webshit weekly

An annotated digest of the top "Hacker" "News" posts for the second week of July, 2018.

A div that looks different in every browser
July 08, 2018 (comments)
Some webshits play with the inadequacy of their platform. Hackernews forms two lines: the grumpy pensioners bemoaning the shoddy work put into basically all web standards, and the naive youth, gleefully effing the ineffable, for whom standards are things that happen to other people. Several Hackernews are momentarily confused regarding which line they should join, but in the long run they both wind up in the same toilet.

Nissan Admits Internal Emissions-Test Results were Falsified
July 09, 2018 (comments)
Some auto workers lie to each other. Nothing interesting results. Hackernews spends two days bikeshedding the headline, then debates the seditious and possibly fatal concept of taking responsibility for their work. Everyone agrees it's not worth doing, especially since nobody seems to be forcing them to, but there's a lively argument to be pursued regarding whose fault that is.

Goodbye Microservices: From 100s of problem children to 1 superstar
July 10, 2018 (comments)
Some webshits (business model: "uber for surveillance") think anyone cares about their jobs. Their home page features a link entitled "Website Data Collection Preferences" that does not affect anything, which may be performance art. Hackernews reads the thousands of words about reckless overengineering, then declares that Hackernews could have predicted the results, since Hackernews is the world's leading authority on reckless overengineering. Many dozens of comments insist that all the problems come from not aping Google, followed by many more claiming to know the true meaning of Google's Holy Writ.

The San Franciso Fire Department makes its own wooden ladders by hand
July 11, 2018 (comments)
Nota Bene: Yes, Gizmodo misspelled "San Francisco" in the headline. "Hacker" "News" apparently chose not to correct this either.
Some workers understand their tools. Hackernews is completely revolted by this concept, and uses it as a springboard to offload every complaint they've ever had about every government in the Bay Area. One Hackernews is particularly pissed off about the time when someone called for emergency services and emergency services arrived. The rest are mostly content to bicker about whether fire engines should be standardized internationally, or complaining that firefighters do not work enough, or they're not smart enough to handle lumber, or are too dumb to select a ladder.

“I'm basically giving myself a permanent vacation from being BDFL”
July 12, 2018 (comments)
A programmer caps off nearly three decades of effort with some light whining. Hackernews can't seem to care; instead they whine about people being mean to them, develop a deep rage at the idea that someone might be being mean to them in a circumspect manner, and then place a bounty on the heads of anyone who has ever been mean to anyone else. When someone finally notices the content of the article in question, they bikeshed the thirty years of work instead.

Learn how to design large-scale systems
July 13, 2018 (comments)
A webshit purports to educate us. The content of the education is entirely inconsequential, unless your organization is focused on wasting resources and/or human dignity. Even Hackernews recognizes the idiocy inherent in the source material, and chooses to spend the time arguing about the programs used for typesetting instead. Later, an argument breaks out when someone smugly points out that "Hacker" "News", a site primarily devoted to agreeing with cloistered rich people, requires less hardware than Facebook, a site primarily devoted to the destruction of Western civilization.

Why Use OpenStreetMap Instead of Google Maps?
July 14, 2018 (comments)
An idiot thinks you should use a broken map because the working one is owned by shitheads. Hackernews is unconvinced, but has lots of strong opinions on why the shitty map is shitty. Most of the comments are people namedropping competing products and/or whining about the times those products did not work.