I think you missed the point, or at least read something in that wasn't there. What does knowing how a person will act have to do with wanting them to be that way?

Absolutely. But do they let that panic take over their thoughts? Or do they push that down and try to approach it rationally? In that 5 minute puzzle I can get insight. Sure, I won't know the full story on the person, but that would take years of knowing them to get. So in the span and constraints of an interview, I find it to be absolutely worth while...

I actually wrote a blog post on this very subject this morning (I pushed up the publishing when I saw this). The post

In short, I disagree. I find brain teasers invaluable. But not in determining skill, but in determining personality and how a candidate behaves when they are faced with a challenge that they aren't familiar with...

Look at the line below it. I said if you search for those names by itself (I skipped email, but I got the rest) Google is on top. Then again, those are the product names. And searching them on Bing produces strikingly similar results (email has gmail #3, calendar #4, news #5).

In fact, those three searches on Bing have Yahoo as either #1 or #2. So who's to say that what we are seeing is Google altering the results? Could it be that MS is altering the results so their partner is higher? I'm not accusing MS here. I'm just pointing out that just because something comes up #1 or #2 doesn't mean that it's malevolent.

In fact, let's try those searches on Ask.com:

Email - Google #1, Yahoo #2

Calendar - Google #1, Yahoo #5

News - Google #2, Yahoo #4

So 2 out of the 3 main search engines (Google, Bing and Ask) put Google above Yahoo. Yet the one that has an agreement with Yahoo puts it higher. While I completely understand your point, a cursory look at evidence looks to point exactly the opposite...

That's a very good point. I didn't disagree with the investigation in principle. I was just pointing out that the traditional metrics, and the ones indicated by the post are rather, iffy...

If other search companies cannot compete because of Google's dominance of either or both ads and searching, that is also anti-competitive.

I would just like to point something out here. If other companies can't compete because Google is really good at search, that's not anti-competitive (in fact, it's the exact opposite). So the simple assertion that other companies can't compete isn't enough to bury Google. What they need to prove/find is that Google leveraged its position unfairly to keep competition out. An example of that would be if Google required advertisers to sign an exclusivity deal (or gave incentives to do so) which would then unfairly keep competition out (hint: they haven't, although MS and Apple both do). Another example would be if Google used its dominance in search to promote its other products (by artificially raise their search, or artificially lower competitors), of which my OP is evidence to the contrary.

The key is that other companies not being able to compete does not make Google in violation of anything. It can be just free market pressure that does that (because Google has the "best" product, or whatever reason). But if they are unfairly leveraging their position in one area into other areas, that's where it becomes a dangerous problem...

Yes you can. In fact, Motorola launched a series of android phones that used Bing for everything on Verizon. Now, they were a flop because they sucked, but that's not Google's fault...

It's not illegal to be a monopoly. It's illegal to abuse that power. So, let's look at the main categories of anti-trust abuse that have been prosecuted in the past:

Limiting Supply - there's no way Google is doing that...

Predatory Pricing - They have always been free, as are the competitors. Then again, could that be classified as predatory I guess...

Price Discrimination - The same as above

Refusal to deal - Not that I've heard of...

Exclusive Dealing - Not that I've heard of either

Product Bundling - This is tricky. Sure, their products integrate. But then again you need to sign up for each one separately. There's no "Use search and automatically get this other product"...

So, either they will need to go out and tread new territory with little legal precedent to lead the way. Not saying it should or shouldn't be done, but just that it's a relatively new area.

Additionally, I really find the line who said that it was 'only fair' that Google put its own sites on higher placements than competitors odd. Let's show a few examples:

Free Email - GMail is #5 on the list for me. Yahoo, Mail.com, Hotmail and GMX.com are all above it...

ebooks - Google Books is #6 on the list. Ebooks.com, Amazon, Project Gutenberg, Barnes and Noble and Free-ebooks.net are all above it...

Online Calendar - Google Calendar is #3 on the list.

US News - Google News isn't even on the first page for me (not even in an ad)...

Shopping - Google Shopping is #2 behind Shopping.com

Now, searches for News, Gmail, Images, Videos, Maps and other product names return google first. But that sort-of makes sense, since those are the product names...

In fact, searching for Maps and Images on Bing returns Google for the first results! Is it an anti-trust violation to name your products intelligently???

Except that it's cheaper to launch a new satellite, with advanced technology, then it would be to retrieve and relaunch

And this exact mentality is the reason there are between 2,000 and 5,500 tons of large debris (over 500,000 distinct objects) in space. Since when is money the sole factor in doing something? Stop worrying about the monetary cost and starting thinking of the overall impact of the decisions...

More payload, sure. But smaller cargo dimensions (the shuttle was 4.6m x 18m vs 4.6m x 11.4m). But lower orbit capabilities (200km vs 960km for the shuttle). But without the ability to bring back cargo (the shuttle could retrieve payload from space for return to Earth). But with lest liftoff thrust (17MN vs 30MN).

You don't get something for nothing. I'm not saying it shouldn't be replaced. But this *it's so expesnive, it must die* bs is nothing more than rhetoric. But as of yet, the only alternative to it (the Falcon Heavy) still has not flown. And it also has no human capabilities as of yet (it's designed to be human rated, but there's no crew module, which would take quite a while to design and build). So kill it, it must die! But we won't have something to take the place of it anytime soon...

I really can't stand this *cost effective* bs. People keep coming out and saying how expensive the shuttle was, and how much of a waste of money it was. In reality it was actually very cheap in comparison to other things we spend money on. Source: XKCD

Shuttle
Total: $194 billion
Per Launch: $1.43 billion
Per Year: $6.46 billion

Apollo Program
Total: $192 billion
Per Launch: $11.94 billion
Per Year: $17.45 billion

Federal Fraud
Per Year: $125.4 billion

Iraq War
Per Year: $98 billion

Ballistic Missile Submarines Per Year: $12 billion

Federal Interest on Debt
Per Year: $198 billion

US foreign military aid
Per Year: $11.5 billion

So yes, it was expensive. But we spend money like it's going out of style (heck, the 2009 stimulus was 115 times the annual cost of the program. It was even 4 times the total cost of the program)!!!

So sure, let it die with nothing to replace it. Because nothing ever came from it...

To me, there is a significant difference between a framework and libraries. Libraries are collections of code to do one or more tasks. Frameworks are libraries that enforce architectural constraints in exchange for reducing boilerplate code and making things easier (and faster in theory) to develop. The tradeoff comes back when those architectural constraints are not inline with the application. This either leads to tons of pain when building the application (I've heard the phrase "just do it the rails way" a few times), or when maintaining due to changes in the app requirements or bugs that are deep rooted in the architecture of the application.

That's why I'm a fan of the Architecture First method to development. Do a formal architecture for the application, then pick the framework that fits that architecture (if any). If none do, fit the closest one and remove anything from it that doesn't fit.

To be clear, I'm not opposed to using the ORM in the model, or for some applications having the ORM dominate the model. I'm just against the concept that it is the model (since there's a lot more by most people's ideas)...

Yes, we have talked about it at length...

The first on the list is one that isn't public yet. I know the lead dev on it and got an early preview. So out of the popular frameworks, it is number one to avoid....

I couldn't disagree more. Cake is loaded with deeply awkward black magic and bad practices. Not to mention the fallacy that the model layer is the orm (hint: in the rest of the world it is not). Cake is second on my list of frameworks to avoid (and most senior developers that I know agree). I would suggest you do the same. .