Surely there are anxious people that have won the lottery?

I've met lots of really smart programmers that don't even seem to talk about coding during lunch, much less program during free time. I'd certainly code more at home if I didn't have a family and lots of other interests besides programming.

I'm sorry this article is silly hype. I think someone from Venture Beat would like a job at Facebook.

I got it for PS2. Not exactly the best looking game of its time. But some unforgettably great concepts.

You play the game inside someone's psyche. Early on you come across a suitcase that is crying and it needs your help to find a missing tag. I really laughed out loud when I realized it was emotional baggage. :)

Later in the game you have to solve some puzzles by looking through other people's eyes and realize that they see things differently than you.

Wonderful stuff!

Fonzie jumped the shark because the show was running out of ideas. We won't ever be out of ideas for software.

Sure, at work I dig around lots of legacy stuff and stitch it together. But it never feels assembly line to me even when I'm not thrilled about a specific task. I'm always solving the most important problem of the moment and trying to think about the best way to do it (in terms of balancing time, knowledge, clarity, efficiency, etc...).

Only in the last few years I've seen some of the best software I've ever encountered. Ableton Live is unbelievably insanely great. Max/Msp/Jitter is an inspiring playground I could stay in forever. There is some great hacking out there and plenty of culture to support it.

This article is equating anything that is feature rich and highly competent to being a Trojan Horse. If so, then bring on the horses!

Mel was a requirements driven programmer that had the luxury of only having to write code for one platform at a time. None of his code as described sounds possible to abstract and maintain across platforms. I'm going to guess he evolved towards hardware engineering rather than software engineering.

I definitely consider it an overreaction to call the described approach over-engineering. Separating simulation and presentation in to separate threads is common and very practical in many games (2d or 3d). It is also common and easy to support a single threaded mode that just runs both simulation and presentation update from one thread. The single threaded mode can make debugging certain issues much easier, but it is rare to have a desire to ship single threaded.

I really miss it. I thought I got more done personally. In the 90's I worked places where most programmers had a door. In the 00's almost no one where I work has a door anymore.

At work I sit about 10 desks away from users. But immediately next to me are programmers (both working with me and are not working with me). Most of my users talk more often and not terribly understanding of breaking a programmers "zone". So they are close enough for necessary feedback and interaction, but not too close. As a programmer, I find programmers are much more quiet and peaceful to work next to. :)