The last time I worked on a brand new Sony laptop, it was clear that Sony considered the laptop to be nothing more than a delivery vehicle for it's entertainment products. There was so much Sony crapware on the machine that, out of the box, it wasn't even usable until I uninstalled the majority of the junk.

I anticipate that Sony will force you to watch a movie trailer every time you turn it on, and won't let you use it until you've watched the whole thing.

Have I missed something?

I've always believed algorithms and neural networks to be essentially opposites to each other.

Algorithms are blocks of code that handles a predefined task. Classic example: quicksort vs bubblesort

Neural networks are a black box of systems that are trained with input until they produce the output you want. Further, even when it is working, you won't truly know what is happening internally, and you're only hope of knowing that it works is throwing a ridiculous amount of inputs at it and seeing how it responds.

You've missed my point completely. It's not about how difficult it is to implement. It's about knowing when to implement it.

And I've seen enough hideous code to say that way too many programmers are not skilled enough to realize that they don't know how to make that judgement call, so it is infinitely simpler to simply advise them to not use certain constructs.

Is this one of those "Do as I say, not as I do" things?

I bet it's one of those "Do as I say, not as I do" things.

Are you an anti-vaxxer as well? Because you're using the same logic that they use.

"It's not a problem anymore so we shouldn't have to do this and I resent being told what to do!"

It's not a problem anymore BECAUSE avoiding goto has become conventional wisdom.

If we start telling people that it's ok to use goto again, take a wild guess what will happen? We will go right back to the days of spaghetti code, except it will be that much worse now because software has become overwhelmingly more complex today compared to several decades ago.

The problem with self-described experts is that a lot of people think they're experts when in fact they are not, resulting in a hideous mash that some poor sap down the line has to somehow decipher.

It boils down to risk-reward. If there is a clear and overwhelming reason to use it, then go ahead. If not, then a convention control flow structure will be easier to debug, easier to maintain, and is less likely to cause an inadvertent bug because you jumped out of a code block without cleaning something up.

Just peruse http://www.thedailywtf.com/ if you need emperical evidence.

That is a neverending wealth of evidence of how badly people code.

But your argument is silly. Of course banning conditional loops is dumb. You're right A determined programmer can make hash out of any programming language. The question becomes a matter of how easy it is for Dunning-Kruger code monkeys to mutilate their code while thinking they are doing things properly.

It's about raising the bar and forcing people to think in a more structured way.

"Banning" goto is like "Banning" jaywalking. Because enough people screw it up badly enough that it is simpler to just warn against it in general.

Just because an expert does it, doesn't mean everyone should. An expert developer has a much better structural understanding of how a system works, and is better able to judge whether going against conventional wisdom is beneficial or not, risky or not, etc.

Anyone else doing is is just doing the programming equivalent of the cargo cult.

Why is this modded to -1?

What the AC said is absolutely correct, although admittedly they could have been a tad more tactful about it.

OF course there's a debate! There are gaps in the science that scientists refuse to acknowledge!

Some celebrity told me that AGW causes autism, and I for one won't stand for it!

Not having any idea of the actual reasons behind these decisions, I'm going to pull a possibility out my... out of thin air.

Is it because their liability would increase dramatically if they implemented a more secure system and it still somehow gets compromised?

What is this SH3 ASM nonsense?

System/390 assembly is the proper assembly to use! All other ASM is just uneducated slang talk.

Case in point...

In other words, it's working?

I'm sorry, but you picked a shockingly bad example to support your argument. Gamergate IS a problem. If you think women getting flooded with "You should be raped until you die!" messages is acceptable, then you have no business being part of civilized society.

Obviously it hasn't occurred to you that there would be a lot more 'good posts' if there weren't so many trolls around.

The only thing I use twitter for is as an RSS feed for certain companies I want to pay attention to. I sure as hell have no interest in posting random thoughts on there and waiting to become a target.

Does this mean Microsoft has developed cancer?

Seriously, while recent moves in this regard have been good, only a fool would ignore history. Microsoft, for as long as it has existed, has done countless morally dubious things in order to maintain control. The history is all right there for the googling. Just because they do a couple Good(tm) things doesn't magically mean they have suddenly realized the errors of their ways and are doing a 180. You can't erase ~40 years of assholry.

Based on the moves Microsoft has done lately, I will move my needle from "completely distrust" to "MAYBE it's not a trap" but still nowhere near the realm of "trustworthy"