Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA • Hacker News Board

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#121

Post by Jach » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 6:33 PM UTC

wonnage wrote: post #33

roel_v wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would they have to understand? Do you understand the intricaties of an airplane when you fly one?

I can at least understand it takes a bit of engineering to heave a nearly million pound piece of metal in the air. Twitter just doesn't have the same cachet. Hell, it's only 140 characters, how hard could it be?

I don't think Twitter is an adequate comparison. Even within the developer world you get plenty of programmers saying Twitter is a "weekend toy project" to implement. (And in many respects it is, for the functionality--the more interesting bit is handing the massive user load.) A more apt comparison may be with the Linux Kernel, or Windows 7.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#122

Post by itsameta4 » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 6:49 PM UTC

DTanner wrote: post #80

ck2 wrote: post #26

Is "geek" too cool of a word now that they have to reach for the calculated more insulting "nerd"? (my apologies to proud nerds - but my point is that's not how they were using it) So if people who know what they are doing with computers are the equal of geeks, do politicians think they are the dumb jocks in this high school infantile throwdown?

If you watch SC2 on GSL with Tasteless and Artosis, you'll see that even "nerd" is no longer pejorative. The greatest compliment they know is "nerd baller". They refer to themselves and the audience as "nerds" all the time, but in a totally friendly way. It's almost a badge of pride.

It's a point of pride, but only between other nerds. They're taking it back. It's also because "geek" got co-opted by people who aren't actually geeky, so we needed a more specific word for "the type of person who would watch the GSL".

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#123

Post by ibejoeb » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 6:53 PM UTC

AgentConundrum wrote: post #3

I was glad to see him call them out on that. I made a similar comment here on HN about a month ago[1] saying that calling on "nerds", to me, implied a lack of respect. The replies I received, however, seemed to disagree. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3358472

Well, I agree with you. The word can certainly be used endearingly in some crowds, but this is absolutely not it. This is entirely disparaging.

Language is important.

There was a post on here recently about the communication problem, and it's spot-on. Just like we can't characterize SOPA/PIPA as "the anti-piracy bills," we can not allow ourselves to be demeaned.

SOPA/PIPA are the internet censorship bills. They are the defeating due process bills.

We are experts. We are architects and engineers of the technical infrastructure.

Call yourself what you want but realize that, in the greater world, these terms serve only strip you of authority. That's unacceptable.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#124

Post by srdev » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 6:58 PM UTC

roel_v wrote: post #96

Sapient wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"People" dont have to understand. Unless they are legislators trying to write new laws to govern "x", then they MUST understand.

Because they need to understand medicine when they make drug (the prescription kind) or other medical related laws, or chemistry when they make environmental regulations? Please. Only a superficial understanding of technicalities is required to legislate sufficiently effectively, understanding that can easily be supplied by staff who make high-level summaries.

They don't have to have an intricate understanding of medicine, but they should understand the issues well enough to be able to make informed decisions. If they do not understand, then they should bring in experts. For example, if you want to make legislation regarding a certain vaccination, then you should understand how vaccines work at a high level and the concept of herd immunity. Otherwise, you have no business writing laws to regulate it, period. The people writing this legislation don't have an equivalent level of insight into how the internet works.

In this video, we had a lot of people proudly proclaiming that they didn't have the slightest clue about how the stuff they were regulating works, made terrible and inaccurate apologies, all without bringing in experts who could inform them as to the implication of the law. To add insult to injury, rather than calling them experts, they used derogatory language to put down the very people who knew what they were talking about (lets be clear here, some people use nerd as a badge of honor, but that was clearly not how they were using the word).

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#125

Post by swasheck » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 7:14 PM UTC

pinaceae wrote: post #17

it points to a big shift in society and the economy. software is now a cornerstone of the world economy. modern life runs through the internet. even if you personally avoid the internet, you depend on it. but the baby boomer generation, represented by these politicians has not understood it. they know engineers as the guys building houses, bridges, aeroplanes, rockets. but software? it is an invisible world to them.…

i agree with your sentiment. however, to nuance it a bit more. if, as you say, "software is now a cornerstone of the world economy. modern life runs through the internet. even if you personally avoid the internet, you depend on it." then it seems more likely that this is a power play. if you can control the means/crutch of modern life then you have tremendous financial, social, and political influence.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#126

Post by wvenable » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 7:23 PM UTC

roel_v wrote: post #31

lusr wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've often wondered how to explain to non-developers the level of complexity in large software projects. I don't think the new generation will understand it any better than the old generation because, as you say, it's an invisible world. I am currently contracted on a project with 1.5 million lines of code and dependencies on hundreds of services written by a number of different teams. It takes a few weeks just to ge…

Why would they have to understand? Do you understand the intricaties of an airplane when you fly one?

Airplanes are usually come up when people are asked for an example of a complex piece of engineering. But rarely do they realize that most complex part of a modern airliner is the software.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#127

Post by SoftwareMaven » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 7:35 PM UTC

dalke wrote: post #93

saulrh wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For last couple of centuries or so, each generation grows up with unprecedented change in their lifetime. I'd argue that this generation's changes aren't just unprecedented, but in an entirely different category. Not just in size, but in speed and extent. The cell phone alone is the most fundamental change in society in human history; suddenly, every person on earth can communicate instantly with almost any other per…

Consider someone who died in 1955 at the age of 70. In their life they saw the introduction of: home electric providers, telephones, radio, movies, automobile, air travel (from nothing to the jet age!), nuclear energy, the polio vaccine, penicillin, color photography, frozen food, and more. There are also less known changes with deep impact: the introduction of municipal garbage service cleaned up our cities and impr…

It is very hard for people to understand the impact of changes before their lives. All those things are "just the way the world is" for them. Conversely, I think it can also be difficult to understand how profound changes in the current day are if you aren't paying attention, and the world is big enough that there are profound changes happening somewhere that I may know is happening, but I don't understand how profound it really is.

And then, every once in a while, a polio vaccine is created, and the world is different for everybody. I certainly think the WWW is one of those. Facebook might be (800 million people under one roof is something, but I'm not convicted it is really changing the world).

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#128

Post by wrs » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 7:36 PM UTC

I suppose this is only fair, as I certainly use the term "politician" with the same dismissive tone of voice on occasion. And I have to admit that there are skills involved in being a successful politician that I don't much care to understand or appreciate. So henceforth I will use the term with more respect. Perhaps they will do the same someday.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#129

Post by drumdance » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 7:59 PM UTC

lusr wrote: post #30

pinaceae wrote: post #17

it points to a big shift in society and the economy. software is now a cornerstone of the world economy. modern life runs through the internet. even if you personally avoid the internet, you depend on it. but the baby boomer generation, represented by these politicians has not understood it. they know engineers as the guys building houses, bridges, aeroplanes, rockets. but software? it is an invisible world to them.…

I've often wondered how to explain to non-developers the level of complexity in large software projects. I don't think the new generation will understand it any better than the old generation because, as you say, it's an invisible world. I am currently contracted on a project with 1.5 million lines of code and dependencies on hundreds of services written by a number of different teams. It takes a few weeks just to ge…

Heh. Early on in my software education, I asked a friend of mine about the difference between real time systems and normal. He said, "In real time systems, if something goes wrong, the Space Shuttle blows up." Seems like an apt metaphor.

Re: Jon Stewart calls out congressional nerd bashing over SOPA

#130

Post by JeremyBanks » Fri, Jan 20, 2012, 8:50 PM UTC

neilk wrote: post #12

bravura wrote: post #8

On the plus side, all the conspiracy theorists who claimed that Jon Stewart and The Daily Shows were pawns of their parent multinational media conglomerate, and thus wouldn't negatively cover SOPA, these people were wrong. On the negative side, no one in the news media or whistleblowers and WTF-watchers like Jon Stewart knew what SOPA was until two days ago. That's even scarier.

More on the plus side: Jon Stewart and his team of researchers and writers can go from knowing nothing about a topic, to absolutely nailing some of the central absurdities, in less than a week. Either comedy is easier than it looks or these guys are really good at their jobs.

Did you watch the full segment? It didn't look to me like they had much understanding of the issue at all. It seems like they'd read a few articles about it and threw together a segment whose humour didn't require a deep understanding.

I was a little bit disappointed.