I started programming at age 10 on a Vic-20. By high school (1987) I wanted nothing to do with literature classes, but I had it crammed down my throat that one needed to be well rounded, and science and mathematics just weren't enough (I didn't go to Catholic school, so that isn't a literal cramming down my throat). Then came the magnet schools, and their more targeted programs; but alas, it was too late for me.

My opinion: Kids need to be well rounded coming out of high school. Writing should be emphasized more, based on the writing quality of my peers and those younger than me. What we need to change is the idea that we must go to college, and that trade jobs are for blue collar people.

I fear we have created a chasm between the college and no-college crowd, and a strict division of college and no-college jobs. College people largely end up with high-level skills; no-college people end up with practical skills that used to be viewed as essential. We college people have divested ourselves of having to truly know that world. We consume at a level that allows us -- and sometimes even requires us -- to live in blissful ignorance.

In conclusion: Take your college degree and learn how to make your own sausage. Or bread (without a machine). Or soap. Or operating system.

Sure, then the White House grounds would be inundated with masochists getting their jollies by scaling the fence; soon, as the prisons fill with them the ACLU gets involved, declaring the security practice "discriminatory," and our courts are clogged with lawsuits declaring the right to have one's testicles electrocuted is guaranteed in the Constitution. The Department of Health and Human Services will find some US code that can be interpreted loosely to agree with that assertion and circumvent Congress, forcing states to provide Testicle Electrocution centers. Due to cost concerns the states will be allowed to make electric car charging stations dual purpose ("charge your electric car...or your nuts"), but soon angry parents will protest because charging stations near schools will have to allow guys to pull out their nuts in public. The teachers' unions won't allow the government to move the charging stations because they are in bed with the "green" movement, so now regular old perverts will hang out at the stations and pretend they are electrocuting their nuts.

In conclusion, your idea will lead to perverts showing their balls to school girls, you insensitive clod.

Proximity to lobbyists and think tanks?

I think if one is a depressed anything at all they should not be allowed to control the fate of hundreds of people. If a doctor finds any hint of depression then the airline and maybe FAA should be notified. Fuck doctor patient confidentiality when peoples' lives are directly at stake.

Yes, that is a huge issue, led to, in part, by complex rules.

I once queried one of my client's security tables to find the instances where multiple users had the same password (stored as a hash). Even though I expected some repetition, I was shocked at how many people had the same passwords.

And one more gripe: When I am limited to between 8 and 12 characters. WTF!? My passwords are dead easy to remember, but impossible to guess. And over 12 characters. Needless to say, I never remember that 8-12 char password.

On the other hand, when the government goes "all coqboy" they can literally tie our hands as they wield the full weight of the law.

So you are saying the Perfect Gaming Mouse should have a vagina?

Companies and online entities need to learn that when you force people to use a capital letter, a number, and a symbol, that most likely the first letter will be the capital letter, the number will be 1, and the symbol will be !. Or maybe @. If they foist a wacky password or require one based on complex rules, it will either be written down, or be the most simple implementation of the rules.

Enforce minimum length. Allow spaces. Make a comparatively small alphabet have sufficient entropy to withstand brute force.

I'm sure buried somewhere in an engineering spec is the requirement that it support a weight that coincidentally is the same as that of a Russian tank division.

I coulda told you that with my abacus...

We consider ourselves very "fuzzy" computers, but ultimately we make a decision (or decide not to make one, which is the same to the person getting hit by the trolley). Programming "fat" or "very fat," similarly, could be "looks like this picture of Honey Boo Boo's mom." But even that fuzzy logic, at some point, is a pre-programmed threshold that leads to a binary decision.

Except that "reasonable point" hinges upon the notion that Facebook isn't a choice.

That may, in fact, be the dumbest thing written on the internet. At least so far today.