First off, i want to thank lilo for accrediting me, and cmacd for offering proof that people really do read these things. Encouraging and unsettling at the same time.

Had a realization today that one of the most important qualities i'm looking for in a job isn't "small company" or "casual environment". It's "no PowerPoint presentations". I can handle lots of things, but i flatly refuse to make ppt presentations (by which i mean "slideshow presentations", ppt being the standard, and easiest to deride).

I'm serious. It's not that i refuse to explain things to people -- i'm happy to do that. Give me a whiteboard and a half-hour, and i'll happily convey the concept of a TCP stack to the most unenlightened of board members. But i draw the line at reducing the problems of a department to three vapid, overgeneralized bullet-points, then following up with three equally vapid and overgeneralized solutions.

I realize that i'm probably painting an unfair portrait of the whole slideshow presentation thang, and i'm sure that, somewhere, they are being used for genuinely useful and appropriate exchanges of information. But that's an assumption -- i have no proof.

On a slightly less rant-ish note, i had the wonderfully cathartic experience of expounding on the sound capabilities of the Apple ][ earlier today on a listserv. I'm convinced i've weirded everyone else out, but it was good to type up some old 6502 assembler. Purges the soul.