The Polarans solved FTL travel ages ago, and now use it to troll other civilisations by placing their star along some life-bearing planet's axis of rotation, waiting for people to develop advanced astronomy, then randomly feinting at them to mess with the scientists' heads.

A man is walking around in the streets of [insert dictatorial state] and loudly shouting: "What a shitty government!" Needless to say, it is not long before state security arrests him.

"I never said which government I was talking about," he defends himself.

"You said 'shitty'. There is only one shitty government," the secret policeman retorts.

1. Somewhat cheaper.
2. Has the words "DON'T PANIC" in large friendly letters on the cover.

(And conversely, programmers also benefit greatly from learning some basics of business to avoid being at the mercy of managers.)

Cold fusion is more lucrative. To refute a cold fusion hoax, you usually need an understanding of nuclear physics. To debunk this, all you need is high-school mechanics.

This inventor has apparently managed to duplicate the invention of medieval alchemists: Transmuting gullibility into gold.

Obviously it's not the guns, it's the video games/communism/vaccines/fluoridated water/contrails/illegal immigrants. (Cross out what doesn't apply.)

Well, maybe.

That this and the linked story are really about the same two coders.

Holy SHIT!

If we go around switching bases, we should go for the one that is used in every single bit of modern electronics instead. Hexadecimal for brevity would be a good compromise, though.

(Whichever base is used, of course, pronunciation and notation would have to be standardized. For one thing, you'd have to recognize the base being used until everyone switched, and also aty (a0) sounds like eighty (80), particularly when taking different accents into account.)

After the inevitable flood of criminal* gun-owners predictably sending them threats, this is pretty much a given.

(*Threats are in fact a crime.)

"I can give you one cookie or two cookies, but you have to split them with your brother."

"So if you give me two, I have to give my brother a WHOLE COOKIE? No way! Give me one."

This article isn't about scammers casting a wide net to find victims for confidence tricks; these are business partners and colleagues actually conspiring to commit corporate fraud or tax evasion.
The confidence trick is a meta-scam: It pretends to invite you to become a partner in crime, while you are in reality the intended victim. They're two different things.

with remaining head.