Zeynep Tufekci, on why we should worry about the state of software:

From our infrastructure to our privacy, our software suffers from “software sucks” syndrome which doesn’t sound as important as a Big Mean Attack of Cyberterrorists. But it is probably worse in the danger it poses.

I agree. Duct tape fixing duct tape, and taking short cuts because it has to make money (and never fixed because of ill thought out cost-benefit analysises) is a big problem that will only get worse before it gets better if we aren’t careful.

As a profession, we’re lucky that we have relativity lax regulation. And we are a massively growing profession which is moving at an incredible pace.

Yes, we did things badly in hindsight, I bet most engineers look at work they did only six months ago and cringe.

But we can’t let quality be a second class citizen, and we have to keep things maintained: just as we do with buildings, roads, and cars.

It shouldn’t be “more glamorous” to be working on a brand new greenfield project. Me, I love working my skills on keeping things ticking, pushing systems to its limits then putting the bits back together again.

Let’s hope I’m not a dying breed.