Doodle!

Ever got a headache trying to arrange a meeting or even a gathering? Well here is one neat solution: Doodle! Spread the word!

Attracting talents

Eric Lippert has asked the community about what makes a developer job posting attractive. He followed up his post by summarizing all the answers he got. I have nothing to add except that I will usually look at the company web site to see whether they care enough about quality that their own web site is well done.

Priceless

Engineering hours building unbreakable DRM: $1.6M
Marketing devoted to managing customer hostility to new DRM: $800K
Lost sales due to customers boycotting your product: $2M
Having some smart ass kid from Sweden break your DRM on the very first day: Priceless
Pissing off all your paying customers because they can no longer play: Doubly Priceless

p.s. Numbers in this post are anything but real. My guess is that they may in fact be even higher…

It’s all about the team

If you give a good idea to a mediocre group, they’ll screw it up. If you give a mediocre idea to a good group, they’ll fix it. Or they’ll throw it away and come up with something else. Execution isn’t merely a multiplier. It’s far more powerful. How your team executes has the power to transform your idea from gold into lead, or from lead into gold. [...] If I had to point to the one thing that made our project successful, it was not the idea behind it, our internet fame, the tools we chose, or the funding we had (precious little, for the record).

It was our team.

From an article by Jeff Atwood well worth reading.

To better understand type system limitations in Java/C#

Here is an interesting article by Joe Duffy explaining what are some of the limitations of the type system in Java/C# in relation to Haskell/ML, namely parametric polymorphism and higher kinded types.

Mon motto cette année

Je viens de finir de lire “Dieu et nous seuls pouvons” de Michel Folco et voilà un extrait qui tombe à point:

Moins tu réussis, plus tu parles des difficultés.
Celui qui réussit n’en parle jamais.
As-tu bien rempli ta journée ?
Pose-toi cette question tous les soirs.

Quebec City is beautiful!

You have to come here at least once in the winter!

Quebec in the winter

CRIA me a river!

The Canadian Recording Industry Association faces a lawsuit for 60 billion dollars over willful infringement.

L’autre St-Jean

Ceux qui capotent sur la question de la langue française devrait regarder du côté de l’Irlande, qui a su faire rayonner sa culture partout à travers le monde sans qu’elle repose principalement sur la langue. Tsé, le jour de la St-Patrick, tout le monde est Irlandais, peu importe la religion ou la langue. En fait, ce jour-là, le trip de plusieurs est de remonter son arbre généalogique pour se trouver du sang vert et en tirer une certaine fierté … ou ben justifier une méchante brosse, c’est selon. Pas obligé d’être unilingue gaélique pour être fier d’être Irlandais comme on n’est pas obligé de parler français pour être fier d’être Québécois.

J’rêve d’un Québec où des touristes affluent de partout pour s’imprégner de notre culture unique … Un Chinois avec une chemise à carreaux ben chaud sur le caribou en criant Tabarnak, ça me ferait verser une petite larme de joie.

On the other hand, the reality of being French in Canada still resembles what is portrayed in this parody, so it’s not like it’s only the frenchies who have to open up their mind…

Insider look at Blizzard’s cinematics

I have been a fan of Blizzard’s cinematics since day one. In the April 2009 issue, Atomic gives us a chance to take a look behind the scenes. Enjoy this interview!