I really can't figure out why so many people read The Old New Thing, or perhaps more accurately, feel compelled to comment in the comment section. This post is perfectly typical of the level of technical comprehension necessary to enjoy the blog. You are routinely expected to (after explanation at least) be able to understand COM, or the details of the Windows message pump, or how C++'s deallocation interacts with Windows process shutdown, or how threading interacts with destructors, or as in this case, get the joke without having it explained for you, but the comment sections are always populated by dozens of people who are just lost as can be. I don't know how they get there in such quantity, or why they seem to collectively stay. (Do they get to the blog via google searches and stick around because they think it's a place to complain about Windows? It's certainly at least one popular pasttime....)
I'm grateful that Raymond Chen seems to have a lot of patience for it, because The Old New Thing is a unique gem and would be irreplaceable if shut down, so I'm glad he keeps at it. May his patience stay strong.
A decent number of his posts are fascinating historical stories that don't require deep technical knowledge to enjoy, so I assume those draw in readers that stick around despite not understanding most of what he posts.
Yeah, I go back to it a lot for this reason, despite having little of the necessary knowledge to enjoy the more technical posts - I would never comment, but I can understand fully why people [often näively] do
His replies to some of the comments wink at the possibility that he thoroughly enjoys the rancor and consternation stirred in the minds of that particular subset of his readers.
e.g.
That problem will go away once the optimizer is
taught to recognize this operator. Then we could
call it the rocket-powered tadpole.
- Raymond
Consider the people, who haven't commented, instead simply skimming this post, without reading deeper, then showing up to work on Monday, and dutifully explaining to colleagues about a new operator they learned of.
"I'm grateful that Raymond Chen seems to have a lot of patience for it, because The Old New Thing is a unique gem and would be irreplaceable if shut down, so I'm glad he keeps at it. May his patience stay strong."
A couple of years ago he was much more cynical about it, mentioning giving up all together IIRC. Maybe he had a spiritual epiphany about the nature of idiocy on the internet or something, nowadays he seems to enjoy stringing the clueless-and-unwilling-to-learn along a bit.
