Only 36% of Indian engineers can write compilable code: study.

That many? I’d have guessed 25%, but I’m not that experienced in dealing with the coding side.

On the infrastructure side, it’s about a quarter who are capable of doing what their nominal job titles imply they should be able to do.

Why is this? I am not really sure. Probably contracting companies trying to fill positions with unqualified people for low salaries.

My latest strategy when I call for support is the first obvious technical screw-up from the “engineer” I get on the phone (this is for high-end enterprise-class products), I hang up immediately and call back until I get someone who knows what he or she is doing. This usually takes a few tries but it means I waste 10 minutes instead of four hours.

I know, it’s a little rude, but I simply do not have time to do anything else.

I will never, ever use a webmail client as my only/full-time email client.

Don’t like your data? Use webmail! Want it slow, buggy, and impossible to search? Webmail has the solution for you!

Again: fuck webmail.

Natalie’s voice has only gotten better with age. It’s lost that edge of brightness and gained more in the way of world-weariness. It’s an improvement, or perhaps it’s just fitted to its era — just as her 90s voice was.

I can’t believe I first listened to a 10,000 Maniacs song in 1989 or so.

I don’t put on many 10,000 Maniacs songs these days — old or new. They don’t do much for me now. They are artifacts of a time long past. But I’ll always watch Natalie perform if it’s well-recorded.

Compare and contrast with this:

I watched that live in 1993. IMO one of the best live performances ever. And that outfit is amazing, too.

Everyone was just so damn perky and optimistic in the 90s. It was such a different time, so much so that I look back on it — contemplate living through it — and I can hardly comprehend how much has changed, and how quickly. The person who was me in 1993 in many ways is barely related to who I am now.

I can’t listen to 10,000 Maniacs songs anymore because it’s like a dissimilar alternate universe that I no longer understand.

Just look at Natalie, look at them all: they have no idea what’s coming and how that optimism will be replaced with the narrative of diminution, of loss, of decline and dissolution.

Look at who we were. My god.