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— Elio (@eliopictures.bsky.social) 2026-03-06T21:20:54.283Z
Category: Quotes
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The MTA MetroCard System Runs on OS/2
From Ernie Smith at tedium.co:
The reasons why the MTA ultimately decided to utilize OS/2 as it digitized some aspects of the subway system mirror the hype surrounding the launch in the early 1990s. But a lot of that conversation and development started years before. Behind the scenes, Microsoft and IBM were working on the next generation of operating systems. While modern tech lore has Gates and Microsoft fleecing IBM over MS-DOS, at the time IBM clearly felt otherwise.
Rather than bemoan lost profits, IBM seemed to recognize a gap in its knowledge and it began the push to develop next-generation operating systems at a fundamental level, at first in partnership with Microsoft. This, almost predictably, worked out for IBM about as well as the MS-DOS deal did. However, in a very narrow window in the late 1980s, executives at the MTA were looking to remove tokens from the subway system and replace them with a prepaid card. The benefits were obvious, allowing for easier fare increases while offering tiered pricing. Riders would now have the option to choose between an individual or round trip option and an unlimited option that covers a set amount of time.
To implement this revolutionary upgrade, the MTA went with a known entity, IBM. At the time, it made a lot of sense.[…] To understand why, you need to understand the timing. Waldhauer continues, “The design is from a time before either Linux or Windows was around. OS/2 would have seemed like a secure choice for the future.”
So for a lack of options, the MTA went with its best one. And it’s worked out for decades, as one of the key software components of a quite complex system.And it might even survive beyond that, according to Waldhauer: “I will go out on a limb and say that as long as MetroCard is accepted in the system, OS/2 will still be running.”
Official support for OS/2 apparently lasted until 2007! Hell of a run IBM.
Related:
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I Will Fucking Piledrive You If You Mention AI Again
And then some absolute son of a bitch created ChatGPT, and now look at us. Look at us, resplendent in our pauper’s robes, stitched from corpulent greed and breathless credulity, spending half of the planet’s engineering efforts to add chatbot support to every application under the sun when half of the industry hasn’t worked out how to test database backups regularly. This is why I have to visit untold violence upon the next moron to propose that AI is the future of the business – not because this is impossible in principle, but because they are now indistinguishable from a hundred million willful fucking idiots.
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How to Write according to David Ogilvy
In September of 1982, David Ogilvy shared the following:
- Read the Roman-Raphaelson book on writing.* Read it three times.
- Write the way you talk. Naturally.
- Use short words, short sentences and short paragraphs.
- Never use jargon words like reconceptualize, demassification, attitudinally, judgmentally. They are hallmarks of a pretentious ass.
- Never write more than two pages on any subject.
- Check your quotations.
- Never send a letter or a memo on the day you write it. Read it aloud the next morning —and then edit it.
- If it is something important, get a colleague to improve it.
- Before you send your letter or memo, make sure it is crystal clear what you want the recipient to do.
- If you want ACTION, don’t write. Go and tell the guy what you want.
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Buenaventura, Colombia Will Be Exorcized Via Helicopter
He told local radio: “We have to drive the devil out of Buenaventura, to see if we can restore the peace and tranquility that our city has lost due to so many crimes, acts of corruption and with so much evil and drug trafficking that invades our port.
“We want to go around the whole of Buenaventura, from the air, and pour holy water on to it to see if we exorcise and get out all those demons that are destroying our port, so that God’s blessing comes and gets rid of all the wickedness that is in our streets.”
Colombia’s army is reported to be providing the bishop with a helicopter for the aerial exorcism during the city’s annual patron saints’ festivities.
Buenaventura, on Colombia’s Pacific coast, was named as the country’s most violent place in 2014.
Yeah, I’m sure sprinkling a few gallons of some water by air, onto the city will help everyone.