? Or more innovative systems of innovation, such as contests like the X-Prizes or DARPA Grand Challenges, or micro-grants to tiny energy startups along... more... - Jim Norris

Paul Buchheit

Arrogant self-aggrandizing jerks, self-promoting narcissists, anti-social obsessives, or pompous blowhards (worth reading) - http://www.shirky.com/weblog...

January 16, 2010 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Christopher Chung, Dan Hsiao, FunkyRose and 33 other people liked this

"They aren’t just bad at behaving like arrogant self-aggrandizing jerks. They are bad at behaving like self-promoting narcissists, anti-social obsessives, or pompous blowhards, even a little bit, even temporarily, even when it would be in their best interests to do so. Whatever bad things you can say about those behaviors, you can’t say they are underrepresented among people who have changed the world. ... It’s tempting to imagine that women could be forceful and self-confident without being arrogant or jerky, but that’s a false hope, because it’s other people who get to decide when they think you’re a jerk, and trying to stay under that threshold means giving those people veto power over your actions. To put yourself forward as someone good enough to do interesting things is, by definition, to expose yourself to all kinds of negative judgments, and as far as I can tell, the fact that other people get to decide what they think of your behavior leaves only two strategies for not suffering from those judgments: not doing anything, or not caring about the reaction." - Paul Buchheit from Bookmarklet

18 more comments

Painfully true in my experience. My only concern is that I'm not sure whether it's a good or bad thing. - WoH: Minding her Steves

...and what I mean by that is women shouldn't need to be jerks to get on. The article is well written and worth reading. And, like, the author, I have no idea what the answer is. I naturally do not like to be pushy, but when I have put myself forward I have invariably done far better than I imagined I would. - WoH: Minding her Steves

The point, or at least as I would communicate it, is not so much that you should be an arrogant jerk, but that you shouldn't be afraid of being perceived as such, because then you won't put yourself forward. - Paul Buchheit

I understand that, Paul, and that is the crux of it. *Doing* it is the hard bit. - WoH: Minding her Steves

This is somewhat akin to one of Malcolm Gladwell's premises in "Outliers." He used the example of a tragic airliner that crashed, and follow up of the flight recordings and data showed that the plane ran out of fuel because the cultural etiquette of the pilot and co-pilot prevented the co-pilot from explicitly telling the superior officer of an error he was making in estimating their... more... - Mark J

Of course, the point could be made that employing in some situations being a jerk is necessary to get the situation resolved. In other situations, it becomes a barrier to communication and eventually undermines desired progress. - Mark J

Worth a read - http://www.plasticbag.org/archive... - moderation

Thanks, moderation, that's another good read. - WoH: Minding her Steves

I'll echo that - thanks for the link, moderation. - Micah

Thx again, moderation. I much prefer @plasticbag's post to the original. - Ayşe E.

"It would be good if more women got in the habit of raising their hands and saying “I can do that. Sign me up. My work is awesome,” no matter how many people that behavior upsets." - Clare Dibble

I don't disagree with this post (though it has taken me a while to get there). However the guy writing this post has obviously never been called a bitch (or equivalent) for acting a little cocky. And usually when a guy goes past his limit, is is forgiven and forgotten much more quickly than when a chick steps out of line. I would say that this finding the edge of self promotion that is acceptable is reinforced over time in both genders, not necessarily something that is innate. - Clare Dibble

how about doing something worthwhile and removing this antisemitic/jihadist fan page on Facebook: http://is.gd/6sddL - JIDF

This is another perspective from a writer about why being a man isn't necessary: http://www.freelancewritingjobs.ca/2010... - WoH: Minding her Steves

403? - no name

403 for what, Bill? - WoH: Minding her Steves

My takeaway from this is that people who overstate their abilities need to actually be called on it. In Shirky's example of overstating his own drafting ability, the difference between his behavior and that of a con man is that he truly believes he can get there, and does. But I've seen a number of cases where someone overstated his abilities and either (a) made a big mess for the people he ended up working with, or (b) got smacked down when he couldn't back up his bravado. We need more of (b). - Joel Webber

Maybe it's just me, but I guessed that the student was female. - Jim Norris

Jim, it sounds like your experience with women is with a particular subset. - Clare Dibble

Kelly Norton

Why do we all still go to offices to work? If we invested our commute times into missing tools, wouldn't we have what we need in under 2 years?

January 18, 2010 from Android - Comment - Like - Share

Thomas Broyer, Joel Webber, Cornelius Toole and 2 other people liked this

I am pretty sure this will happen eventually, but only after very immersive collaboration and virtual presence tools are available at a low enough cost to justify the down scaling of office space. Most workers still need human interaction as a motivator to accomplish their work and while email and IM can accomplish most of that interaction, many still feel isolated without the face time. - no name

blackvoices

Banking News: Religious Leaders Plan 'Exodus' From Bank of America http://www.bvonmoney.com/2010...

January 14, 2010 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

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Tim O'Reilly

Exponentials R Us: Seven Computer Science Game-Changers from the 2000’s, and Seven More to Come http://www.xconomy.com/seattle...

December 27, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Michael R. Bernstein, Cornelius Toole, Alex Kapranoff and 2 other people liked this

Robert Scoble

50% of US engineering students drop out - Why? - http://dondodge.typepad.com/the_nex...

November 12, 2008 from Google Reader - Comment - Like - Share

Jimminy, CoG of FF, Ashish, Michael R. Bernstein and 32 other people liked this

I am part of the 50% who don't drop out! - Kevin Mohr

34 more comments

I didn't drop out but here is part of my experience in this post from years ago. It was discouraging to hear the professors talk. Needless to say i don't code. :-) http://www.altamirano.org/marketi... - Antonio Altamirano

Thankfully I'm in the other 50%, but I can see why many would change their major or drop out. I saw it first hand where many 1st and 2nd year Mechanical Engineering students changed their majors to something 'easier'. The most common reason was difficulty with the required advanced Math courses. Calculus being the road block for many. - Jeff P. Henderson

If I were entering college now, I would try to go to Olin. I really like their approach. - Paul Buchheit

nice post, I'm looking for the number of engineers (or per thousand capita ratio) graduating in Greece (or greeks graduating around the world) - George Tziralis

In CA we have two types of public universities. The UC schools require the professors to do research, where as the State University schools do not. I think the State University schools are much better for undergrad tech education as you get much more attention from your professors. - Jeff P. Henderson

The UC Berkeley College of Engineering started the Center For Entrepreneurship and Technology http://cet.berkeley.edu to address some of the issues Dodge talks about. - Ruchira S. Datta

Engineering is hard and requires above-average intelligence. Think about it this way: Statistics tells us that probably 50% of people will be below-average. Wouldn't you want those 50% of the students to drop out before actually becoming an engineer? MIT just doesn't admit that half of the population in the first place, but most schools don't have that luxury. - Gabe

People have a lot of options for (a) careers (b) money (c) power (d) image (e) attracting mates in the US, compared to China/India. Engineers are not valued very highly in the US compared to businesspeople, doctors, and lawyers. - Mitchell Tsai

@Gabe: You would think that all the people that go to study Computer Sciences or seek other Engineering degrees are above the 50% average to begin with. - Amit Morson

somestimes it's a scoail or maturity thing - was for me. I get by. Wished I finished. - Alan Wilensky from Alert Thingy

It's because of the fact that people with higher standards of living pursue less demanding challenges offering similar ROI (I = investment+involvement). That's why there's so many non-US students (especially from lower income countries) in engineering and why they're much less inclined to fail. - Nenad Nikolic from twhirl

Engineering sucks. I think there's a point where any engineering student realizes that even with a degree they're looking at a pretty mediocre salary working in a really boring job. Add this to the difficult coursework and boring courses, well, engineers are good at math. It adds up to being a raw deal. That being said, if you get into engineering at Stanford or UC Berkley, your ROI would look a lot better then mine. I'm sure a large number of engineering students consider dropping out, even after Calculus. - Will Higgins™

All I can do is nod. For a couple of years, not a day when by when I didn't consider jumping ship, for all the reasons commenters here have mentioned: long hours, heavy workload, fickle job market, salary barely comparable with what I could expect with a business or law degree. But here I am, a month away from (finally!) finishing my EE degree, and I couldn't be happier. - Derrick Burns

Continued from above: Basically, I think so many give up because they were looking to get something out of being an engineer: money, prestige, etc. But it's simply too great a commitment on several levels. You really have to pursue engineering because it's something you want to do, something you care about. - Derrick Burns

I dropped out because Chemical Engineering was not what I was expecting. I wanted more Chemistry, less Math. I switched to IT Management and found it much more interesting. Mind you, I'm Canadian. - Shey

I remember having a crisis in my final year of Electrical/Computer Engineering. Dropping out was a non-option, but I did consider completely abandoning 3.5 years of engineering study to switch fields and schools during my senior year. In hindsight, I didn't understand what engineers really did. My vision at the time was closer to industrial or product design than engineering. I had to take it on faith in my first two years that I was on a path to do what I was envisioning. - Kelly Norton

I suspect that more than 50% (even at good schools like GATech, I have friends who have done this) are in the wrong field. Many of my friends went into programming because they enjoyed computers and I've told them they would hate it because they don't like math. They don't listen. :) - mjc

still others go into engineering due to parental expectation, which I find ridiculous, but understandable - mjc

Amit: one of the properties of being in the lower 50% is not knowing that you're in the lower 50%. That means many of the applicants do not know they are unqualified. - Gabe

Extensive aptitude/personality testing could fix this - Aaron Eaton

Engineering is a tough subject. how does that compare to other subjects? - John Cass from twhirl

I actually sit on an advisory board for ASU (arizona state) Poly - I can tell you that what I see is students becoming disillusioned by all the stuff they have to learn before they can go out and create something "cool". The challenge is keeping them engaged through the pre-reqs/early coursework. BTW - IMHO the problem with "drop out and learn X" is that they've intentionally skipped the fundamentals that make good engineers. Just because you can code doesn't mean you can engineer... two different things. - Brian Roy

Is Computer Science part of engineering? Because it didn't take much training in Computer Science for me to start doing cool stuff. I wrote my first game and posted it onto the internet my freshman year (Core Wars). By my Junior year, I had designed a programming language and integrated in it into a MUD. Pengtoh had contributed to Linux by his sophomore year. On the other hand, I always flunked electrical engineering classes, and couldn't stomach math past linear algebra. - Piaw Na

I switch from Engineering to a Computer Science degree. Apart from the fact that I wanted to program, there were two reasons. 1) The load was very high (it was close to 40 contact hours/week in first year). 2) The maths was hard - I'm ok at math, but combined with the high load I found I struggled when I wasn't too interested in it. - Nick Lothian

"the US should staple a Green Card to every foreign student's engineering diploma and encourage them to stay in the USA." - Clare Dibble

Same as Nick here. Dropped out due to difficulty and lack of passion for the field. Went back later to finish a BS in Computer Information Systems. - Bill Sanders

I wonder what percentage of medical school students drop out. Engineering is a hard discipline, if you want to be a web dev or a study IT or "new media" instead. Making engineering "softer" because today's students don't like to work hard and expect results instantly will just create generations of mediocre engineers and will not make the US more of an engineering power. - Kevin Goldsmith from twhirl

engineers are boring and dry, pay is low, classes are full of non-social ppl. (and almost no girls). Why not study finance, or something, girls and pay is much better. - imran

Engineering is fun! The big thing is that school's curriculums are frequently irrelevant. For instance, a lot of CS majors require irrelevant Math or Physics not because it's a requirement to do good software (they aren't), but because those classes serve as weeders. The result is, for instance, we get lots of CS majors who can't communicate or string a sentence together. If we rearranged the CS major so that we didn't impose a stupid requirement, we'd get a bigger diversity of candidates and less dropout. - Piaw Na

Engineering is the best!!!! and for those who says it sucks or that the pay is not good (or that we are boring and dry), its probably because you are in that 50% of retards that dropped out of it. No other profession gets paid as much as an engineer right after graduation, and there is usually more demand for engineers than for anything else. I just think people are too lazy to even try anymore. I dont know why, even graduate school is fun in engineering. Aerospace is the best!!!!! - Mike hawk

life in a conceptual box is the result .. content with that, you will stay with it .. not content, universes open up - Gregory Lent

life in a conceptual box? do you even know what you are saying? universes open up when you quit engineering? If only you were to see the world through the eyes of en engineer, we see everything from several different perspectives, not just that of people like you. If anything, engineering has really opened up the world for me as it really is. Stop making those type of remarks. Instead get back to engineering school so you can see what it feels like. - Mike hawk

I think I know the boxes Gregory is talking about from some of his other comments. Whether you've gone to engineering school is orthogonal to whether you can get outside of them. So it's pretty much irrelevant to this thread. - Ruchira S. Datta

At least, those 50% tried. - Ashish

I bet you the pre-med numbers are similar, but I'm not sure universities necessarily track undergrads who aspire to go to med school. In general, how many freshmen actually stick with the major they pick when they start college? - Victor Ganata

Kevin Fox

Dude, this is excellent. Luis von Ahn's 10 Steps to Successful Teaching - http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~scsfac...

December 15, 2009 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Raymond Marr aka Knatchwa, Clare Dibble, Vedrana Janković and 7 other people liked this

"3. Teaching evaluations are highly correlated with the grade the students think they will get at the time of filling out the surveys. Make your course easy, then crush them on the final." - Kevin Fox from Bookmarklet

Dave Winer

@greggish1 -- I've never seen or heard of anyone claiming a copyright on an API. To me, it's like a contract, and you can't copyright them.

December 13, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Nicola Greco and Cornelius Toole liked this

I lend a little background and color to this statement here: http://friendfeed.com/dewitt.... Technically Dave's right, but there's more to it than that. - DeWitt Clinton

Tim O'Reilly

Hilarious, profanity-laced Fake Steve Jobs rant about ATT trying to discourage iphone users from heavy network use. http://www.fakesteve.net/2009...

December 13, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole and Michael R. Bernstein liked this

Jenny Morman

Fwd: Evolution - http://9gag.com/gag... (via http://friendfeed.com/funny-p...)

Fwd: Evolution - http://9gag.com/gag/5270?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+9GAG+%289GAG.com+Site+Feed%29 (via http://ff.im/cwvNV)

December 6, 2009 - Comment - Like - Share

Victor Ryden 美久太阿, Christian (Simply X), Kenton and 10 other people liked this

Extrapolation suggest scary results for the future. - Eivind

Paul Buchheit

So I finally tried Wave... - http://paulbuchheit.blogspot.com/2009...

November 28, 2009 from Paul Buchheit - Comment - Like - Share

Bertrand Doux, JSLeFanu, Tyson Key and 71 other people liked this

Integrating into Gmail -- never thought of that as a possibility before. - Brian Sullivan

32 more comments

Think of it as "live email" - Paul Buchheit

The only problem I see is that advertising may not be the best way to make money from it. - Brian Sullivan

Hasan, I don't understand your question. - Paul Buchheit

A wave-gmail integration sounds like quite the challenge. Perhaps the real-time text updates will happen and will be useful, but I can't see the conversation fragmentation of Wave being a good thing for Gmail. - Mitch

While I admire the approach of releasing something that's pre-beta, it seems there is quite a risk that people will think, "oh, I tried Wave and didn't get it," and they will not come back to it for a long time. - Laura Norvig

Laura - Google wants developers in there making cool stuff in the lead-up to the public release. If it were only developers trying out each others tools, things would be stagnant. - Mitch

I live and work in Gwave - business partner could not access wave due to inferior connections in Manchester and working in docs again was such a backward step! - Callie O Farrell

That's true, Mitchell, I forgot about all the gadgets people are developing. Also, Gina Trapani pointed out that the one interface that most of us see when we opt in to "try wave" is not the only interface available. I would love to see some samples of simpler/different interfaces. - Laura Norvig

Hasan, no, it will augment email. - Paul Buchheit

The fact that Google Wave was not part of Gmail's roadmap and in fact is positioned as "the future of e-mail" was a sign to me that Google is now large enough to suffer the kind of organizational dysfunction that has done in its predecessors. As you mentioned, e-mail will be with us for a long time. It would have been better to position it as "the future of collaboration" and indicate... more... - Dare Obasanjo

Speaking of gmail-wave integration: http://www.engadget.com/2009... - Mitch

There was shortage of wave invites when it came out but now people are waiting to give wave invites. I didn't see any of my friends returning to wave after they used it once. I log into wave everyday just to see if there are any improvements. - Ashish

Paul - Great insights! I too feel Wave is most suited as a team collaboration / productivity tool. The biggest hurdle is loss of context and convo structure. Once the wave team better organizes the UI, then it can go mainstream. Wave integration with gmail would be super cool and highly useful, plus it greatly would speed up user adoption. - Susan Beebe

I just posted my comment above on your blog, facebook and here - LOL :) - Susan Beebe

Mitch - cool share, thanks - Susan Beebe

"The chronological flow of the conversation is lost." That's exactly the issue. Playback tries to address it but doesn't quite. I think there are other ways to do this, that will be tried both inside and outside Google. I'm thrilled that Google didn't force the Wave team to be part of Gmail from the start, because that would have added all kinds of unnecessary constraints. This way Wave can try lots of new stuff and Gmail can adopt what sticks. - Daniel Dulitz

It's Sharepoint started from the web side instead of Office - Nick Lothian

I had assumed that at some point Google would merge Wave and Gmail. It seems the natural progression. Also, I think the linearity problem will be addressed when they can figure a way to easily mark the new replies so that you can quickly see them - maybe in some from of selectable overlay or view of the wave - Martha

Don't we think they should merge Gmail and Wave because we don't check our waves as often as our emails? What if we all had a cross-browser and mobile notification system for both Wave and email? Since I have installed the Chrome checker extensions for Wave and Gmail, the question of a merger doesn't make any sense. I can easily email and wave the same way I use Facebook, Friendfeed and... more... - Jérôme

PS: here's the Wave extension I use http://www.jeremyselier.com/entry... - Jérôme

No, I think Google should merge Gmail and Wave because many times in the middle of an email conversation I wish I had wave functionality. Because the conversation has gotten hard to understand and I want to play it back. Because different subthreads have different people on them for no good reason. Because an idea has turned into a proposal and the words aren't quite right. - Daniel Dulitz

Here's a specific type of merger I think could work. Wave "merges" with Gmail, GChat, and Docs, in that whenever you create an email/IM/doc you are creating a wave. Anyone can see that wave in its full realtime nonlinear glory from the product Wave. Any wave you have (whether started from Docs or email or...) can be seen in Wave. But Gmail, GChat, Docs, etc. provide only some functions... more... - Daniel Dulitz

@Daniel Dulitz sounds somewhat like how social networking aggregator such as friendfeed works. This way Google wave will aggregate all the activities of gmail,Gchat, docs and other "google activity" in one place. - Ashish

I am not so sure about Gmail or Gchat and how you would integrate them-- as Wave seems to have similar and some cases superior functionality that supplants them but being able to collaborate on the production/editing of Google docs in real time perhaps using Google voice conferencing would be nearing a game changer. - Brian Sullivan

That would be great, Daniel. But I think it would require *a lot* of work for some teams at Google and some good explanations to users. I'm sure we'll find specific usages for Wave. Personally, I would let the service grow by itself, without complicating other services. Imagine if I start a Wave and some of my friends participate in it through Docs, some other from Gmail: many troubles... more... - Jérôme

@Dare: I disagree that Wave is evidence of organizational dysfunction (not saying there *is* not such dysfunction, but Wave certainly doesn't prove it). Whether you love it or hate it, and whether or not you think it will be successful, I believe it's evidence of a company that wants to continue to take risks and innovate in the face of organizational momentum. Why wasn't Wave part of... more... - Joel Webber

It seems like the only big issue is the non-linearity of Wave. So, instead of merging other products to offer alternative (somehow), why not let the creator/owner of a Wave choose if blips should be linear? - Jérôme

Well Paul, I also think Wave is very clever. Yet I see a few problems regarding the launch process: 1. They launched it exactly like Gmail, by reducing invitation supply & delaying invitation delivery. Yet, unlike an e-mail account and a web based e-mail client this is a collaborative tool that you can not use alone. That's the main reason most influencers and early adopters are... more... - Cem ARGUN

Regarding my proposed merger... I think part of the problem of Wave is that it has too much capability for many people, but real experts (may) like the full-on experience. So let's make everything a wave. Experts interact with those things in Wave or some other full-on experience. But people in the slow lane can interact with _the same wave_ using "views" they are more familiar with --... more... - Daniel Dulitz

Jérôme, in addition to "linearity" there is also the issue of edits versus replies. Also, what do you mean by allowing the creator to choose if blips should be linear? Transforms are sequential today; the whole question is how to extract "(conversational) linearity" from "mere sequence." Linearity is a UI issue. Why allow the creator to specify the reader's UI, instead of leaving it up... more... - Daniel Dulitz

My definition of linearity is rather basic, as is my English :) I meant "non-threaded" conversation, just like here. I think most of the confusion comes from realtime hierarchical conversations: we can't determine easily where the discussion is going at a given moment. As a doc, a Wave must support sub-threads, but as a conversation it may be helpful to oblige participants to respond to... more... - Jérôme

Keep in mind that's there's a difference between the Wave Protocol/Architecture, and the Wave client, just like there's a difference between SMTP/IMAP and Outlook (vs Gmail). If the UI is not streamlined for a particular use case, then perhaps other clients can be designed which leverage Wave infrastructure, but provide a more optimal experience for a given problem space. - Ray Cromwell

Jérôme, in my view not even email obliges people to respond only to the most recent email in the thread. Maybe Wave should always show a compressed "timeline" view of every event. Perhaps a very zoomed-out icon of the whole wave in the upper-left corner of the wave, showing its blip structure, nesting, etc., with hotspots everywhere there's a change you haven't read yet. To the right of... more... - Daniel Dulitz

Paul Buchheit to Paul's feed, Clare Dibble

Hacker News | What should I choose, PhD or startup? - http://news.ycombinator.com/item...

November 27, 2009 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Fabrizio Giordano, Alberto Bietti, Space Cowboy and 18 other people liked this

for Clare :). The comments are kind of amusing. - Paul Buchheit from Bookmarklet

5 more comments

Thank you for putting up this post. I'm going through the same thing. I can't decide whether to get my PHD or start working. - FunkyRose

"Lots of choices in life is about choosing one or another, and it will never be clear which was the best, and there is no "scientific" way of choosing, lots of luck are involved too." - Clare Dibble

FunkyRose, what did you take from the post? what is your field? - Clare Dibble

I'm an MBA student and I'm almost done doing my degree. - FunkyRose

In the case presented , I would pick the startup. But otherwise , I would say pick a PhD, it gets difficult to do one later in life..and its generally a rewarding learning experience. - Hari

There are also arguments that startups are also difficult to do later in life. :-) Not that I agree with either premise. - Piaw Na

Matt Cutts

Google will talk about launch plans for Chrome OS at 10am Pacific. You can watch the webcast: http://www.google.com/intl...

November 19, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

anil madamala, Robert DeBord, Sebastian and 7 other people liked this

Shey

Google Makes A Bid To Control The Internet - http://regulargeek.com/2009...

November 18, 2009 from Google Reader - Comment - Like - Share

edythe and Cornelius Toole liked this

Tim O'Reilly

RT @bjepson: Buy @jonathanstark's early release ebook bundle (Mobi+PDF+ePub), get free updates when it's released: http://oreilly.com/catalog...

November 17, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole liked this

Gabor Cselle

One Feature of Go that Every Programming Language Needs to Have - http://www.gaborcselle.com/blog...

November 13, 2009 from Gabor hits Send - Comment - Like - Share

Tracy, imabonehead, deerstep and 12 other people liked this

Named return parameters are awesome, but it still doesn't eliminate the need for reference parameters. - Gabe

10 more comments

There are two things here: multiple return and named return. You can have multiple return and de-structuring assignment without named return, e.g. foo() { return (a,b); } x,y = foo(); Many languages implement this. Some go further with and allow de-structuring assignments, like this swap operation: [a, b] = [b,a]. One thing that concerns me about this named return value stuff is that it... more... - Ray Cromwell

I love multiple return values, but the named return values seems a bit dodgy. In the example on your page, it looks nice, but I agree with Ray about the implications in a longer function. - Joey Gibson

The problem with unnamed return values is that you don't know what order to put them in. How do you know if the GetNames function is supposed to be "return firstname, lastname" or "return lastname, firstname"? The solution is to name them so you can have "return {firstname=f, lastname=l}" and not have to worry that you got the order wrong. - Gabe

That's a reasonable point, but then I would say that you shouldn't just have a 'naked return', but rather something like the syntax you wrote. Of course, it works both ways -- you could get the method parameters in the wrong order as well, so named parameters would help fix that. :) - Ray Cromwell

Gabe - do you mean that if say "firstname, lastname = GetNames()" it will return "Robert, Felty", and if I say "lastname, firstname = GetNames()" it will return "Felty, Robert"? - Robert Felty

Rob: Maybe something like "with GetNames() { fn, ln = .firstname, .lastname }" - Gabe

That makes sense Gabe. What languages currently have a "with"? - Robert Felty

The "with" statement goes back many decades. Pascal and similar languages (like Modula) have one, but it's more like Javascript's let statement. JS has a with statement, but it's almost too pointless to use. VB's with statement was the one I was approximating, and is probably the best syntax for one. Ada has a with statement, but it's for importing packages, so it's nothing like in the other languages I described. - Gabe

Hm, Pascal's "with" works exacly like JS's one, AFAIR. - Alex Kapranoff

Alex, it seems you are right. It's been decades since I've used Pascal, and misremembered. - Gabe

Also, Python's with statement (new for 2.6) is actually more like C#'s using. Actually, C# has a few different ways of using "using". One way is to import a package into your namespace, like Ada's with statement. Another way is to declare a variable to be initialized at the beginning of a block and make sure it is destroyed at the end of the block, like Python's with statement. - Gabe

Gina

Follow your waves - Google Wave Blog - http://googlewave.blogspot.com/2009...

November 15, 2009 from delicious - Comment - Like - Share

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When you see a public wave that you would like to get updates on, you can chose to follow it by hitting the follow button in the wave panel toolbar. - Gina

Tim O'Reilly

Interview with me in Entrepreneur Magazine: Radicals and Visionaries http://www.entrepreneur.com/magazin...

November 14, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

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Paul Buchheit

An early birthday present: The Gmail Javascript compiler was just open-sourced! http://code.google.com/closure... (it compiles JS into smaller, faster JS)

November 5, 2009 - Comment - Like - Share

mel, Mona Nomura, Uğur Aslan and 104 other people liked this

We first started work on it almost 8 years ago. It has come a long way since then :) - Paul Buchheit

31 more comments

Happy Birthday Paul! - AJ Batac :)

Today is actually just my internet birthday. - Paul Buchheit

Well, thanks :) But for a verbose API I'll stick with YUI :P Have to inspect the power of templating and compiler, though. - Claudio Cicali

I wonder what happens when you apply it recursively -- can you get down to 1 byte of code that takes no time to execute? ;=) - Brian Sullivan

Finally! This is great. - Tudor Bosman

Happy Birthday! - Robert Scoble

Nice! - Micah

Unfortunately it looks like the internationalization features may be missing. I wonder why those were removed? (or if I'm just not seeing it) - Paul Buchheit

Paul you are my best-friend :`( - deerstep

if you were starting a new site today, would you use this over jquery (which friendfeed uses)? - Karl Rosaen

Karl, jquery is a library, this is a compiler. I would use them both. - Paul Buchheit

well, i mean closure library :) but yeah, they could be used together - Karl Rosaen

ah, i see this is a link closure compiler, not the broader closure tools. - Karl Rosaen

Refactoring, JS style. - Gabe

Now, this is a good news - Özkan Altuner

@Paul the Closure project has three components: compiler, library, and template language. Looks like the Closure/library might be competing with jQuery. - Shakeel Mahate

this is sweet! - Jay

I think jQuery does a lot of stuff that might confuse the compiler, e.g. iterating over an array of string function names and creating new function wrappers (look at the way the parent/child/next/prev/etc functions get installed) The Closure library is also full of type annotations that help the compiler make better optimization choices, so you're likely to get a better compiled outcome using Closure than jQuery + fixes + compiler - Ray Cromwell

@paul -- I know you've been wanting this opensourced for a long time. sorry it took such a long time. Nick Santos and the jscompiler team has finally done it! Cheers! - Jing Lim

Happy Birthday - Ashish

Many happy returns!! - Count Caturday

Happy Birthday, Paul! - Andrew Terry

Happy Birthday Paul - Sandeep Kalidindi

Happy B'day Paul! don't be evil :) - sirishkumar

Congratulations to the team (and @Paul & Jing) -- I know everyone's been waiting a long time for this. For anyone considering whether to use jQuery vs Closure, consider that they're meant for largely different purposes. jQuery's good for enhancing static web pages; Closure's much better at building large apps. And as Ray points out above, Closure the library is going to get much better results from Closure the compiler than an arbitrary js library would, because of all the type annotations. - Joel Webber

Paul Buchheit has been at the top of my best of pages all month. Rock on, Paul. - Donald C. Lindsay

Hey HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAUL !!! Cool present!! <insert CAKE> :D - Susan Beebe

Paul, any comment on this write up? http://www.sitepoint.com/blogs... - Sachin Sebastian

That writeup is trolling for traffic IMHO. Nit picking 50 lines out of 200+ thousand (written for readability, which get compiled and optimized), providing no benchmarks for claims, and spending half the time bashing Java, it just seems to be struggling to find something wrong with Closure. - Ray Cromwell

Sachin: he seems to be commenting on Closure the JS library, not Closure the JS compiler (that Paul's post was about). And he may be a douchebag, but I haven't seen anything I disagree with. - Gabe

@Sachin: I hate to be too harsh, but that post is pretty much garbage. From what I can tell he's pretty much managed to enumerate some of the worst things about Javascript -- nitpicking the code for referencing "undefined" directly without declaring it as an uninitialized local? That's insane. Following this advice is mostly a recipe for an unreadable mess. Also, look in the comments for several refutations of the idea that some of these are even optimizations. - Joel Webber

Joel, you're just not man enough to handle a language where 'top' is an implicitly reserved keyword, and 'undefined' which should be, isn't. But it could be worse, 'null' could be something you could override. :) - Ray Cromwell

Aaron Crews

Superfeedr : Real-time feed parsing in the cloud for web-developers - http://superfeedr.com/

September 3, 2009 from delicious - Comment - Like - Share

Marek Blazek, hiroshimo, Tomonori Murakami and 8 other people liked this

Real-time rss client - Aaron Crews

11 more comments

Let me know what you think and if I can help with Superfeedr :) - Julien

True to form, that comment came quickly! I'm trying to sort out the best way to get real-time notifications of posts inside a firewall. Pubsubhubbub won't work because I don't want to send feed contents. I'm looking at RSScloud. That'll ping some service through the firewall, which will notify me (back inside the firewall), and then my client can retrieve the content. - Aaron Crews

Why don't you want to send the feed contents? Are they authenticated feeds? - Brett Slatkin

They're generated inside the firewall, so for legal reasons, etc, I want to keep the content in the enterprise. - Aaron Crews

Another option could be hosting my own private pubsubhub since it's open-source, but I don't know of any good clients that I could use. - Aaron Crews

PubSubHubbub (and rssCloud) are primarily for doing messaging between two separate providers. It's an integration protocol. If you're entirely behind the firewall, why not use a simple message queueing service like Starling or RabbitMQ? - Brett Slatkin

Brett - the simple answer is because I didn't know about Starling or RabbitMQ :) Thanks for the suggestions. I'll have to look them up. - Aaron Crews

Well, I guess you find your way;) At superfeedr, we have an XMPP API that passes through firewalls pretty easily, maybe it's worth looking into that direction as well? - Julien

Julien - that's very interesting. XMPP would work great, too. I am interested in that option. A lot of cool stuff to look into, including the multiuser chat. - Aaron Crews

Good! Well, you know where to find me if you have any question/problem... - Julien

Just now getting to this - looks like I can do some fancy things with RabbitMQ, the ejabberd XMPP gateway, and rabbithub (http://github.com/tonyg...). - Aaron Crews

Yup. Please send an email with more questions (julien@superfeedr.com), I'd be happy to answer! - testingsupsuperfeedr

Rah-PM 2012

I liked it, so I finally put a ring on it. - http://pikchur.com/Fz2

August 23, 2009 - Comment - Like - Share

Paul, @Renchin@, Victor Ganata and 123 other people liked this

Congratulations!! (if I am interpreting this correctly) - joey

65 more comments

Yeah. LOL. I just made it official, like in the Thriller video...except that I didn't turn into a werewolf and chase her through the woods.... - Rah-PM 2012

Congrats!! - iTad

congrats - MiniMage, enterRUPPted

Congratulations to you both! - WoH: Minding her Steves

Congrats!!! - RAPatton from iPhone

Very good, my dear Rah! - Derrick

Congrats, Rah! - Pete D

Congrats to both of you, Rah! - ha3rvey (Hugs 50% off!)

Congratulations! - Spidra Webster

Congratulations!!! - Michael Fidler

Congratulations, Rah! - Micah

Congrats Rahsheen! - Hutch Carpenter

Congrats to both of you! - Jandy

Way to go Rah! Congratulations! - DJ Stevie Steve

Nice work. - Louis Gray

Awesome... don't know her from Eve... But from what I've gleaned from you online. She's got a good guy. Congrats! - SAM

Congrats! - imabonehead

congrats then :) - webosapien (Burcu Tüzün)

Congratulations man :) - LANjackal

Congratulations, Rah! :-D - Kol Tregaskes

Congratulations! - Anne Bouey

Congratulations! ^__^ - Abhishek

"it" ? ;) Congratulations though ! - ɯɥøq sɐɯoɥʇ

*wonders if he should put on leotards, a metallic hand and run up the wall...* Congrats man! - Johnny

Congrats man!!! - Marco(aureliusmaximus)

Congratulations!! :) - Emma

Congrats! - LB shining

ویدا بیا برات حلقه ازدواج خریده دوستت :)) - Mil∂d

congratulations to you and, um, "it" ;) - Que Sarah Sarah

Congrats! - jbrotherlove

Congratulations, dude! - Daniel B. Honigman

Woohoo! Congratulations! - Ladyepiphanybug

Congrats! - Shevonne

Congratulations! :) - JA Castillo

Congrats. :) - Kevin Winn

Congrats! - MoTO Bott

میلاد :)))))))))))) انگشترش رو دوست نداشتم نامزدی رو به هم زدم :دی - Viva Vida

Oh that's awesome!! Congrats! - Just Katie

Congrats! - anna sauce

Yay! Congratulations!! - Yolanda

Congrats, happy for you Rahsheen!!! - YoYo_P

Congrats, Rahsheen!!! - Live4Emma (L4S) from iPhone

Congrats :) - Rodfather

Not fair that the lady gets to wear a fancy ring before we even do the church thing. What's the point of being engaged if you can't flaunt it? LOL. Thanks everyone :) - Rah-PM 2012

Woot! Congrats. :) - Jen (SquirrelGirl) from iPhone

Congrats! That's fantastic news...! - sean808080

Congratulations! Welcome to the ranks of those of us promised and intended to the love of our lives =) Aloha! - Arleen Boyd

woohoo! congrats! - Leslie Poston

Congrats, Young Sheen! - Bryan R. Adams

CONGRATULATIONS!!!! :) - Susan Beebe

congrats and good luck! :) - Tim Hoeck

Alright, Rah! Happiest best wishes to you both! - Ayşe E.

Congrats! - xero

Congratulations, Rahsheen and Trail! - Anika

Congrats Rah! - Justin Korn

woooooo hooooo! - metalerik

CONGRATS MAN! - AJ Batac :)

So very nice. Congratulations! - Martha

Congratulations!! - Erica Thompson Briggs

CONGRATS!!! - David Cook

Congratulations!! - Harold

Congratulations, Rahsheen! I had a similar thought for Harold when he gave me my ring: "Gee, kind of unfair the guy doesn't get to wear something too until the wedding." - Kamilah Reed (K. Gill)

Congratulations! - Tracy Benham

Way to go... May you have a wonderful life together. - Mitchell Tsai

bump. - Rah-PM 2012

bump^2 - imabonehead

Vaughn

Skype will be Open Source - http://linuxcrunch.com/content...

November 5, 2009 from Digg - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole liked this

Fast Company

Vertical Farms, a Tower of B.S. - http://www.fastcompany.com/blog...

November 5, 2009 from Fast Company - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole liked this

Paul Buchheit

Almost nobody understood my earlier webapp idea, so I'll try again. Imagine you were looking at a website such as FriendFeed and you wanted to create a near pixel-perfect copy but in a way that you could move things around, adjust shadows, etc. I want a tool that makes that easy.

September 5, 2008 - Comment - Like - Share

Meryn Stol, Charles Ying, Morton Fox and 26 other people liked this

And without taking screenshots or copying the html, since the point is that it should have the power to quickly create something that looks just like our current ui. Also, it should be web based, because then fonts, etc will be right, and also I hate installing things. My previous attempt at explaining this: http://friendfeed.com/e... (Balsamiq is not what I want). It does not need to produce html though, so it can cheat anyway it likes. - Paul Buchheit

29 more comments

So you wanna something like "html to png/psd"? Editable graphical interface with layers and stuff? - Selim Yoruk

No, not at all. My point is that you could look at the the FriendFeed ui (with your eyes) and then create something that looked just like it. - Paul Buchheit

Fireworks is pixel perfect, correct font sizes and previews image in browser. Yes/No? - Toby Graham

Are you looking for something like what is mentioned in this article - http://www.labnol.org/interne... - Atul Arora

Are you want something like web-based rich page editor which works with objects in manner the human see them and want change them? - gmarketer

I guess it's difficult to explain something that doesn't exist :( - Paul Buchheit

thats piracy!!! - Arjun

Paul, I like the idea, it's got merit. There's plenty of tools that do half the job, that is, snip the page. The second part, i'm not overly familiar with the tools out there. The manipulation. I guess you could snip the page, and embed into your tool a js library, like scriptaculous, and attach special event significance to the controls/tags, for moving, dropping, dragging. - Stu Andrews

I think I get what you mean now and I agree. That's not very helpful but hey. In the mean time you could edit the page live using firebug maybe? - Toby Graham

It seems to me like you want the Visual Studio Win Forms designer for web apps hosted and served to designers as a web app. Drag and drop elements onto the page and adjust their properties in a property grid. Then send a link to others so you can share your concept. - Eric Schoonover

For this, I use simple vector graphics editing app, like Xara or InkScape - I just make screenshots and use them as raw building blocks - usually I cut out from them small elements like controls/text-blocks/images/etc... In vector graphics enironment managing such kind of blocks is much more easier than in photoshop. - philsmirnov

remembers that this idea has been described by David Siegel in 1997 in his book : Creating Killer Web Sites (http://tinyurl.com/5skw63) - Oaksun

Paul, i think the edit-page command on ubiquity with the ability to: visually edit css and publish the changes is close to what you are describing. - Ian

Eric pretty much nailed the description of the dream tool that I think Paul was asking for. In my dream the web app is truly collaborative and has an active GUI. So you can adjust those properties using a mouse or tablet and anyone else on your design team can watch as you do it so they can make suggestions and modifications as you work. - David Muir

Let's say you want to make a mockup of FriendFeed called "FriendFood". You want it to generally have the same layout, only the top blue bar will actually have a background made of lasagna and a font that is made of French fries, and what shows on the page is everything people write about food on the regular FF, like "pasta OR bean OR potato OR steak". But you'd like someone to be able to do that from the web and without messing into much coding. Is that it? - Rodrigo Jaroszewski

http://blogoscoped.com/video... - Philipp Lenssen

I use OmniGraffle for this purpose. - Jason Wehmhoener

Could you achieve it by using Firebug and tweaking the CSS? - Shakeel Mahate

So something with the usability of say, omnigraffle, but that only used webkit for its rendering. With text controlled and positioned by actual css so that line spacing etc were correct, although again with a simpler UI than CSS has. - Robin Barooah

Paul - I _just_ came across a site that did exactly that. Unfortunately, Safari's browser history is failing me and I can't find it anymore. Doh! - Patrick Lightbody

Paul, not sure if you're still reading, but are you looking for interaction design changes as well, or just appearance? - Mark Trapp

Did you try "PENCIL" an add-on for Firefox http://www.evolus.vn/Pencil/ - Francois Lamotte

I had never heard of Pencil, but it sure looks a lot like what I think Paul is describing. - Jason Wehmhoener

I use ScrapBook Firefox extension to capture the page as is, and then edit that using Firebug. - Jughead

Thanks @Francois. Pencil looks quite promising... - Ashwin Bharambe

Firefox Webchunks? Does only the snipping part though. Perhaps an add-on to webchunks that will let us use all those chunks together. - Vamsee

it'd be kind of like pushing edit on a wiki, right. like, firefox would have an edit button then you could visually redo the page - Coleman Foley

There's also Axure RP, something I found a while ago. http://www.google.com/search... - jho

Dosen't ASP.Net do that already??? - Roberto Bonini

One quick tip in Photoshop is to turn off anti-aliasing and use your various web fonts (Arial, Verdana, Helvetica, etc.) and use your preferred font size in pixels/points... This will provide you with screen accurate font appearances and sizes. The biggest problem with a "pixel-perfect" browser rendering is that it will never be consistent from browser to browser. They all render ever... more... - Nathan Chase

Tim O'Reilly

Fascinating NYT article about running and evolutionary biology: The Human Body Is Built for Distance http://www.nytimes.com/2009...

November 4, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole, Charanjit, Antonio Rossano and Atul Arora liked this

Corvida

RT @Avinio: 15+ great Google Chrome extensions http://www.pheedcontent.com/click...

November 2, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Cornelius Toole liked this

Gina

Thrilled to release my new book on Google Wave w/ @adampash today, free to read and share http://completewaveguide.com/

October 31, 2009 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Cameron Neylon, Cornelius Toole, suelibrarian and 4 other people liked this

Paul Buchheit

ooc - low-level / high-level goodness - http://ooc-lang.org/

October 28, 2009 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Alberto Bietti, Shivanand Velmurugan, JMaultasch and 50 other people liked this

Looks promising. C++ is too much of a disaster -- we need a real successor to C. "ooc is a modern, object-oriented, functional-ish, high-level, low-level, sexy programming language. it's translated to pure C with a source-to-source compiler. it strives to be powerful, modular, extensible, portable, yet simple and fast." - Paul Buchheit from Bookmarklet

89 more comments

Meh. I dislike post-fix'd declarations, and given that the assignment operator is frequently used, I think C's decision to make it a single character operator is the correct one. Otherwise, it doesn't seem any better than say, Objective C, D, or any of the other languages vying to be the next C. - Piaw Na

Have you looked at the D language? http://www.digitalmars.com/d/ It's been around for years and near the top of language shootouts in performance. - Ray Cromwell

Pointers? Do we really need pointers? - Gabe

Yes, if you're doing a systems language, you need pointers --- for writing device drivers, if nothing else. - Piaw Na

Based on the sample code, it appears to have a very direct interface to C, which I think is important for a systems language. For most things I'd rather just use Python, but for lower-level, perf-critical stuff, we need something else. D looks like too much, but I haven't tried it. - Paul Buchheit

Type inference, yummy - a main reason why Scala has mad traction these days - Christopher Galtenberg

Start by creating a really lightweight and easy to use development environment. I should be able to teach Jay Rosen to program in it. Back in the 80s there was serious compeititon in this area -- from Borland with Turbo Pascal and on the Mac, from Think Technologies with their C and Pascal systems. The languages aren't the issue, at least not for me. I want to program in C again, but the curve is too steep in all the environments. Give me a Turbo environment and some nice libraries, and lets go! :-) - Dave Winer

Dave: http://tryruby.sophrinix.com <- that kind of easy - Christopher Galtenberg

Piaw Na: For ':=' I've just made a homepage edit to make it very clear. := is decl-assign. Regular assign is '=' as in C/Java/etc. RTFM! ;) - 'n ddrylliog

Piaw Na: As for trying to be the next C... well, no =) The next C is probably C itself, since C hackers are way too picky to be satisfied with anyside above C (in high-level/low-level terms) - 'n ddrylliog

Btw, why is everyone thinking of ooc as a systems language? It can be used as such, but it's not really the goal. Do you all think so because it's compiled? - 'n ddrylliog

I'm thinking of it as a systems language because that's what I want. We already have reasonable options for higher-level stuff, but when writing a database or whatever, we're stuck with C or C++. - Paul Buchheit

Paul Buchheit: Hmm. High-performance implementations of current reasonable high-level languages are still pretty much experimental :/ (unladen swallow, shedskin, etc.) Why sacrifice performance? Many compiled languages have shown that expressivity isn't reserved to "interpreted" languages. =) - 'n ddrylliog

Piaw Na: about ooc being better or worse than Objective-C, D, etc. Well, D is really complex. It gives a *lot* of control, but it makes code less readable imho. As much as you may currently dislike it, the ooc syntax is (for some at least) more readable, so more maintainable, in general simpler, etc. (a lot less trickier than C++, for example. And if you don't see what I'm talking about, you haven't done enough C++) - 'n ddrylliog

Ocaml is pretty expressive, it has a REPL, and it's been in the top of the language shootout benchmarks for years. - Ray Cromwell

How does ooc compare to C#? If I had to write something like a compiler, I'd use C#. - Gabe

The missing dots really bother me. - τorƍue

C++ a disaster? I don't think so, its main problem is the lack of high level straightforward frameworks. IMHO generic programming is a deeper paradigm than OOP, but like functional languages has a slow learning curve, look at the matrix implementations/compiler optimizations in Boost! - Sebastian Wain from iPhone

Sebastian: C++ has lots of significant problems. For example, it's actually 3 languages: precompiler (#define), C++, and templates. The template language is so powerful that you can't even tell if the compiler will halt on a given program, let alone understand the error messages it produces. Just the shear size of the language, manual memory management, things like multiple inheritance, and vast overlapping standard libraries make it hard to program in by giving the progammer an overly large cognitive load. - Gabe

My two biggest gripes: Error messages from templates, specially from STL, can be notoriously hard to track down. And secondly, default implicit conversions can lead to hard to track down bugs. When you have a type system so complex you have to mentally "run the compiler" as you code, something's wrong. - Ray Cromwell

I've been doing nothing but C++ lately. It's not bad, but only because everyone subsets it. The compilers are horrible, but I don't think that's because nobody has an incentive to improve g++'s front-end. - Piaw Na

Ouch. decl-assign is terrible. I hate that. I think C's syntax (e.g., int a = 3; ) is much better than decl- assign. If you want to imitate C, at least make the declarations C-like. Personally, I think language design should be performed so that you can hand-code a compiler (i.e., no lex & yacc). Why? Because hand-coded compilers can much more easily produce human readable error... more... - Piaw Na

I've seen it argued that LL(k) compiler-compilers don't have this fault, because they generate recursive decent parsers that look somewhat like what you'd write by hand, JavaCC certainly has this attribute for example. Although I'm quite fond of the parser-combinator approach now. - Ray Cromwell

Gabe: the issue is: when you need performance you must follow the C++ path. Don't forget http://theory.stanford.edu/~amitp... - Sebastian Wain

What Ray said. yacc uses an LALR parser, and LALR parsers are kind of notorious for producing inscrutable error messages. LL(k) compiler-compilers can generate much more intuitive error messages, and the code they generate often looks like something a human would write. Both JavaCC and ANTLR are good LL(k) compiler-compilers. I believe LL(k) parsers aren't strictly as powerful as LALR... more... - Laurence Gonsalves

On the topic of ooc: the "object [space] method-call()" syntax is the most jarring thing about the syntax for me. I'm surprised that there doesn't seem to be any actual introduction to that syntax on the linked page -- it's just used several times without explanation. Also, I have to say I'm not a fan of conservative garbage collection. - Laurence Gonsalves

Yes, when I hand code parsers, I write them in recursive descent form. The problem with C++ is that it's not easily parseable in that form. And seriously, any language where you can write map<string, string>, but have to write map<string, vector<string> > is seriously messed up. - Piaw Na

+1 to Laurence's comment about conservative GC: that's plain evil. - Piaw Na

Yeah, Piaw only uses progressive GC, and even then he keeps complaining that it's finding ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. - Daniel Dulitz

I believe JavaCC grammar repo has a relatively straightforward C++ grammar implemented, using LL(k) - Ray Cromwell

Piaw Na: You got so much wrong in so few comments that it's actually worrying. Decl-assign is not terrible. It's called type inference, and is used in a lot of modern languages (ML, C#, Scala) to make our lives easier, and limits repeating yourself and it works damn well. Grow up and learn other languages. So no, the goal is not to imitate C. Go use Objective-C/C#/C++/Java/D if you want C-like languages. - 'n ddrylliog

Piaw Na: Second: I have hand-written the ooc 0.3 compiler's parser, and it was a piece of cake, because the syntax is so simple and unambiguous. Having "object[space]field" is a non-issues since declarations are "name: type". And you're mistaken in thinking that the fact you can hand-write a parser for a grammar means that it's simple. It's the other way around. If you can write a LL(K)/LR/PEG grammar, then the syntax is *very* straightforward. And the new ooc compiler (rock) uses a PEG grammar.. - 'n ddrylliog

Conservative Garbage Collector: There are advantages 1) the performance is a lot better than you would expect (and actually faster than plain malloc/free for lots of small objects) 2) there are advantages, e.g. seamless integrations with all the C libs out there. 3) Writing a GC isn't easy, the Boehm has been around for years and is well-tested/optimized, portable, etc. Read the papers please :/ This thread is a showcase of ignorance and arrogance. - 'n ddrylliog

As for "Language blah is better". No, sorry, apples are not better than oranges. That's your personal taste. Well, good for you =) One size doesn't fit all. Why do you even bother? - 'n ddrylliog

why `diagonal := Vector3f new()` instead of `diagonal := new Vector3f()` or even `diagonal := Vector3f()` is this because someone felt he must not be like any other language? - Tzury Bar Yochay

I know several typed inference languages. I dislike them --- again, type inferencing never took off not because the technology was hard, but because programmers preferred the declarations --- it really helps. Not to mention tools like ctags/etags, etc., do a good job for popular programming environments (i.e., vi and emacs), which meant that languages without such support never get widespread use. - Piaw Na

Conservative Garbage Collector: 1) this is more an argument abut gc than conservative gc. I have no problems with gc, I just want accurate gc. 2) That's a fair point, but not enough to make me want to use conservative gc. I'd be happier managing resources from C libraries manually than worrying that hash values are confusing the collector. 3) Yes, writing a gc isn't easy, but I'm sure... more... - Laurence Gonsalves

@Piaw, a type inferenced language just means that the type is concretely there, just it doesn't need to be declared in syntax. Thus, any smart editor or IDE, or other tool could reify or show types on demand if the developer so chose. Ctags are a relatively primitive mechanism for source code indexing, once you have an editor which understands your language's AST/semantics, you don't... more... - Ray Cromwell

Tzury: why 'diagonal := Vector3f new()'? Because new is simply a static method: http://ooc-lang.org/blog... Your definition of "any other language" must be "Java and C++" and both are inconsistent/magical on this issue, as opposed to, yeah, pretty much "any other language" (Smalltalk, Ruby, Io, ...) - 'n ddrylliog

I've never heard of this before. Feel a bit disconnected. - mikepk

Ray: for better or worse, most programmers out there are using Emcas and vi. Why? Because no other tool scales up when you're dealing with large code bases. (That's one reason why even some Java programmers at Google use vi and Emacs) I don't care how primitive the tools are, they have to get things done. - Piaw Na

I agree with Laurence about conservative GC. The big one is memory fragmentation. Once upon a time, when all we ever wrote were desktop apps, memory fragmentation didn't matter. For server side applications, it matters a heck of a lot, and any language that uses conservative gc might as well provide the delete operator. - Piaw Na

C++ can be used quite effectively without STL or complicated templates, but it will never be safe from corruption or memory leaks. - Todd Hoff

I love lamp. - Mark J

@Laurence 1) Yes and no. The performance gap between good conservative and precise (/accurate/exact) garbage collectors is less significant than one would think. 2) That's a valid point 3) Actually, I've thought of using Steve Dekorte's libgarbagecollector (look on GitHub). These are still plans though, Boehm was clearly the easiest option to start with, and ooc itself isn't bound to... more... - 'n ddrylliog

Easily one of the most fascinating threads on FriendFeed right now. You guys are talking mostly over my head but it reminds me that I need to get my ass out of managed languages one day. - Akiva

@mikepk The language+impl has only been out there for a few months. =) - 'n ddrylliog

@Todd Totally agreed, which explains some design choices in ooc. Memory leaks is a non-issue with a GC, and as for corruption, as long as you stay out of manual memory manipulation, the compiler does most the checking for you, statically. - 'n ddrylliog

@piaw: I think we're mostly in agreement, but I really don't think it's fair to say that "most programmers use Emacs and vi". I use vi a lot, but when it comes to Java/Scala code bases, I still use Eclipse (or IntelliJ, or whatever). Even at Google. I just don't map the *entire* Google Java code base into my workspace at once. I'm pretty sure the vast majority of Java developers at... more... - Joel Webber

Joel: sure, you can play tricks like mapping only what you use. But a surprising number of Java users at Google kick up vim/emacs just so they can use the *fast* low-latency search tools when they need to read code outside of what they've mapped. The numbers were really surprising to me. - Piaw Na

I've been using emacs for 2 decades and I still use it when I need to quickly edit something or slice and dice text with macros (or I write sed/perl to do it). But when I'm developing stuff, a switchover point occurs where emacs is no longer sufficient and I desire the IDE. Emacs is great for scripts where you can test for errors via a quick eval, but the cost of a compile is high in... more... - Ray Cromwell

There is, once you get into Google-size (or even Linux-kernel-sized) code bases. But I guess I've living in the Google bubble for so long, the concept of not having mega-libraries doesn't even occur to me. And we've built enough fancy tools at Google that make Emacs way faster than Eclipse/IntelliJ (see http://code.google.com/p...). Latency matters! - Piaw Na

Ultimately, this is a search problem, something that google excels at. I'm not sure why you think Emacs has any innate advantage over Eclipse/IntelliJ for this. If GTags can be built for Emacs, it can be done for those IDEs. (Those IDEs already index all symbols and store them on disk) The issue here is that "find symbol" is necessary, but not sufficient, especially on large code bases.... more... - Ray Cromwell

Heh. I open sourced all the infrastructure, but not the ranking algorithms for code (which are google proprietary) Having seen lots of old Google hands work in Emacs, I think you'll find that they disagree. People have tried adding plugins to gtags for Eclipse/IntelliJ, but none have succeeded --- those IDEs aren't designed to take plugins quite the way Emacs does. Even Vim isn't as... more... - Piaw Na

As a practical example, the Linux kernel core (minus the whole driver universe) is about 500kloc. The GWT compiler, which I work on, is about 500kloc. I have zero complains about my IDE's ability (IntelliJ 9) to deal with this code base. Call it a medium sized code base if you will. Too big IMHO to practically use with Emacs/VI (where I desire refactoring and other navigational... more... - Ray Cromwell

What you'll find is that top engineers everywhere have heavily customized environments, scripts, editors, libraries, even their own programming languages, that make switching hard. Anecdotal evidence doesn't really prove anything, if "old hands" is meant to covey argument by authority. Like I said, I've been personally using Emacs since 1987, I use a bevy of ELisp, Perl, Awk, and other... more... - Ray Cromwell

I think the mindset difference is huge. Codebase too big? The IDE solution is to subset. The EMACS solution is to create a search index held in memory and apply search technology to it. The size of the community hacking away on these tools also matters. - Piaw Na

Piaw, you do realize that the IDE solution (I can't speak for Eclipse), is to build a search index and apply search technology? IntelliJ spiders all your reachable code and files on project setup (now, as a background process since it can take some time) and serves up IDE functions by consulting the index. In fact, it's very much like Google Suggest. I can type symbol lookup requests... more... - Ray Cromwell

Oh yeah, but they do it on disk and so have high latency when the code base scales up. I know, because people switch to Emacs/gtags from those IDEs for that reason. :-) - Piaw Na

Google's code base is large? I mean, I know the data it holds and indexes is very large, but somehow I assumed the code itself was quite small. - Andrew C (✓)

Actually, they cache some or all of the indices in memory depending on heap, at least according to the IntelliJ lead, if you increase heap, you lower cache thrashing. I still don't see why you think ETags/CTags/etc is any different in this regard. IntelliJ uses a similar index structure, it just records a bitmask on each tag as to the context (comment, identifier, method, field, etc).... more... - Ray Cromwell

@Andrew: I assume Piaw's talking about the *entire* code base, apps and all. That's a lot of code. - Joel Webber

gtags keeps it all in memory on a server, so there's no disk seek latency. There's nothing fundamental about the IDEs that makes this stuff impossible to do. It's just far easier to do in Emacs when there's just one of you. Once the prototype gets going, it's usefulness allows others to add in more useful functionality. Until recently, things like IntelliJ weren't even open source, so... more... - Piaw Na

Thanks Joel. Yes, I'm talking about the entire codebase. All of it. :-) - Piaw Na

@Piaw, Ray: It's becoming clear to me that we're all essentially saying the same thing. To deal with a large, complex code base, you need good tools. IDEs vs. Emacs isn't really much of a dichotomy if they're both building indices and cross-references of your code base and serving them up to you within the editor. They're both IDEs, n'est-ce pas? - Joel Webber

Yes, I'm just saying, if you need to build something in a hurry, it's far easier to do it in Emacs. But more importantly, ignoring a base of Emacs/Vi users when designing your programming language is ignoring a large percentage of the population. And in some cases, it's a large percentage of a very influential population. - Piaw Na

@Piaw I somehow lost your point between the "omg I don't like type inference" and the "you're ignoring Emacs/Vim users". It's still straight-forward to look for declarations of things, what's your problem? It's precisely why := and = are separate operators - 'n ddrylliog

You'll get no argument from me. I'm a fan of diversity in programming, and I do use emacs daily. IntelliJ/Eclipse would do well to offer a simple in-editor tool for building plugins via any Java scripting engine and support saving those persistently. I guess my point is, I can't live without Etags functionality, and now I can't live without all the other features I've gotten used to:... more... - Ray Cromwell

Even without any support, editing ooc in at text editor (I personally use Vim and Geany for .ooc) is very easy, cause you can search for "whatever:" (notice the ':') and be done with it. Try doing that with a C/C++/Java codebase =) That's the payback of a simple, non-ambiguous consistent syntax - 'n ddrylliog

And AFAIK, most ooc users/contributors/hackers use vim. A few use emacs, too. We have a vim syntax file, and a contributor is looking into writing an emacs mode. =) - 'n ddrylliog

@Piaw, Ray, et al: To finish my previous thought -- There will always be some point at which an IDE (be it Emacs or Eclipse) will fail to scale. The time and space required to deal with the code base eventually grows without bound, and you simply aren't going to load it into a single machine's memory. Even if you could load all of Google's code (or at least its index) into a single... more... - Joel Webber

Or you do the work to integrate the external search tool (or whatever) into the IDE. Emacs is designed to make that easy. The other IDEs that are around today, not so much. Code Search introduces a lot of latency. gtags as implemented internal to Google has sub 300ms response times. Whenever it goes down, I get complaints from people, declaring that "it's just too much work to remember where files are." - Piaw Na

I think Piaw's concern with type inference comes from the fact that explicitly stating the type of something acts as documentation. With type inference that documentation goes away. For example, in ooc, suppose I search for "whatever:" and I see "whatever:= foo()". What's the type? Whatever foo() returns. So now I have to look up foo(). Suppose it uses type inference on its return type (assuming that's possible in ooc). Now I have to dig even deeper. - Laurence Gonsalves

I'm guessing the IDE digression related to the fact that a sufficiently smart IDE can add the implicit type information back by doing the same type inference as the compiler. The problem with going down that road is that you're coupling the code editor and the language. Either your editor needs special language support so it can do the type inference, or you have to put up with not having an easy way of knowing something's type. - Laurence Gonsalves

I don't understand how you can do conservative garbage collection without leaking memory. - Gabe

Gabe: In theory, you can't. In practice, Hans Boehm did a lot of studies in the 1990s showing you that the leakage is very tiny. The real problem is memory fragmentation. With accurate GC, you can actually improve the locality of your data structures in memory (e.g., by putting elements of a linked list or array next to each other so a cache fetch brings them all into cache), with conservative GC, you can't do that. - Piaw Na

@Laurence: type inference: For me, the advantages far outweighs the drawback(s) (And, no, no return type inference in ooc). Plus, you don't *have to* use type inference. You can declare type explicitly in your whole codebase if you feel like it. - 'n ddrylliog

For the record: I'm not saying I necessarily agree with Piaw's distaste for type inference. I've thought about the issue in the past, but haven't used languages with type inference enough to have an opinion one way or the other. The lack of return type inference might be a good compromise, as it would tend to limit how far you'd have to search to figure out the type of something, while still eliminating a lot of the "busy work" in languages that require that you specify the type of everything. - Laurence Gonsalves

@Laurence You've come to the exact same reasoning as me =) - 'n ddrylliog

I do still think you should explain the "object[space]method-call" syntax somewhere on that page. Up until the point where you use that syntax ooc looks vaguely similar to C/Pascal/Algol/etc., so seeing this unfamiliar syntax with no explanation is confusing. - Laurence Gonsalves

@Laurence I just edited the homepage. Better now? - 'n ddrylliog

w.r.t. fragmentation and conservative GC: take a look at "Compacting garbage collection with ambiguous roots" by Joel Bartlett. Worked very well when I used it in a home-brew JVM for alphas at Dec/Compaq about twelve years ago. - Sanjay Ghemawat

I really like the way C# handles pointers and GC: All objects are allocated from the GC heap. If you need a pointer to a GC-able object, you only get it by pinning it. Once the pointer goes out of scope the object gets unpinned. And you can only use pointers in code marked "unsafe" so it's obvious to the reader. - Gabe

Gabe - does the fact that C# is not compiled to machine code like C++ make it slower? - Robert Felty

Rob: C# gets compiled to native machine code when you run the code. There's also a program that ships with .Net called ngen which will create a native image without having to run the code. - Gabe

It would be nice if Microsoft open-sourced C#/.net. I know there is Mono, but that seems like it will always be second-class. - Paul Buchheit

What happened to the "Opening .Net Framework's Source Code" project, any ideas? - Özkan Altuner

I guess Rotor isn't good enough, huh? - Gabe

I was thinking of an actual open/free license. - Paul Buchheit

Paul Graham on object orientation: http://www.paulgraham.com/noop... - Donald C. Lindsay

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