tinkering. No sooner would he send a drawing to the machine shop than he 
would find a better way to perform the task and would order work stopped 
until he had finished pursuing the new line. By and large this flaw kept 
Babbage from ever finishing anything."

OK, so how many of you are thinking "hmm, that sounds like me" right 
now? ;-)

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Invisible wrote:
> "One of Babbage’s most serious flaws was his inability to stop
> tinkering. No sooner would he send a drawing to the machine shop than he
> would find a better way to perform the task and would order work stopped
> until he had finished pursuing the new line. By and large this flaw kept
> Babbage from ever finishing anything."
> 
> OK, so how many of you are thinking "hmm, that sounds like me" right
> now? ;-)

_o/ *raises hand*

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Invisible escreveu:

> tinkering. No sooner would he send a drawing to the machine shop than he 
> would find a better way to perform the task and would order work stopped 
> until he had finished pursuing the new line. By and large this flaw kept 
> Babbage from ever finishing anything."
> 
> OK, so how many of you are thinking "hmm, that sounds like me" right 
> now? ;-)

I believe it's the flaw of all tinkerers, including programming types... :)

-- 
a game sig: http://tinyurl.com/d3rxz9

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Invisible <voi### [at] devnull> wrote:

> OK, so how many of you are thinking "hmm, that sounds like me" right
> now? ;-)

**me too**

It's unfortunate, though, that large corporations in the modern world don't have
MORE Babbage types working for them (with the freedom to keep pushing for
changes and improvements); it sure would eliminate lots of bad products from
entering the marketplace--cars, software, etc.  Taking the time to actually get
it 'right' in the first place seems to be a lost philosophy, among many
companies...whether due to economic constraints or whatever. Something Babbage
apparently didn't have to worry about.

Of course, Babbage types need *some* constraints, imposed from
outside--otherwise, we'd *never* get anything done. It's a tricky trade-off.

Ken

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Kenneth wrote:

> It's unfortunate, though, that large corporations in the modern world don't have
> MORE Babbage types working for them (with the freedom to keep pushing for
> changes and improvements); it sure would eliminate lots of bad products from
> entering the marketplace--cars, software, etc.  Taking the time to actually get
> it 'right' in the first place seems to be a lost philosophy, among many
> companies...whether due to economic constraints or whatever. Something Babbage
> apparently didn't have to worry about.

It's the Microsoft philosophy: Why bother designing a superior product 
when you can just eliminate all the competing ones?

> Of course, Babbage types need *some* constraints, imposed from
> outside--otherwise, we'd *never* get anything done. It's a tricky trade-off.

Hell, Babbage successfully designed the world's first Turing-complete 
computer - but it was several hundred years late to the market. (!!)

Talk about Analysis Paralysis...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Am 12.05.2010 22:45, schrieb Orchid XP v8:
> Kenneth wrote:
>
>> It's unfortunate, though, that large corporations in the modern world
>> don't have
>> MORE Babbage types working for them (with the freedom to keep pushing for
>> changes and improvements); it sure would eliminate lots of bad
>> products from
>> entering the marketplace--cars, software, etc. Taking the time to
>> actually get
>> it 'right' in the first place seems to be a lost philosophy, among many
>> companies...whether due to economic constraints or whatever. Something
>> Babbage
>> apparently didn't have to worry about.
>
> It's the Microsoft philosophy: Why bother designing a superior product
> when you can just eliminate all the competing ones?

No, it's nothing MS specific - it's just typical shareholder value 
thinking: Keep the owner satisfied /today/ and let the devil take tomorrow.

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clipka wrote:
> No, it's nothing MS specific - it's just typical shareholder value 
> thinking: Keep the owner satisfied /today/ and let the devil take tomorrow.

Actually, MS generally had a pretty good product compared to their 
competition, for the areas they were competing in. It wasn't perfect, and it 
lacked a lot of features, but it worked fairly well if you were in their 
target market, compared to anything else close to the same price. It's 
really only their competition that hated them, not their customers.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
    Ada - the programming language trying to avoid
    you literally shooting yourself in the foot.

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On Wed, 12 May 2010 16:31:19 -0700, Darren New wrote:

>  It wasn't perfect, and
> it lacked a lot of features, but it worked fairly well if you were in
> their target market, compared to anything else close to the same price.

I have always said Microsoft was good at making products that were "good 
enough" for users.  Not outstanding, but they really found the right 
breakeven point for the users when it came to marketing/pricing their 
products and incorporating enough features that they met the needs of a 
large number of users.

Jim

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Jim Henderson <nos### [at] nospamcom> wrote:
> On Wed, 12 May 2010 16:31:19 -0700, Darren New wrote:

> >  It wasn't perfect, and
> > it lacked a lot of features, but it worked fairly well if you were in
> > their target market, compared to anything else close to the same price.

> I have always said Microsoft was good at making products that were "good 
> enough" for users.  Not outstanding, but they really found the right 
> breakeven point for the users when it came to marketing/pricing their 
> products and incorporating enough features that they met the needs of a 
> large number of users.

  One shouldn't, though, forget the marketing tactics Microsoft used, and
is still using, to enforce their products on people.

  While other software companies were content simply advertising their
products, MS often went one step ahead and actually lobbied or made
contracts with PC vendors so that their products would be included by
default in all sold PC's. I don't know how the situation is today, but
at least some time ago there were many places in the US where you simply
could not buy a PC without Windows. (You could have the vendor remove
Windows from the PC, but that would not affect the price of the PC. You
would still be paying for Windows.) And this goes all the way back to
the early days of DOS. (Many people don't remember that there was, in fact,
competition on the OS market on those days, even for the PC, and even with
DOS-compatible systems. However, MS succeeded in making DOS such an
ubiquitous product that people don't even remember that back then there
were actually alternatives, even compatible ones.)

  I find it rather obnoxious when Steve Ballmer, when questioned some time
ago about the problems with Windows Vista, referred to it as "the second
most used operating system in the world" (obviously referring to XP as
the most used one), like that was some kind of indication of its quality,
like it was some kind of indication of what people prefer. The fact is,
however, that Vista didn't get so popular by choice: It was (and may even
still sometimes be in some cases) pre-installed in the vast majority of
new PC's (both desktop and laptop), and the vast majority of consumers
had no choice than to buy it. Most of the people who buy a PC don't know
enough about computers to really have a choice: It's the computer vendor
who makes the decision of which OS they will buy, not the customer. And
ultimately, albeit indirectly, it's really Microsoft who is making the
decision of which OS customers will buy, not the customer himself.

  Being "the second most used operating system in the world" is not saying
much about *quality* when we are talking about Vista. It only tells how well
MS has succeeded in their marketing tactics.

-- 
                                                          - Warp

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> It's the Microsoft philosophy: Why bother designing a superior product 
> when you can just eliminate all the competing ones?

All (successful) companies work the same way:

A = estimated costs for developing with X man hours of resources
B = estimated sales income after X man hours of development

Choose X to maximise (B-A)

It's not quite that simple, but you get the idea that after a certain point 
your profit goes *down* the bigger X is.

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