> Hearing Mark quoting a non-attributed non-Dominusism during his bit in > the YAPC NA 2002 movie at first left me perplex.
There wasn't time for attributions. However: * "Read; Learn; Evolve" was a talk.bizarre-ism, not original to me. * I don't remember if I swiped "Bad Programmer! No Cookie!" from someone else or not, or if so, who it might have been. * "Premature optimization is the root of all evil" is of course from Donald Knuth's wonderful article on "Structured Programming with GO TO Statements. * The remark about taking a crap on someone's doorstep is not original to me; I swiped it from an explanation of "chutzpah". But as far as I know the very apt application to file locking techniques is original with me. * Nat and I discussed briefly the original provenance of "You are a stupid asshole. Shut the fuck up." which was another talk.bizarre catchphrase. We decided that if it hadn't been coined by Greg Nowak, it might as well have been. I actually recited sixty-six lines for Nat; he edited them down to what you heard. Mot of the ones he removed *were* original. I don't know if this means that I'm worse than Knuth, Nowak, etc. at coming up with catchy sayings, or if Nat's just a loser, or what. > But he is fully vindicated by Anatole France: I would also suggest that these things, like books, belong not to any individual person, but to the universe. > When a thing has been said and well said, have no scruple; take it > and copy it. Give references? Why should you? Either your readers > know where you have taken the passage and the precaution is > needless, And, I should add, patronizing and insulting, > or they do not know and you humiliate them. It's funny, but I never knew it was France that said that. I always thought it was original to Greg Nowak.
