daring-rss

Dominic Gates, reporting for The Seattle Times last week:

When the Boeing 737 MAX 9’s side blew out explosively on Alaska
Airlines Flight 1282 Friday evening, a 15-year-old high school
student was in the window seat in the row directly ahead, his
shoulder beside the edge of the gaping hole.

His mother, who was seated beside him, in the middle seat of row
25, described the moment as a very loud bang, like “a bomb
exploding.”

As the air in the passenger cabin rushed out, the Oregon woman
turned and saw her son’s seat twisting backward toward the hole,
his seat headrest ripped off and sucked into the void, her son’s
arms jerked upward.

“He and his seat were pulled back and towards the exterior of the
plane in the direction of the hole,” she said. “I reached over and
grabbed his body and pulled him towards me over the armrest.”

The boy had been wearing a T-shirt and a V-neck pullover
windbreaker. Both were ripped off his body. “I could see his
back,” Faye said. “My mind just assumed his shirt had been pulled
up by me grabbing him. I did not know that it had been torn off.
It didn’t even occur to me.”

A harrowing story. If his shirt and pullover were pulled off his body, and his seatbelt headrest sucked through the void, it sure sounds like he was nearly sucked out of the plane. Terrific reporting by Gates, too — the mother’s name is not publicly known, and she was initially resistant to tell her story to the press. She changed her mind only after Alaska Airlines put forth a version of events that made the incident seem far more tame than it clearly was. Good infographics, too.

Unmentioned in the story is whether the passengers near the door plug were wearing their seatbelts. I suspect they all were, perhaps luckily, because the plane had only just taken off and was still ascending to cruise altitude. In years past I’d often leave my seatbelt unbuckled mid-flight, other than when the pilot turned on the mandatory seatbelt light, but a few bouts of out-of-nowhere turbulence over the years changed my mind on that. Never in a million years would I have considered a scenario like this one.

 ★ 

Dominic Gates, reporting for The Seattle Times last week:

When the Boeing 737 MAX 9’s side blew out explosively on Alaska
Airlines Flight 1282 Friday evening, a 15-year-old high school
student was in the window seat in the row directly ahead, his
shoulder beside the edge of the gaping hole.

His mother, who was seated beside him, in the middle seat of row
25, described the moment as a very loud bang, like “a bomb
exploding.”

As the air in the passenger cabin rushed out, the Oregon woman
turned and saw her son’s seat twisting backward toward the hole,
his seat headrest ripped off and sucked into the void, her son’s
arms jerked upward.

“He and his seat were pulled back and towards the exterior of the
plane in the direction of the hole,” she said. “I reached over and
grabbed his body and pulled him towards me over the armrest.”

The boy had been wearing a T-shirt and a V-neck pullover
windbreaker. Both were ripped off his body. “I could see his
back,” Faye said. “My mind just assumed his shirt had been pulled
up by me grabbing him. I did not know that it had been torn off.
It didn’t even occur to me.”

A harrowing story. If his shirt and pullover were pulled off his body, and his seatbelt headrest sucked through the void, it sure sounds like he was nearly sucked out of the plane. Terrific reporting by Gates, too — the mother’s name is not publicly known, and she was initially resistant to tell her story to the press. She changed her mind only after Alaska Airlines put forth a version of events that made the incident seem far more tame than it clearly was. Good infographics, too.

Unmentioned in the story is whether the passengers near the door plug were wearing their seatbelts. I suspect they all were, perhaps luckily, because the plane had only just taken off and was still ascending to cruise altitude. In years past I’d often leave my seatbelt unbuckled mid-flight, other than when the pilot turned on the mandatory seatbelt light, but a few bouts of out-of-nowhere turbulence over the years changed my mind on that. Never in a million years would I have considered a scenario like this one.

Read More 

Kevin Systrom:

We’ve made the decision to wind down operations of the Artifact
app. We launched a year ago and since then we’ve been working
tirelessly to build a great product. We have built something that
a core group of users love, but we have concluded that the market
opportunity isn’t big enough to warrant continued investment in
this way. It’s easy for startups to ignore this reality, but often
making the tough call earlier is better for everyone involved. The
biggest opportunity cost is time working on newer, bigger and
better things that have the ability to reach many millions of
people. I am personally excited to continue building new things,
though only time will tell what that might be. We live in an
exciting time where artificial intelligence is changing just about
everything we touch, and the opportunities for new ideas seem
limitless.

I am particularly proud of all the work our small team of 8 has
accomplished. For instance, our app was recently named the
everyday essential app of the year by the Google Play Store.

Winning an award on Android is a little like winning the Canadian Football League title. Artifact had great potential — no surprise given its pedigree: Systrom and Mike Krieger are hall of famers for Instagram — but never became a top-tier iOS app.

When it debuted a year ago, I called it a disappointment:

It’s just ads ads ads, interrupting seemingly every single
article, every couple of paragraphs. This same “man, I miss ad
blockers” feeling strikes me when I use Apple News too, but Apple
News articles have way fewer ads, and better ads, than what I’m
seeing so far in articles I read in Artifact. “Like Apple News but
worse” is not a good elevator pitch. […]

Instagram was an instant sensation because it was obviously such a
premium experience. Great photos, with cool filters (which filters
were necessary to make phone camera pictures look great a decade
ago), a simple social concept, all wrapped in a great app.
Artifact does feel like a nice app, but the reading experience, at
least today, is anything but premium. It feels cheap. And the
social aspect isn’t there yet.

I stuck with it all year, but have used it less than ever in recent months. In the first half of 2023, Artifact’s suggestions were improving steadily for me, but in recent months the quality of the suggestions dropped off a cliff for me. Lots of clickbait.

They added the social component, with the ability to post articles and add comments, but those features didn’t make the overall product any better. And while the core reading experience improved, it never improved to the point where it was as good as reading in Safari. Their refusal to focus on providing first and foremost a premium reading experience is exemplified by their own blog post announcing their shutdown. It looks like this on MacOS, and this on iOS. You literally can’t even read the first sentence of the article on the iPhone until you click the little box to dismiss Medium’s dickbox.

 ★ 

Kevin Systrom:

We’ve made the decision to wind down operations of the Artifact
app. We launched a year ago and since then we’ve been working
tirelessly to build a great product. We have built something that
a core group of users love, but we have concluded that the market
opportunity isn’t big enough to warrant continued investment in
this way. It’s easy for startups to ignore this reality, but often
making the tough call earlier is better for everyone involved. The
biggest opportunity cost is time working on newer, bigger and
better things that have the ability to reach many millions of
people. I am personally excited to continue building new things,
though only time will tell what that might be. We live in an
exciting time where artificial intelligence is changing just about
everything we touch, and the opportunities for new ideas seem
limitless.

I am particularly proud of all the work our small team of 8 has
accomplished. For instance, our app was recently named the
everyday essential app of the year by the Google Play Store.

Winning an award on Android is a little like winning the Canadian Football League title. Artifact had great potential — no surprise given its pedigree: Systrom and Mike Krieger are hall of famers for Instagram — but never became a top-tier iOS app.

When it debuted a year ago, I called it a disappointment:

It’s just ads ads ads, interrupting seemingly every single
article, every couple of paragraphs. This same “man, I miss ad
blockers” feeling strikes me when I use Apple News too, but Apple
News articles have way fewer ads, and better ads, than what I’m
seeing so far in articles I read in Artifact. “Like Apple News but
worse” is not a good elevator pitch. […]

Instagram was an instant sensation because it was obviously such a
premium experience. Great photos, with cool filters (which filters
were necessary to make phone camera pictures look great a decade
ago), a simple social concept, all wrapped in a great app.
Artifact does feel like a nice app, but the reading experience, at
least today, is anything but premium. It feels cheap. And the
social aspect isn’t there yet.

I stuck with it all year, but have used it less than ever in recent months. In the first half of 2023, Artifact’s suggestions were improving steadily for me, but in recent months the quality of the suggestions dropped off a cliff for me. Lots of clickbait.

They added the social component, with the ability to post articles and add comments, but those features didn’t make the overall product any better. And while the core reading experience improved, it never improved to the point where it was as good as reading in Safari. Their refusal to focus on providing first and foremost a premium reading experience is exemplified by their own blog post announcing their shutdown. It looks like this on MacOS, and this on iOS. You literally can’t even read the first sentence of the article on the iPhone until you click the little box to dismiss Medium’s dickbox.

Read More 

In 2003 there was one person in the world who could be described as a former vice president of the United States and avid Mac user.

Apple press release, on 19 March 2003 (about seven months after I started writing Daring Fireball1):

Apple today announced that Albert Gore Jr., the former Vice
President of the United States, has joined the Company’s Board of
Directors. Mr. Gore was elected at Apple’s board meeting today.

“Al brings an incredible wealth of knowledge and wisdom to Apple
from having helped run the largest organization in the world — the United States government — as a Congressman, Senator and our
45th Vice President. Al is also an avid Mac user and does his own
video editing in Final Cut Pro,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “Al
is going to be a terrific Director and we’re excited and honored
that he has chosen Apple as his first private sector board to
serve on.”

I love that the second sentence from Jobs was about how Gore is a Mac enthusiast who uses Final Cut Pro. Compare and contrast with today’s utterly milquetoast statements from Tim Cook and chairman Arthur Levinson about new board member Wanda Austin:

“Wanda has spent decades advancing technology on behalf of
humanity, and we’re thrilled to welcome her to Apple’s board of
directors,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “She’s an extraordinary
leader, and her invaluable experience and expertise will support
our mission of leaving the world better than we found it.”

“Wanda has long been a leader in unleashing the potential of
cutting-edge technology,” said Arthur Levinson, the chair of
Apple’s board of directors. “She brings incredible insights and
experience to our board, and she will play an important role in
helping Apple continue enriching users’ lives around the world.”

In 2003 there was one person in the world who could be described as a former vice president of the United States and avid Mac user. (That’s still true today, and that person remains Al Gore.) Cook’s and Levinson’s descriptions of Austin could apply to just about any technology company executive in the world.

Gore’s statement from 2003:

“Steve and his team have done an incredible job in making Apple
once again the very best in the world,” said former Vice President
Al Gore. “I have been particularly impressed with the new Mac OS X
operating system and the company’s commitment to the open source
movement. And I am especially looking forward to working with and
learning from the great board members who have guided this
legendary company’s inspiring resurgence.”

In 2003, Mac OS X was the most important product for the future of the company, and the open source movement was one of the major stories of the moment.

Austin’s statement today:

“Like Apple, I’ve always believed in the power of innovation to
improve lives, support human potential, and shape a better
future,” said Dr. Austin. “I’m honored to join Apple’s board of
directors, and I look forward to being part of a company that’s
always creating new ways to empower people all over the world.”

She could have said the exact same thing about joining the board of any tech company in the world today. If she serves for 20 years, like Gore did (which is unlikely, given that she’s already 70 and Gore is stepping down because of a policy “directors generally may not stand for reelection after reaching age 75”2), no one in the year 2044 is going to look back her statement above and think, Yeah, that captures what was then the current moment for Apple. Austin may well be a perfect candidate to serve on Apple’s board, but there’s nothing in today’s press release that indicates why.

Gore was widely mocked in the run-up to the 2000 election for supposedly claiming to have “invented the internet”. But he never claimed any such thing. From Snopes:

The claim that Gore was actually trying to take credit for the
“invention” of the Internet was plainly just derisive political
posturing that arose out of a close presidential campaign. If, for
example, Dwight Eisenhower had said in the mid-1960s that he,
while president, “took the initiative in creating the Interstate
Highway System,” he would not have been the subject of dozens and
dozens of editorials lampooning him for claiming he “invented” the
concept of highways or implying that he personally went out and
dug ditches across the country to help build the roadway. Everyone
would have understood that Eisenhower meant he was a driving force
behind the legislation that created the highway system, and this
was the very same concept Al Gore was expressing about himself
with interview remarks about the Internet. […]

A spirited defense of Gore’s statement penned by Internet
pioneers Robert Kahn and Vinton Cerf (the latter often referred to
as the “father of the Internet”) in 2000 noted that “Al Gore was
the first political leader to recognize the importance of the
Internet and to promote and support its development” and that “No
other elected official, to our knowledge, has made a greater
contribution [to the Internet] over a longer period of time.”

Not a bad endorsement.

Read More 

Apple Newsroom:

Apple today announced Dr. Wanda Austin, former president and CEO
of The Aerospace Corporation, has been nominated for election to
Apple’s board of directors. Dr. Austin brings decades of science
and technology experience to her role, and she has a significant
track record of advancing innovation and shaping corporate
strategy.

As president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, Dr. Austin led
an organization dedicated to supporting the U.S. space program and
expanding opportunities for future exploration. She was the first
woman and the first African American to hold the position. […]

The board has a longstanding policy that directors generally may
not stand for reelection after reaching age 75. As a result, Al
Gore, who has served since 2003, and James Bell, who joined in
2015, will both retire from Apple’s board this year.

“We’re deeply grateful to Al and James for their many years of
service to Apple — their insights, energy, and values have made
us a stronger company in so many ways,” said Cook. “For more than
20 years, Al has contributed an incredible amount to our work — from his unconditional support for protecting our users’ privacy,
to his incomparable knowledge of environment and climate issues.”

I strongly suspect that even if Gore had never joined the board, Apple would be a staunchly environmentally-minded company today, but surely Gore pushed them hard in that direction. And I think he was instrumental in Apple’s hiring of Lisa Jackson.

 ★ 

Apple Newsroom:

Apple today announced Dr. Wanda Austin, former president and CEO
of The Aerospace Corporation, has been nominated for election to
Apple’s board of directors. Dr. Austin brings decades of science
and technology experience to her role, and she has a significant
track record of advancing innovation and shaping corporate
strategy.

As president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, Dr. Austin led
an organization dedicated to supporting the U.S. space program and
expanding opportunities for future exploration. She was the first
woman and the first African American to hold the position. […]

The board has a longstanding policy that directors generally may
not stand for reelection after reaching age 75. As a result, Al
Gore, who has served since 2003, and James Bell, who joined in
2015, will both retire from Apple’s board this year.

“We’re deeply grateful to Al and James for their many years of
service to Apple — their insights, energy, and values have made
us a stronger company in so many ways,” said Cook. “For more than
20 years, Al has contributed an incredible amount to our work — from his unconditional support for protecting our users’ privacy,
to his incomparable knowledge of environment and climate issues.”

I strongly suspect that even if Gore had never joined the board, Apple would be a staunchly environmentally-minded company today, but surely Gore pushed them hard in that direction. And I think he was instrumental in Apple’s hiring of Lisa Jackson.

Read More 

My recent spate of Tetris-related links got me thinking again about this post from 2018:

So as far as I can tell, not only is there no official Tetris for
Mac, there are no Tetris-like games either. Back in the 90s, there
were several really good Tetris games for the Mac. Anyone remember
Wesleyan Tetris? It was a goofy version in which the
developer, Randall Cook, would rudely critique your gameplay.

If The Tetris Company wants to protect the name “Tetris”, fine,
but I think it sucks that there’s no good way to play the game on
a Mac today. Every computer should have a good version of Tetris.

Not much has changed from 2018. There is an officially licensed game in the Mac App Store now: Tetris Beat. It’s part of Apple Arcade, so most of you can probably download it and play it. It’s not just plain Tetris, and whatever is that it wants to be, it sucks. It doesn’t even let you customize the controls. It occupies 2.3 GB on disk after installation. For Tetris! Jiminy. Niklaus Wirth would be rolling over in his (fresh) grave if you told him a Tetris game took 2.3 GB on disk and made the fans get loud on an Apple silicon MacBook Pro when you play it.

The best options for just playing Tetris on a Mac are web games: Tetr.io and Jstris. (I presume both websites are hosted in countries outside the reach of litigious The Tetris Company.) Tetr.io offers “desktop” versions, but their Mac app is an Intel-only Electron app that instantly made the fans on my MacBook Pro veritably roar. It’s far better playing online in Safari, but Tetr.io is geared toward Tetris fanatics, not casual play. Jstris is simpler, but fundamentally exists as a platform for competitive online play. (Go to Play → Practice to just play single player.)

What a sad state of affairs. A hearty fuck you to The Tetris Company for ruthlessly shutting down hobbyist clones while refusing to license a decent official just-plain-Tetris Mac app.

 ★ 

My recent spate of Tetris-related links got me thinking again about this post from 2018:

So as far as I can tell, not only is there no official Tetris for
Mac, there are no Tetris-like games either. Back in the 90s, there
were several really good Tetris games for the Mac. Anyone remember
Wesleyan Tetris? It was a goofy version in which the
developer, Randall Cook, would rudely critique your gameplay.

If The Tetris Company wants to protect the name “Tetris”, fine,
but I think it sucks that there’s no good way to play the game on
a Mac today. Every computer should have a good version of Tetris.

Not much has changed from 2018. There is an officially licensed game in the Mac App Store now: Tetris Beat. It’s part of Apple Arcade, so most of you can probably download it and play it. It’s not just plain Tetris, and whatever is that it wants to be, it sucks. It doesn’t even let you customize the controls. It occupies 2.3 GB on disk after installation. For Tetris! Jiminy. Niklaus Wirth would be rolling over in his (fresh) grave if you told him a Tetris game took 2.3 GB on disk and made the fans get loud on an Apple silicon MacBook Pro when you play it.

The best options for just playing Tetris on a Mac are web games: Tetr.io and Jstris. (I presume both websites are hosted in countries outside the reach of litigious The Tetris Company.) Tetr.io offers “desktop” versions, but their Mac app is an Intel-only Electron app that instantly made the fans on my MacBook Pro veritably roar. It’s far better playing online in Safari, but Tetr.io is geared toward Tetris fanatics, not casual play. Jstris is simpler, but fundamentally exists as a platform for competitive online play. (Go to Play → Practice to just play single player.)

What a sad state of affairs. A hearty fuck you to The Tetris Company for ruthlessly shutting down hobbyist clones while refusing to license a decent official just-plain-Tetris Mac app.

Read More 

Emily Schmall, reporting for The New York Times:

Fruit Stripe, the striped chewing gum known for its short burst of
flavor, has been discontinued after more than a half-century,
inspiring nostalgic tributes across social media.

“Best two seconds of flavor you’ve ever had,” one Reddit user
wrote on Wednesday. “R.I.P. to a legend.”

Rainbow-colored packs of Fruit Stripe gum first appeared in stores
in the United States in the late 1960s. Ferrara, a confectioner
based in Chicago, said this week that it had stopped making the
product.

There were two kinds of Fruit Stripe: chewing gum and bubble gum. I could never decide which was better, so, of course, I always bought a pack of each. (Juicy Fruit, of course, is the superior fruit-flavored stick-shaped chewing gum.)

 ★ 

Emily Schmall, reporting for The New York Times:

Fruit Stripe, the striped chewing gum known for its short burst of
flavor, has been discontinued after more than a half-century,
inspiring nostalgic tributes across social media.

“Best two seconds of flavor you’ve ever had,” one Reddit user
wrote on Wednesday. “R.I.P. to a legend.”

Rainbow-colored packs of Fruit Stripe gum first appeared in stores
in the United States in the late 1960s. Ferrara, a confectioner
based in Chicago, said this week that it had stopped making the
product.

There were two kinds of Fruit Stripe: chewing gum and bubble gum. I could never decide which was better, so, of course, I always bought a pack of each. (Juicy Fruit, of course, is the superior fruit-flavored stick-shaped chewing gum.)

Read More 

David A. Graham, writing at The Atlantic:

In a hearing before the D.C. Circuit Court, the former president’s
lawyers argued that he should be immune from criminal prosecution
for his role in the attempt to steal the 2020 presidential
election. This argument has an obvious flaw: It implies that the
president is above the law. Such a blunt rejection of the
Constitution and the basic concept of American democracy is too
much even for Trump to assert — publicly, at least — so his
lawyers have proposed a theory. They say that he can’t be
criminally prosecuted unless he is first impeached and convicted
by Congress.

This argument is no less dangerous, as a hypothetical asked in
court demonstrated in chilling terms. Judge Florence Pan asked
Trump’s attorney, D. John Sauer, if “a president who ordered SEAL
Team 6 to assassinate a political rival” could be criminally
prosecuted. Sauer tried to hem and haw his way through an answer
but ultimately stated that such a president couldn’t be prosecuted
unless he was first impeached, convicted, and removed by Congress.

“But if he weren’t, there would be no criminal prosecution, no
criminal liability for that?” Pan pressed. Sauer had no choice but
to agree, because acknowledging any exceptions would have blown a
hole in his argument.

The most forgiving take on this argument is that Trump’s legal team doesn’t mean it, and they’re merely stalling for time — throwing as much shit as possible up against the appeals court walls, hoping to delay his umpteen trials until after his possible reelection in a year. But Trump himself clearly means it.

The best refutation of Trump’s argument that presidents are above the law, and accountable only to Congressional impeachment, comes from Representative Jamie Raskin, who points to the glaring game theory hole in this absurd argument: if it were true, the president could order the assassination of any congressperson who threatened to impeach or convict him. As Raskin concluded, “This is the GOP 2024.”

 ★ 

David A. Graham, writing at The Atlantic:

In a hearing before the D.C. Circuit Court, the former president’s
lawyers argued that he should be immune from criminal prosecution
for his role in the attempt to steal the 2020 presidential
election. This argument has an obvious flaw: It implies that the
president is above the law. Such a blunt rejection of the
Constitution and the basic concept of American democracy is too
much even for Trump to assert — publicly, at least — so his
lawyers have proposed a theory. They say that he can’t be
criminally prosecuted unless he is first impeached and convicted
by Congress.

This argument is no less dangerous, as a hypothetical asked in
court demonstrated in chilling terms. Judge Florence Pan asked
Trump’s attorney, D. John Sauer, if “a president who ordered SEAL
Team 6 to assassinate a political rival” could be criminally
prosecuted. Sauer tried to hem and haw his way through an answer
but ultimately stated that such a president couldn’t be prosecuted
unless he was first impeached, convicted, and removed by Congress.

“But if he weren’t, there would be no criminal prosecution, no
criminal liability for that?” Pan pressed. Sauer had no choice but
to agree, because acknowledging any exceptions would have blown a
hole in his argument.

The most forgiving take on this argument is that Trump’s legal team doesn’t mean it, and they’re merely stalling for time — throwing as much shit as possible up against the appeals court walls, hoping to delay his umpteen trials until after his possible reelection in a year. But Trump himself clearly means it.

The best refutation of Trump’s argument that presidents are above the law, and accountable only to Congressional impeachment, comes from Representative Jamie Raskin, who points to the glaring game theory hole in this absurd argument: if it were true, the president could order the assassination of any congressperson who threatened to impeach or convict him. As Raskin concluded, “This is the GOP 2024.”

Read More 

NanoRaptor:

For Niklaus Wirth, 1934-2024.

Apple’s classic Pascal poster, remade as a nice clean vector
image. Print at any size with the PDF link.

Just beautiful.

 ★ 

NanoRaptor:

For Niklaus Wirth, 1934-2024.

Apple’s classic Pascal poster, remade as a nice clean vector
image. Print at any size with the PDF link.

Just beautiful.

Read More 

Liam Proven, in a nice obituary in The Register:

Swiss computer scientist Professor Niklaus Wirth died on New
Year’s Day, roughly six weeks before what would have been his 90th
birthday.

Wirth is justly celebrated as the creator of the Pascal
programming language, but that was only one step in a series of
important languages and research projects. Both asteroid
21655 and a law of computer design are named after
him. He won computer-science boffinry’s highest possible gong, the
Turing Award, in 1984, and that page has some short
English-language clips from a 2018 interview. […]

As described in C H Lindsey’s History of ALGOL-68 [PDF],
when the ALGOL-W proposal was rejected, Wirth resigned from the
committee, contributing a strong “Closing Word” to the
November 1968 Algol Bulletin 29, containing gems such as:

I pulled out my copy of the draft report on ALGOL-68 and showed it
to her. She fainted.

Instead, Wirth took his proposal, changed it to be somewhat
less compatible with ALGOL, and released it in 1970 under the
name Pascal.

Wirth’s Law encapsulates Wirth’s philosophy: “The hope is that the progress in hardware will cure all software ills. However, a critical observer may observe that software manages to outgrow hardware in size and sluggishness.” Or, as he rephrased it in his paper describing Project Oberon: “In spite of great leaps forward, hardware is becoming faster more slowly than software is becoming slower.” In many ways, this remains the fundamental problem of our entire industry. It’s a truism, and can only be mitigated.

He endorsed simplicity and clarity, and his languages and system designs exemplified those ideals. Studying computer science in the early to mid-1990s, I was among the last to learn Pascal as a teaching language. After outgrowing BASIC, I had actually started learning Pascal my senior year in high school, in a class with just two other students — thanks, Mrs. Spatz — and it was that class that made me want to study computer science in college.

And Pascal was to the original Macintosh what Objective-C was to Mac OS X — the language Apple established as the default for writing application software. Most of the apps that established the Macintosh as the platform for people with good taste in the 1980s and early 1990s were written in Pascal. THINK Pascal was an IDE years — maybe over a decade — ahead of its time.

 ★ 

Liam Proven, in a nice obituary in The Register:

Swiss computer scientist Professor Niklaus Wirth died on New
Year’s Day, roughly six weeks before what would have been his 90th
birthday.

Wirth is justly celebrated as the creator of the Pascal
programming language, but that was only one step in a series of
important languages and research projects. Both asteroid
21655 and a law of computer design are named after
him. He won computer-science boffinry’s highest possible gong, the
Turing Award, in 1984, and that page has some short
English-language clips from a 2018 interview. […]

As described in C H Lindsey’s History of ALGOL-68 [PDF],
when the ALGOL-W proposal was rejected, Wirth resigned from the
committee, contributing a strong “Closing Word” to the
November 1968 Algol Bulletin 29, containing gems such as:

I pulled out my copy of the draft report on ALGOL-68 and showed it
to her. She fainted.

Instead, Wirth took his proposal, changed it to be somewhat
less compatible with ALGOL, and released it in 1970 under the
name Pascal.

Wirth’s Law encapsulates Wirth’s philosophy: “The hope is that the progress in hardware will cure all software ills. However, a critical observer may observe that software manages to outgrow hardware in size and sluggishness.” Or, as he rephrased it in his paper describing Project Oberon: “In spite of great leaps forward, hardware is becoming faster more slowly than software is becoming slower.” In many ways, this remains the fundamental problem of our entire industry. It’s a truism, and can only be mitigated.

He endorsed simplicity and clarity, and his languages and system designs exemplified those ideals. Studying computer science in the early to mid-1990s, I was among the last to learn Pascal as a teaching language. After outgrowing BASIC, I had actually started learning Pascal my senior year in high school, in a class with just two other students — thanks, Mrs. Spatz — and it was that class that made me want to study computer science in college.

And Pascal was to the original Macintosh what Objective-C was to Mac OS X — the language Apple established as the default for writing application software. Most of the apps that established the Macintosh as the platform for people with good taste in the 1980s and early 1990s were written in Pascal. THINK Pascal was an IDE years — maybe over a decade — ahead of its time.

Read More 

Jason Koebler, writing for 404 Media:

A 13-year-old competitive Tetris player has become the first
known human to beat the game on the original NES by
forcing it into a kill screen. In doing so, the player, Blue
Scuti, broke world records for overall score, level achieved, and
total numbers of lines in the 34-year-old game. Previously, only
an AI had broken Tetris.

The feat took Blue Scuti about 38 minutes, as shown in a video he
posted to his YouTube. As he nears the feat, Blue Scuti says “Oh I
missed it,” after misplacing a block. He recovers, then says “Oh
my God,” as it seems like he’ll be able to do it. “Please crash,”
he says as the blocks careen down the screen impossibly fast. He
gets another line and the game freezes: “Oh my God! Yes! I’m going
to pass out,” he says. “I can’t feel my hands.”

From Sopan Deb’s story about Gibson for The New York Times:

Ms. Cox bought her son a version of a Nintendo console called a
RetroN, which used the same hardware as the original Nintendo
console, from a pawnshop, as well as an old cathode-ray tube
television to help him get started. In a given week, Willis said,
he plays about 20 hours of Tetris.

“I’m actually OK with it,” Ms. Cox, a high school math teacher,
said. “He does other things outside of playing Tetris, so it
really wasn’t that terribly difficult to say OK. It was harder to
find an old CRT TV than it was to say, ‘Yeah, we can do this for a
little bit.’”

Koebler’s story ends with a sad note: “Blue Scuti dedicated the game to his dad, Adam Gibson, who died in December.” My mom’s mother died when my mom was just 16, so I’m familiar, second-hand, with how devastating such a loss is. Young Gibson seems utterly delightful — a gracious champion — so we’d all be rooting for him anyway, but this adds a note of poignancy.

Recommended viewing: This 17-minute video from aGameScout is a wonderful, fun explanation of Gibson’s feat — it explains why NES Tetris was, for decades, thought to end at level 29; the new advanced controller techniques that allow elite players to blow past level 29; and suggests future accomplishments that remain unachieved.

 ★ 

Jason Koebler, writing for 404 Media:

A 13-year-old competitive Tetris player has become the first
known human to beat the game on the original NES by
forcing it into a kill screen. In doing so, the player, Blue
Scuti, broke world records for overall score, level achieved, and
total numbers of lines in the 34-year-old game. Previously, only
an AI had broken Tetris.

The feat took Blue Scuti about 38 minutes, as shown in a video he
posted to his YouTube. As he nears the feat, Blue Scuti says “Oh I
missed it,” after misplacing a block. He recovers, then says “Oh
my God,” as it seems like he’ll be able to do it. “Please crash,”
he says as the blocks careen down the screen impossibly fast. He
gets another line and the game freezes: “Oh my God! Yes! I’m going
to pass out,” he says. “I can’t feel my hands.”

From Sopan Deb’s story about Gibson for The New York Times:

Ms. Cox bought her son a version of a Nintendo console called a
RetroN, which used the same hardware as the original Nintendo
console, from a pawnshop, as well as an old cathode-ray tube
television to help him get started. In a given week, Willis said,
he plays about 20 hours of Tetris.

“I’m actually OK with it,” Ms. Cox, a high school math teacher,
said. “He does other things outside of playing Tetris, so it
really wasn’t that terribly difficult to say OK. It was harder to
find an old CRT TV than it was to say, ‘Yeah, we can do this for a
little bit.’”

Koebler’s story ends with a sad note: “Blue Scuti dedicated the game to his dad, Adam Gibson, who died in December.” My mom’s mother died when my mom was just 16, so I’m familiar, second-hand, with how devastating such a loss is. Young Gibson seems utterly delightful — a gracious champion — so we’d all be rooting for him anyway, but this adds a note of poignancy.

Recommended viewing: This 17-minute video from aGameScout is a wonderful, fun explanation of Gibson’s feat — it explains why NES Tetris was, for decades, thought to end at level 29; the new advanced controller techniques that allow elite players to blow past level 29; and suggests future accomplishments that remain unachieved.

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