That's because in the 90's programming got more difficult, and programmers *liked* it. No more soccer moms entering the field because they heard it was a way to earn a decent wage.

Complexity makes programmers feel they can do things most people can't. So, they seek complex solutions. If it's not complex, it must not be the intelligent way to do it, since a lesser person could do the simpler thing.

They have it backwards, of course. The ability to reduce the complexity of a task is actually a higher skill.

And I've worked with enough people who were so smart at 18 years old that they decided they didn't need to go to college that I've decided the requirement of a degree has some merit.

Some of these people really are great at syntax and terminology, and a few of them are actually good at coding certain things, but mostly, they do things the hard way, they organize their projects around data when it is process that better defines what they're trying to accomplish, the write overly complex solutions to simple problems, they saddle their employer with unnecessary technology, and there are certain classes of problems that they simply can not solve at all. For one, why do they think it's funny that they don't know math, and that a solution involving guessing, approximation and unreasonable process limitation is an acceptable alternative to algebra?

In short, they suck at problem solving. That's not a surprise since the first adult problem they faced, they took a shortcut.

Second Life. They still make regular releases for the Mac (and Linux). It's open source, so you can grab a copy and see how they do it. Xcode not required.

Watch starting at 45:00:

http://www.apple.com/apple-eve...

Clearly a joke.

I'll lend two more points of visibility to this. The humor may not be apparent in the transcript. Watch the video, starting at 45:00:

http://www.apple.com/apple-eve...

*cough* fusion *cough*

Note that those projects are getting bigger and bigger. It may be that there aren't enough people or there isn't enough money to make a sentient AI. It may also be that there is something well short of it that will give us all the benefit we are willing to pay for.

There's a world of possible outcomes between physically impossible and inevitable. It isn't sure to happen just because it isn't impossible.

...sign up.

I tried to sign up for the streaming service today. I pressed the prominent "free trial" button, read the terms of service and privacy policy, and filled out the web form, only to be told "username not reserved." WTF does that mean? Temporary trouble? Hit the sign up button again...username not reserved. Picked a different user name. "Email not reserved."

So, I read some of their support forum, where other people are asking, "wtf is username not reserved", and found you had to sign up through their mobile app before you can sign up for the free trial on their website.

I checked again and found no instructions to that effect.

Maybe there are only 110K people who have figured out how to sign up.

I'm guessing, "tell me if it's crap and shouldn't be published" isn't something they're willing to pay for?

For media content, and even commodity manufactured items like guitar pedals and toasters, I search at Amazon. It's the easiest way to get a description and picture of the item, and sometimes the reviews are even helpful.

When using a search engine, mostly what you get for media and consumer products is offers to sell it. That only adds a step in the search. Easier to just go to Amazon. Once I've found it there I can use my wishlists to remember it and camelcamelcamel to tell me if it goes on sale.

That Ready Player One got published indicates that they don't. That people seem to like it indicate that consumers aren't very discerning, and that the role of gatekeeper publisher may be obsolete.

Amazon is responsible for createspace? Then they aren't doing those things very well. Createspace titles aren't exactly top tier offerings.

I was wrong. They are always showing eight asterisks. It's not the length of your password unless your password is eight characters.

The personal information screen shows me the length of my password, in asterisks. They wouldn't know how long my password is if they were storing it securely.

How can it be necessary to run scripts from so many sites? And if you allow the ones on extremetech to run, it runs even more third-party scripts. Short of serving up obvious malware, this is about as hostile and risky as a webpage gets.

Until I can print something meaningful, like a house or a car or a TV or a pair of shoes, I'm not interested. I don't need trinkets.