MetaMan

6 ms·

1.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Our judgement of the Roman / british legacy is subject to "Survivor Bias". If you can't see the cost paid by those who did not survive then things will look much better !
2.
by MetaMan 15y ago
The standard of living might have improved for the descendants of those that survived but what about those who had to undergo generations of subjugation or slavery or worse? What about those wiped out? In other words at what cost was this l
3.
by MetaMan 15y ago
The standard operating procedure of the British Empire was "divide and conquer". In order to rule a minority was usually put in a privileged position. It should be no surprise to anyone that when the British left things often become a mess
4.
by MetaMan 15y ago
"high point in world history" hahahaha - for who ? Look how many conflicts today have their roots in the decisions and actions of the British Empire. Seriously, yes, there were some side benefits eventually for the colonies but the cost wa
5.
by MetaMan 15y ago
well said !
6.
by MetaMan 15y ago
can you provide a link. I found 2 books with the same title and neither is free. Thanks
7.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Good points. Also since there will be loads of users stuck on Gingerbread / Froyo the N1 will probably be useful as a development test phone in my case.
8.
by MetaMan 15y ago
When did you get your IPhone 3G? I got my Nexus one around 14 months ago. I choose it because its was the official Google developer's phone and so mostly likely to get updated! Except of course we now know that the Android benchmark device
9.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Thanks. I think you have proven something that many of us have experienced - Android may have a number of technical advantages but its rollout management is unreliable and chaotic and so many non technical users may actually be better off w
10.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Agreed. But most of the crashes I see are of the former type (I.e developers fault). I honestly can't remember ever seeing a Flash crash actually bring down the the browser. Maybe I've been very lucky. I see that I'm getting down voted for
11.
by MetaMan 15y ago
For me there are many real world cases which can't be handled without showing the user a fatal error. E.g. - the developer asks for an runtime created asset that doesn't exist anymore or there's a condition under which a block of code runs
12.
by MetaMan 15y ago
"Crashing in a managed environment is never the developer's fault" !!! WHAT? Are you serious? Please educate us as to how that is done.
13.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Where did I say that that coding is the only useful thing? The point I was trying to make is that tools are productivity aids and if a tool gets in the way and distracts you from your main activity (or activities) too much it can be counter
14.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Err - Maybe we just resent having to spend so much time on the mechanics of the tool/s rather than our main activity which is writing code.
15.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Totally agree. We switched from SVN to Mercurial around 6 months ago and I have to say I am annoyed that I have to spend so much time messing around with the tool rather than coding.
16.
by MetaMan 15y ago
One of the comments on this article referred to this long but very insightful article. http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all-reflections-gop-operati...
17.
by MetaMan 15y ago
I agree with the principle of "over design" - we old guys call it "if it isn't broken don't fix it". However, some of his examples aren't convincing for me. I actually like the ugly Motion-X toggle switches compared to the IOS toggles which
18.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Hey - I like your approach. Its a sort of "for dummies" illustration of the indeterminate nature of 0^0 that everyone can understand.
19.
by MetaMan 15y ago
joe's reply clarified things somewhat - at least for me. Are replies always supposed to be rebuttals?
20.
by MetaMan 15y ago
HAHAHAHAHA - I can't believe anyone is taking this seriously !!!
21.
by MetaMan 15y ago
akeefer. I find it arrogant when someone assumes that disagreement means that the other person just don't understand. Ok. That aside. Let me go back to the actual issues here as I see them. You seem to be arguing that writing software is ba
22.
by MetaMan 15y ago
As a software programmer I don't agree with this view that software patents are wrong in principle. There I said it! Software just as much as hardware can be used to "express" something new. I.e. to invent something. An patentable invention
23.
by MetaMan 15y ago
I can't (read won't) take these guys seriously because they commit one of my biggest design 'sins". They use tiny typefaces in places which can barely be read (at least by me) on a standard 13 to 14 inch laptop screen. you know what they sa
24.
by MetaMan 15y ago
For me their philosophy is clear. Each G+ user needs to be identifiable. They are not against pseudonyms per se but if your pseudonym means they can't identify you then "off with your head" - Otherwise how can they sell advertising? This is
25.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Taking things on face value I congratulate him. There's been a few times when I've tried to access an interesting academic paper only to find that it's only available behind some pay- wall. Why should we have to pay for a scientific paper
26.
by MetaMan 15y ago
So you raised finance for a business based on an app which can be used (amongst other things) to raise finance for an app? :-)
27.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Quote: "Researchers collected fecal samples to measure levels of stress hormones called glucocorticoids". So you can tell who the boss is by their shit ! Metaphorically speaking we've been doing this for years :-)
28.
by MetaMan 15y ago
I don't understand how facebook DO NOT see the danger to their own long term success here. It is clear that being dependent on them for any significant part of your business model is risky and currently ill-advised. Why they aren't taking i
29.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Am I the only one getting fed up with these stupid "religious" wars in much of the IT world? There are many valid cases where native is the better approach and others where web-app is best ! Any decent developer will do their homework and s
30.
by MetaMan 15y ago
Well done. Surprising good fun to play !

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