Warning to newbies

[spinoza1111]

[snipping article because, really, there's no point]

You know, Nilges does serve a purpose; the more rant threads he

Logical analysis, metrical verse, and constant returns to on-topic
matters aren't rants. The problem is that the "hacker ethos" and mass
culture have normalized deviance here to the extent that nondeviance
seems like ranting.

Look, we're all just supposed to work 16 hour days so that clowns like
Steve Jobs can take the credit for our work (and mistakenly market a
brain damaged Newton as the next big thing). Then we are REQUIRED, not
permitted, to fly to product releases and applaud the Big Man like
attendees at a speech by Kim il Jong.

In this "digital Maoism" (as Jared Lanier calls it), individuals
dependent on a paycheck who are one job away from homelessness are
called "ranters" who "rock the boat" and who "bite the hand that feeds
them" where the language conceals the reality as effectively as any
newspeak.

 

[Colonel Harlan Sanders]

One of George Orwell's lesser known, but important, rules for writing
in Politics and the English Language:

Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are
used to seeing in print.

I'd generalize this, but only slightly. Don't even use phrases of > 1
words which you are used to seeing in print.

"Working in a professional manner" is an example; it is Human
Resources boilerplate.

"Does not work in a professional manner" usually means "fails to know
his place in the scheme of things".

Here you simply redefine a phrase that describes what you do in a way
that makes you the hero, the romantic outlaw. That's the usual way you
deal with criticism, twisting it to something that you can interpret
as a compliment, regardless of the obvious meaning intended by the
person who used it.

People tell you that you are verbose, you convert that to "my
brilliant prose makes them swoon with envy".

You see, unlike many corporate "professionals" I had a genuinely
professional father, and his "professional manner" was to force his
views, as a doctor, down other people's throats.

Whereas I discovered that "working in a professional manner" in
corporate data processing meant being subservient to the boss even
when the boss wanted something absurd and counterfactual.

I have no respect it is true for Peter Seebach. Why? Because he's

I'm not talking about individuals. You don't respect ANYONE.
Name the people here you respect.

If there aren't any, in God's name why are you spending hours every
day on them?

And how tedious of you to try to segue everything into your obsession
with a one page review Seebach wrote DECADES AGO and everyone in the
world had forgotten till you kept bringing it up over and over and
over and over.

....

I regard none of these people as my peers. I regard them as my
inferiors.

Is there anyone in the world who would agree with your assessment?
No? They're all so jealous of you, that must be it.

I don't know what you are talking about. You are in fact describing
Heathfield and Seebach.

How about the dozens of posts you've made complaining about
Heathfield's inability to find your posts in an obscure newsgroup? And
you jump with delight on the slightest grammatical error anyone makes
in an argument with you and use it to sneer at them as uneducated
buffoons, and much worse.

You look idly at a mass of postings without seeing their temporal
relationships and become what you describe.

A "mess of postings" indeed when you are trying to backpedal or change
the subject.

No, in fact I stayed with all of them until receiving a better offer,
until I took a sabbatical in 2003 to write my book and live on
savings.

Sure.

So knock yourself out. I'm the person your manager warned you about.

With good cause.

 

[Antoninus Twink]

I wasn't being sarcastic. For a religious man, you show a colossal
amount of malice to Nilges.

And not just to Nilges.

Heathfield is an absolutely classic religious type - all pretty words
about the love of Jesus, but behind the facade he's twisted with hate
and bitterness.

A text-book whited sepulcher.

PS: This is the point where you pretend to killfile me. Again.

Yep. He's not good at fake killfiling. I suggest he either avoids it or
takes a class.

 

[Seebs]

I wasn't being sarcastic. For a religious man, you show a colossal
amount of malice to Nilges.

I have seen no malice towards him. Malice is a term of art in the field,
and there's no evidence of it in Richard Heathfield's posts towards Nilges.
There is some hostility, yes. There is criticism. But no malice. Or at
least, none I can pick up. (I'm usually pretty sensitive to it, too.)

Kindness and love do not necessarily imply pretending that false things are
true, or stupid things intelligent, or ridiculous things plausible. I would
think that one replying to Nilges would be showing no malice by pointing out
that he is ignorant of C, inconsistent, hypocritical, and shows what appears
to be extreme dishonesty in his choices of how to frame things, or how he
handles corrections to his criticisms. On the other hand, I haven't seen
anything from Richard Heathfield suggesting that, should Nilges correct these
problematic behaviors, he ought to be subjected to generalized harassment.
I've seen no threats of legal action, no attacks on his person (as opposed to
his behavior and demonstrations of his character traits; a subtle point, but
a significant one). I've seen a great deal of patiently trying to explain
things to him which would allow him to make less of a fool of himself, were
he so inclined.

That ain't malice.

-s

 

[Seebs]

Oh, definitely. You are more sinned against than sinner. But there is
no point in trying to reason with him about it. He's does not appear
to be amenable reason.

I don't think anyone who's exchanged more than a couple of posts with him
is trying to convince *him*. However, consider that other posters appear
to have formed the conclusion that he was making substantive points; that
could be real harm.

-s

 

[Seebs]

Or, as I said, you are incapable of working in a professional manner.

It's clear from how you act in this newsgroup that the concept of
respect for your peers is alien to you.

If you discovered an error in someone else's work, you use it as an
opportunity to crow over them, reminding them and everyone else over
and over of their mistake.

You know, this raises an interesting point.

I've been reading Robert Sutton's "The No Asshole Rule". What's interesting
about this, to me, is that what Nilges describes as corporate culture is very
much an archetype of what Sutton calls a "pro-asshole" culture; one in which
people are encouraged to be abusive towards weaker people, and submissive
towards more powerful people. I have a friend who is personally convinced
(based, IMHO, on a run of bad luck) that this is the necessary structure of
"corporate" life.

But.

Sutton points out, with a great deal of information and support, that:

1. This is not universal among corporations.
2. It is not particularly effective.
3. To strengthen that, it demonstrably produces substantially inferior
outcomes.

In short, it is not *generally* the case that performance reviews reward
"submission". Some places, perhaps, they do.

There is a more significant point, though, which has some local relevance.
People get a lot of control over how to frame or understand their experiences.
Someone who is by character an asshole, and would himself rate other people on
submission or the lack thereof, might well *interpret* other results that way.
If he were rated poorly on cooperation because he habitually sabotaged
coworkers, caused fights, and generally acted in a hostile manner, he might
well *believe* that he had been rated down for not being "submissive".

When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. When all you
have is a giant chip on your shoulder, everyone you meet is looking for a
fight.

I can't say whether Nilges developed his pathologically hostile character in
response to poor treatment from corporations, or whether poor work
environments created his pathologically hostile character.

I can say that he's wrong; that is not the only way to be, not even within
corporations, not even if you want to be successful within corporations.

I mention this because I worry that some of the newbies, who may not have much
professional work experience yet, may get the feeling that respect and status
come only from abusing the weak or powerless, and it is not so. Nilges and
Twink and their friends can continue to insist that there is only a
dog-eat-dog world and that everyone has to be abusive to succeed. Me, I'll
hang out in the part of reality where people respect me more when I try
to patiently explain basic C to newbies than they would if I were derisive or
hostile to them. I like it better here.

-s

 

[Seebs]

And how tedious of you to try to segue everything into your obsession
with a one page review Seebach wrote DECADES AGO and everyone in the
world had forgotten till you kept bringing it up over and over and
over and over.

I do not think it accurate to call it "decades ago" when I think it's
actually under 15 years. Well, maybe 15-16, but still. Another four
years and it'll be "DECADES AGO". (By which time I hope to have gotten
around to writing a new one for CTCR4E, and mothballed the previous one
as "comments on the third edition".)

Is there anyone in the world who would agree with your assessment?

Yes. I believe he's got Twink and Kenny (if those are in fact two people),
and I think perhaps also the "daemon helper" spammer. I think Jacob Navia has
been more sympathetic to his views than some other people, which sort of
surprised me actually.

-s

 

[Seebs]

You know, Nilges does serve a purpose; the more rant threads he
starts, the farther the spam gets pushed down on the front page*. It
doesn't do anything for the S/N ratio, but at least the first thing I
see *isn't* a steady stream of ads for knock-offs, drugs, and naked
Slavic women.

But aren't those more topical?

-s

 

[Ben Pfaff]

I've been reading Robert Sutton's "The No Asshole Rule". What's interesting
about this, to me, is that what Nilges describes as corporate culture is very
much an archetype of what Sutton calls a "pro-asshole" culture; one in which
people are encouraged to be abusive towards weaker people, and submissive
towards more powerful people. I have a friend who is personally convinced
(based, IMHO, on a run of bad luck) that this is the necessary structure of
"corporate" life.

It sounds like Sutton and Nilges both think of corporations as
being aligned on a "lawful evil" basis:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alignment_(Dungeons_&_Dragons)#Lawful_Evil

 

[Josh Holland]

Number

The statement "Not a number is a number" tickled me a bit.

 

[Willem]

Seebs wrote:
)> Is there anyone in the world who would agree with your assessment?
)
) Yes. I believe he's got Twink and Kenny (if those are in fact two people),
) and I think perhaps also the "daemon helper" spammer. I think Jacob Navia has
) been more sympathetic to his views than some other people, which sort of
) surprised me actually.

I doubt that, actually. It's not unlikely that they just view him as a
tool for their own amusement (i.e. trolling this group).


SaSW, Willem
--
Disclaimer: I am in no way responsible for any of the statements
made in the above text. For all I know I might be
drugged or something..
No I'm not paranoid. You all think I'm paranoid, don't you !
#EOT

 

[Seebs]

The statement "Not a number is a number" tickled me a bit.

Yeah. This is a great example of where precision of terminology is important;
NaN is a value, but Not a Number.

-s

 

[Seebs]

Seebs wrote:
)> Is there anyone in the world who would agree with your assessment?

) Yes. I believe he's got Twink and Kenny (if those are in fact two people),
) and I think perhaps also the "daemon helper" spammer. I think Jacob Navia has
) been more sympathetic to his views than some other people, which sort of
) surprised me actually.

I doubt that, actually. It's not unlikely that they just view him as a
tool for their own amusement (i.e. trolling this group).

Ahh, but they would agree with him. They may not believe what he says to
be true, but they would agree with him. Vociferously.

-s

 

[Phil Carmody]

(I still have fond
memories of discovering that, yes, the Internet contains people who can be
convinced that ATMs print money rather than having a supply of pre-printed
money. The best part was someone who worked at a bank, and testified that
his job included putting fresh rolls of paper in the ATM. When someone
said those were for receipts, a third party jumped in and said "Don't be
ridiculous, those are preprinted.")

Sounds worthy of a.r.k at its finest. Many many thanks for breaking
the monotony with that, I raise a glass to you.

Phil

 

[Phil Carmody]

A better correction would be "something that".

A better correction would be "As always, the one self-dubbed spinoza1111
is full of crap". Shires had ends, beds had heads, and even pain had
smarts if you were Chaucer, for example. And rooms and fires both had
their properties rendered after a 'its'. Not old enough? Even swords
possess many a property if you're the author of Beowulf.

Phil

 

[Edward A. Falk]

Beware of certain buzzwords including "sequence points" and "trap
representation".

[drivelectomy]

I dunno if you should switch to decaf or switch to another language,
but you should definately do one or the other.

 

[spinoza1111]

A better correction would be "something that".

That depends on whether the "which" or "that" is to prefix a self-
contained example of indirect reported speech (where "that" would be
best) or a wh-coordinator is needed to provide the direct object of
had (where "which" is best). "That", not being a coordinator, is best
used in examples such as "Nilges said that Heathfield is a butthead"
or "Nilges proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that he knows more than
you". Whereas "had" is transitive, therefore it needs a direct object
*which* is provided by (as in "provided by") the relative coordinator
"which"!

 

[spinoza1111]

Here you simply redefine a phrase that describes what you do in a way
that makes you the hero, the romantic outlaw. That's the usual way you

Yes, I have. 'Tis my vocation, Hal.

deal with criticism, twisting it to something that you can interpret
as a compliment, regardless of the obvious meaning intended by the

Yes, it's one of my most charming attributes. Blessings from curses.
Garbage in, food out. You clowns throw shit it comes back transformed
into something rich and strange. Your shit, gold-plated.

person who used it.

People tell you that you are verbose, you convert that to "my
brilliant prose makes them swoon with envy".

Well, clearly, you don't have my talent. I don't say that. I show how
every word is needed and that you are the saturnine Salieri (straining
to produce a little march) and I am Amadeus in this opera *bouffa*.

I'm not talking about individuals. You don't respect ANYONE.
Name the people here you respect.

Hmm. I respect Ben Bacarisse's technical skills, but think he's a
child in other ways. I respect Kenny. I have a limited respect for
Navia. I respect Heathfield for a certain low level, scuttling
integrity.

If there aren't any, in God's name why are you spending hours every
day on them?

Primarily to clarify my own ideas.

And how tedious of you to try to segue everything into your obsession
with a one page review Seebach wrote DECADES AGO and everyone in the
world had forgotten till you kept bringing it up over and over and
over and over.

Because this article harmed Schildt, and I saw people harmed by office
politics in the corporation in the same way, therefore it amuses me to
show how much malice was there.

Is there anyone in the world who would agree with your assessment?
Yes.

No? They're all so jealous of you, that must be it.



How about the dozens of posts you've made complaining about
Heathfield's inability to find your posts in an obscure newsgroup? And

comp.risks obscure?

And Lo, the pompous Auto Didact is so very sure
That what he doth not know is just "obscure":
The glory that was Greece, the grandeur that was Rome,
Homer's Greek, and Vergil's account of Aeneas' journey home,
Is but Night and Fog to the block, the stone, the log
The barking and howling, path-defouling Dog
Who sits in the Cubicle and knows, come what may chance
That this which is not on TV to be not worthy of his acquaintance:
It's not on the Web, says Isaac or Rueben or Harlan or Jeb
In some little Shithole where the waters do Ebb:
Who is this guy Nilges, he's talkin' to me
But I am an Atom, a Cipher, a Zero you see:
It follows as follows the Night to the Day
That I need not listen to what he has to say.

you jump with delight on the slightest grammatical error anyone makes
in an argument with you and use it to sneer at them as uneducated
buffoons, and much worse.

No, I don't. Occasionally it amuses me to check my knowledge by
analyzing a solecism.

What you don't understand is that we're all here for recognition, and
there's nothing wrong with that. The corporation would have us be self-
abnegating monks, and I don't see the point of being such even in the
service of God. It is obscene, in my view, to be so in the service of
the wealthy.

 

[spinoza1111]

You know, this raises an interesting point.

I've been reading Robert Sutton's "The No Asshole Rule".  What's interesting
about this, to me, is that what Nilges describes as corporate culture is very
much an archetype of what Sutton calls a "pro-asshole" culture; one in which
people are encouraged to be abusive towards weaker people, and submissive
towards more powerful people.  I have a friend who is personally convinced
(based, IMHO, on a run of bad luck) that this is the necessary structure of
"corporate" life.

But.

Sutton points out, with a great deal of information and support, that:

1.  This is not universal among corporations.
2.  It is not particularly effective.
3.  To strengthen that, it demonstrably produces substantially inferior
outcomes.

In short, it is not *generally* the case that performance reviews reward
"submission".  Some places, perhaps, they do.

There is a more significant point, though, which has some local relevance..
People get a lot of control over how to frame or understand their experiences.
Someone who is by character an asshole, and would himself rate other people on
submission or the lack thereof, might well *interpret* other results that way.
If he were rated poorly on cooperation because he habitually sabotaged
coworkers, caused fights, and generally acted in a hostile manner, he might
well *believe* that he had been rated down for not being "submissive".

When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.  When all you
have is a giant chip on your shoulder, everyone you meet is looking for a
fight.

I can't say whether Nilges developed his pathologically hostile character in
response to poor treatment from corporations, or whether poor work
environments created his pathologically hostile character.

I can say that he's wrong; that is not the only way to be, not even within
corporations, not even if you want to be successful within corporations.

I mention this because I worry that some of the newbies, who may not have much
professional work experience yet, may get the feeling that respect and status
come only from abusing the weak or powerless, and it is not so.  Nilges and
Twink and their friends can continue to insist that there is only a
dog-eat-dog world and that everyone has to be abusive to succeed.  Me, I'll
hang out in the part of reality where people respect me more when I try
to patiently explain basic C to newbies than they would if I were derisive or
hostile to them.  I like it better here.

-s

Peter, I will say that my mistake was to stick to IBM and then
Microsoft environments because I did not wish to retrain in unix or
linux, and that the proportion of assholes in these environments was
somewhat higher. However, starting at Princeton University (a mixed
environment) I discovered that unix types could be even bigger
assholes.

The only non-assholes I met were people with real distinction in the
field: Whit Diffie, Bob Gaskins, and certain Microsoft execs close to
Ballmer whom I will not name.

Elsewhere I found consistently people stunted by long work hours and
the continual assault (that broke out with Reagan's election) on
middle class stability by the rich.

Younger programmers are convinced by a mythos that somewhere they will
find a technical environment in which humanistic values will reign
because everyone will be rated fairly. But in ALL these environments I
have found that managers don't wish to manage, and leave it to the
team to self-manage. The result consistently is that a few bad apples
start bullying people, and management (considering itself unable to
evaluate the technology) won't arbitrate.

The exceptions were few and far between. One was an engineering office
in a field which runs on government and defense contracts...whose
owner simply refused to have anything to do with such contracts
because he was too moral, and whose values permeated the firm, making
it a happy place. I designed them a product twenty years ago which is
still in use. I should have offered to work for them permanently for
five dollars an hour.

Elsewhere it's what Lanier calls "digital Maoism":
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/lanier06/lanier06_index.html. The
crowd does the job of the elite by beating the shit out of
nonconformists like ted "xanadu" nelson out back, the rich get richer.

 

[spinoza1111]

I do not think it accurate to call it "decades ago" when I think it's
actually under 15 years.  Well, maybe 15-16, but still.  Another four
years and it'll be "DECADES AGO".  (By which time I hope to have gotten
around to writing a new one for CTCR4E, and mothballed the previous one
as "comments on the third edition".)


Yes.  I believe he's got Twink and Kenny (if those are in fact two people),
and I think perhaps also the "daemon helper" spammer.  I think Jacob Navia has
been more sympathetic to his views than some other people, which sort of
surprised me actually.

No, Navia thinks I'm an "idiot" because he's more loyal to C than me
and doesn't need friends, apparently. He's promoting C, like
Heathfield, and they both have a financial interest in this language,
and they are both being unprofessional because they won't pay
attention to the defective nature of C.

The best computer scientists, in my experience, don't need to have
this pathetic loyalty to shadowy ideas. I admire Navia but he's not
first-rate, and he's not first-rate because he loses his temper if C
is attacked.