2013-01-07

Understanding Turkey

Understanding Turkey, 103: "TURKTRUST" is an oxymoron.

I have no squabble with the company. I have no issues with them, either, apart from their name.

It's probably every Turkish software/archive/FTP mirror ever that let me down just when I was prepared to break my prejudice, or the bulk of the youth that I discovered the Internet together with. Still, for me, those two words just don't go hand-in-hand.

Course material

Understanding Turkey

Understanding Turkey, 102: Our abuse of women does not omit Justitia (Lady Justice).

Course material

Understanding Turkey

Understanding Turkey, 101: Relinquish the assumption that (directly or indirectly) elected or appointed officials have the public's interests in mind.

For your homework, complete the following sentence:
"Despite worldwide protests, a Unesco warning and court cases to halt the project,"

Course material

2013-01-06

A Bit Pessimistic, Are We?

"That cannot be destroyed which is an eternal lie.
And in dark ages even reason may die."

...was my first reaction upon reading P. C. Hodgwell's "That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.", quoted in Twelve Virtues of Rationality.

2013-01-03

Why us IT folks are always in such a hurry

I had to write this down somewhere for fear of losing it (or worse, forgetting about it):

    "If a project offered a value of 10 times its estimated cost, no one would care if the actual cost to get it done were double the estimate. On the other hand, if expected value were only 10 percent greater than expected cost, lateness would be a disaster.

    Yes it would be a disaster, but instead of obsessing over “What’s the matter with those software folks who didn’t deliver on the schedule we gave them?” we need to ask instead “Why did we ever kick off a project with such marginal expected value?”

    The louder the complaints about project lateness, the more likely it is that the project set out to deliver marginal value and was therefore kicked off under the false premise that it could be completed on the cheap. What’s really wrong with us software folks is that we’re continually beating ourselves up for something that’s somebody else’s fault."

All Late Projects Are the Same — Tom DeMarco