"For a list of all the ways technology has failed to improve the quality of life, please press three."

"Beware of computer programmers that carry screwdrivers."

"Optimization hinders evolution."

"Optimism is an occupational hazard of programming; feedback is the treatment."

"It is not about bits, bytes and protocols, but profits, losses and margins."

"I remember the difficulty we had in the beginning replacing magnetic cores in memories and eventually we had both cost and performance advantages. But it wasn't at all clear in the beginning."

"Fifty years of programming language research, and we end up with C++?"

"A computer will do what you tell it to do, but that may be much different from what you had in mind."

"In seeking the unattainable, simplicity only gets in the way."

"I’ve finally learned what ‘upward compatible’ means. It means we get to keep all our old mistakes."

"Debugging is twice as hard as writing the code in the first place. Therefore, if you write the code as cleverly as possible, you are–by definition–not smart enough to debug it."

"The telephone wire, as we know it, has become too slow and too small to handle Internet traffic. It took 75 years for telephones to be used by 50 million customers, but it took only four years for the Internet…"

"There are only two kinds of programming languages: those people always bitch about and those nobody uses."

"Writing code has a place in the human hierarchy worth somewhere above grave robbing and beneath managing."

"Just about anyone can pass if they have a home computer and are a quick study."

"In a 5 year period we get one superb programming language. Only we can't control when the 5 year period will be."

"Make no mistake about it: Computers process numbers - not symbols. We measure our understanding (and control) by the extent to which we can arithmetize an activity."

"From the time I was 7, when I purchased my first calculator, I was fascinated by the idea of a machine that could compute things."

"Build a program that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it."

"The Web is like a dominatrix. Everywhere I turn, I see little buttons ordering me to Submit."

"The effort required to correct an error increases exponentially with time."

"Early on, when software was developed by computer scientists, just people working with computers, people passed around software because that was how you got computers to do things."

"It’s ridiculous to live 100 years and only be able to remember 30 million bytes. You know, less than a compact disc. The human condition is really becoming more obsolete every minute."

"The best book on programming for the layman is "Alice in Wonderland"; but that's because it's the best book on anything for the layman."

"What do people mean when they say the computer went down on them?"

"The term reboot comes from the middle age (before computers). Horses who stopped in mid-stride required a boot to the rear to start again. Thus the term to rear-boot, later abbreviated into reboot."

"We're seeing how the videos translate to the live shows and how the technology is really reaching kids."

"Well, another market is being created now out of Internet technology."

"The insanity of the collective egoic mind, amplified by science and technology, is rapidly taking our species to the brink of disaster. Evolve or die: that is our only choice now."

"The federal government is like a handicapped turtle trying to crawl around and keep up with the rabbit, which is technology."

"In software systems, it is often the early bird that makes the worm."

"Real programmers can write assembly code in any language."

"That can be a good tax planning tool for small businesses - especially if you get a computer or something that you were planning to buy (in the coming year anyway)."

"Computers make it easier to do a lot of things, but most of the things they make it easier to do don't need to be done."

"In the long run every program becomes rococo - then rubble."

"Think"

"Software suppliers are trying to make their software packages more ‘user-friendly’… Their best approach so far has been to take all the old brochures and stamp the words ‘user-friendly’ on the cover."

"A hacker on a roll may be able to produce–in a period of a few months–something that a small development group (say, 7-8 people) would have a hard time getting together over a year. IBM used to report that…"

"If the automobile had followed the same development cycle as the computer, a Rolls-Royce would today cost $100, get a million miles per gallon, and explode once a year, killing everyone inside."

"Double your drive space — delete Windows !"

"Style used to be an interaction between the human soul and tools that were limiting. In the digital era, it will have to come from the soul alone."

"The best thing about a boolean is even if you are wrong, you are only off by a bit."

"If McDonalds were run like a software company, one out of every hundred Big Macs would give you food poisoning, and the response would be, ‘We’re sorry, here’s a coupon for two more."

"Microsoft has a new version out, Windows XP, which according to everybody is the ‘most reliable Windows ever.‘ To me, this is like saying that asparagus is ‘the most articulate vegetable ever."

"Microsoft has had its success by doing low-cost products and constantly improving those products and we've really redefined the IT industry to be something that's about a tool for individuals."

"The computer is a moron."

"If you have a procedure with ten parameters, you probably missed some."

"I used to think that cyberspace was fifty years away. What I thought was fifty years away, was only ten years away. And what I thought was ten years away... it was already here. I just wasn't aware of it…"