Cogito, Ergo Sumana for 2006 May 21 (entry 1)

# 21 May 2006, 02:54PM: MC Masala on "House, M.D.": Would you rather work with an affable incompetent, or with the most abrasive genius ever?

Software developers, the stereotype goes, have House-ish characteristics: They don't care about their colleagues' emotions and see everyone who does as unduly delicate and probably incompetent. The common term for directing hacker scorn at a "suit" or a "drone" is "flipping the bozo bit." Once a programmer has decided you are a bozo, his mental processes ignore everything you say. But Dr. House goes one step further. He doesn't care how others feel, not because he's socially inept, but because he sociopathically manipulates everyone, including his closest friend.

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