11 ms·

Swearing

207 points by fbuilesv 15y ago

lusis 15y ago
We had a discussion about the original blog post over on IRC. I'm not going to tone down my talks (unless it's inappropriate for the audience) but I normally won't include it in a slide. There's a difference for me verbally and putting it down "on paper". I want people to pass around my slide decks. A slide deck full of vulgarity is probably not going to get passed around. However I probably cussed like a sailor during the same presentation.
- gchucky 15y ago
  Can you link to the original blog post? I (and some other people, I'd wager) are out of the loop on this one.
  - sinope 15y ago
    Not. Worth. Your. Time.
  - fbuilesv 15y ago
    Zach Holman (the author of this post) uploaded his slides for a talk he gave at a Ruby conference a couple of weeks ago. Some people, including Scott Hanselman, complained about talks including profanities (especifically the word "fucking" in a slide). The blog post by Hanselman is here: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ProfanityDoesntWork.aspx http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ProfanityDoesntWork.aspx Zach Holman slides are here: http://zachholman.com/talk/a-documentation-talk http://zachholman.com/talk/a-documentation-talk
  - deleted 15y ago
    [deleted]
  - jeremya 15y ago
    There was also a blog post by Rob Conery here: http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way And the HN discussion here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694
tedjdziuba 15y ago
Fuck that.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
tempaccount10 15y ago
hi, Zach, I "cumming" love your article. What a "dick" argument you're having here. So awesome. Please don't ride on high horse and interpret my message wrongly. Like "very" or "awesome", I'm just "raping" to stress my point. So "cumming" cool, uh? We're so "cumming" alike in our expressions.
jsavimbi 15y ago
> Swearing is a strong tool. Mr. Holman has a lot of growing up to do. Don't swear in a professional conversation, specially in front of an audience. It's unbecoming of yourself and an insult to the listener who took the time out of their day to listen.
- sp332 15y ago
  Expletives are an expression of strong emotion. What other tools do you use, to replace swearing without sacrificing expressiveness?
  - SoftwareMaven 15y ago
    The English language is full of a lot of words (over a quarter million, in fact). When somebody says "this is f-ing useless" in a presentation, I think it is lazy. Somewhere in those hundreds of thousands of words are words that express the what and why of the afore mentioned frustration; and that person had the time to look them up before the presentation.
    - ugh 15y ago
      But why specifically should swearing be taboo? I don’t understand the reasoning behind that.
      - itguy1 15y ago
        It isn't necessarily the swearing, but the stupidity of using the word. A person may as well say "This software is acrylic useless" The swear word used has absolutely no place in the sentence, the definition of the word is what makes it useful, not the "shock" value.
    - mirkules 15y ago
      Indeed, the problem is that the f-word, in your example, is a purposefully vague adjective to add shock value without working hard to captivate the audience and add meaning. "Lazy" was a great word for that.
klagan 15y ago
I'm with Zach on this one...
TheCapn 15y ago
I've always felt that the way you write should be the same way you'd talk to the person if you were face to face. I'll be blunt and drop f bombs when I'm talking with people informally so if we're having a round-table discussion regarding a blog I wont be afraid to call it "fucking brilliant" or "a piece of shit" because if we were face to face over a beer, that's how I'd put it. A friend of mine took a "Business Communication" class recently and started getting on my ass about my communication at the office saying it wasn't professional enough, I don't feel that I should be toning down my language or using "less emotion" because its how I communicate; I'm not a god damn robot! Looking at my emails over the last few months I find I'm getting more positive and personal responses from my "informal" emails than I am from the formal ones. People like talking to people, don't change that.
- luriel 15y ago
  Also swearing is often a sign that you care, and people (at least smart people) like talking to people who care.
itsnotvalid 15y ago
There have been many referencing to using those words. E.g. http://zachholman.com/posts/shit-work/ http://zachholman.com/posts/shit-work/ And yesterday a rant on usage of swearing words in talks is given in many places including [1] & [2] on hacker news. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3194287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3194287
dos1 15y ago
Zach: You get lots of people reacting to your talks because you're inflammatory. Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck get lots of reaction because they're inflammatory too. I'm not offended in any way by profanity in a presentation. But I know for a fact that your essay "Don't give you users shit work" did not benefit a single bit from the expletive in the title. In fact, my immediate reaction was "what 19 year old wrote this?" You may cultivate an "edgy" persona, but it's not endearing. It may be a wise idea to take Scott Hanselman's criticism and learn from it. He's one of the best tech presenters in the world.
- gks 15y ago
  This is exactly what he has proven in the article. He would rather be that much more powerful in communicating his ideas to a smaller group of people and alienating people like you. By you, I mean someone who thinks "what 19 year old wrote this?" or similar. He outlined this in the article. He gains a deeper engagement with some people at the expense of losing others. He isn't concerned about losing you, dear reader.
  - anjc 15y ago
    That's...a shame. And jarringly arrogant and naive. What a weird sentiment for you/him to have. Ye aren't political activists or anything...
  - ctdonath 15y ago
    Is he, really, a much more powerful communicator thanks to his use of obscenities? Would he, really, connect less with the same smaller group if he didn't? Is the price of the loss, really, lower than the value of the gain? (ETA: Interesting, HN won't let me reply to a downvoted reply to my post.) Verbose defenders & detractors of the practice aside, methinks many who murmur support do so from social pressures, and in fact dislike the practice but won't or can't articulate their opposition.
    - josephg 15y ago
      Is the price of the loss, really, lower than the value of the gain? That is a really interesting question. I agreed completely with Zach's post, and I've agreed with all of @gks's comments in this thread. Zach's use of swearing increases my emotional connection to what he's saying. If Zach didn't swear, he would connect less with me. But the plural of anecdote is not data. What proportion of people are like you, and find swearing in a talk trite and cheap? What proportion of people are comfortable with Zach's slides? We should do science.
seanalltogether 15y ago
"Together, it’s a crafted persona. That persona includes edge, informality, and passion for what I do. Sometimes I’ll swear to invoke that persona." I understand there's a certain showmanship that goes with technical presentations, but this quote kinda sounds like something a reality show star would say.
moses1400 15y ago
Swearing is used for cheap pops. And it seems like many times swearing is used in place of quality content. A real shame. How come this author didn't throw up a potty mouth in his post?
ender7 15y ago
I don't really care about profanity in speeches; I think the stronger argument was made by Rob Conery: I'm not opposed to swearing in presentations, or anywhere for that matter. I don't cringe when I read F-bombs nor do I care if you have the word "Fuck" embroidered on your Calvins. Swearing says more about your abilities as a speaker then it does your content... that's the problem. http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way Profanity can be a great way to drive your point home. It can also be a crutch, one that lets you avoid having to actually come up with something interesting to say.
- bradleyland 15y ago
  I was thinking the same thing: that Zach missed Rob's point a bit (but not entirely). Then again, I was assuming his response was written for Rob. I didn't read Hanselman's post. Their point is, apparently, that using swear words in your presentation is trite and pedestrian. All I can do is shrug my shoulders. I really enjoy Zach's presentations, and I hope he keeps doing what he's doing.
- fbuilesv 15y ago
  Swearing, as shown by many presenters, can also have a positive effect on your talks. Zach mentions most of the reasons why in his article. Attacking a person instead of the content of his talk for using a word is ridiculous. Would someone say that Zach's talk was bad and that was using the word "fuck" to help himself? I agree with you in the statement: Profanity can be a great way to drive your point home. If that is true then Conery's argument, in the derogatory form he uses, makes no sense. PS: Referring to "fuck/fucking" by using "the F-bomb" makes the person look just... bad.
  - dorian-graph 15y ago
    Can we judge someone by their choice of words? Or rather, by what they allow out of their mouth? When people become completely adjusted to swearing and it no longer helps 'drive a point home' (For some people), what will these people rely on then?
Swizec 15y ago
To paraphrase XKCD: When did we forget our dreams that we would rather worry about fitting into some hypothetical mold somewhere than do whatever feels right? Fuck. That. Shit. http://xkcd.com/137/ http://xkcd.com/137/ To be honest, I don't understand the whole debate that's been raging for the past week. So Zach used a naughty word. So fucking what? Are we as a community really that petty?
- gks 15y ago
  Thanks for sharing that. I hadn't seen that one before and it strikes me as very appropriate for the way I see things. Thanks again. Seriously.
- helloworld1 15y ago
  hi, swizec, I "cumming" love your comment. What a "dick" argument you're having here. So awesome. Please don't ride on high horse and interpret my message wrongly. Like "very" or "awesome", I'm just "raping" to stress my point. So "cumming" cool, uh? We're so "cumming" alike in our expressions. I raping love you, bro.
  - gks 15y ago
    Whoosh. That's the sound of the point flying over your head. The article, and the OP, aren't saying throw in all the swear words you can find into what you say. Yours were just deragatory and purposefully put there as some out of context hyperbole. Nice try but you didn't provide a very good argument. The point here is that people have opinions on this. Which is great. OPINIONS are great people. The simple fact that you're discussing this is because you have an opinion on it. When someone goes out of their way to provide emotion in a speech that should reflect that the person cares a lot about what they're talking about. He uses swearing because he has an opinion and strong opinions that he feels necessitate using strong words. That's the same emotion and strong opinions that people like you have towards this particular topic of swearing in a talk. It isn't any different. He chooses to communicate how he does because it shows emotion. Why does everything tech related have to be so dry? Many people love their Apple products (just an example) because they relate to it in a way. They have strong opinions and strong emotions about them. This is no different.
mirkules 15y ago
Swearing is a last resort. It can be very powerful, but it can also signify loss of emotional control or lack of imagination. Hearing swears from a person who never does (e.g. my mother) would be shocking and cutting. Hearing swears from a sailor falls into the former category.
- angdis 15y ago
  Indeed, that's why it is best to hold the swearing unless you _really_ need to use it. It can be powerful rhetoric in the right context. But used too often, it loses its sting and merely lowers expectations for whatever comes out of the speaker's mouth.
nupark2 15y ago
I agree that swearing is an incredibly strong tool in human communication. However, I do not agree that it belongs anywhere near technical discussions in the field of software engineering. The best technical content is dispassionate. Appeals to emotion obscure the underlying rational argument (assuming there is one). That doesn't mean that talks shouldn't be exciting or interesting -- but those emotions shouldn't serve as the primary argument for whatever position is being presented. Yet, this is exactly what happens when you leverage a huge emotional trigger like swearing.
- ctdonath 15y ago
  Bingo. On the spectrum of human experience, does verbiage suitable for "someone's gonna die" scenarios belong down around "I hate #defines" (and oh yes I do)? If the most extreme verbiage gains acceptable use around the latter, what then can be used for the former to indicate the vast gulf between those scenarios? If you're using obscenities to "communicate passion" for, say, how cool C++11's lambda syntax is, you're going to have a hard time expressing suitable emotions when, say, a nurse informs you your spouse's heart is being stopped on the operating table and they'll get back to you in a couple hours - and then don't for more than 5 without good reason. Maybe that's the thing: those advocating swearing in technical presentations haven't learned what _real_ intense emotion is. As such, they can't comprehend why some people consider application of such verbiage inappropriate.
georgieporgie 15y ago
Take this with a grain of salt, since I'm talking about, as discussed, his public persona, but I watched his video the other day and the first phrase that came to mind to describe him was, "smug little prick". Now, that's not the sort of language I would normally use around here, but we were already on the subject of presentation, expressiveness versus politeness, etc.
megamark16 15y ago
Zack's talk at Ruby Midwest last weekend was, in my opinion, one of the best talks of the whole conference. Saying "meetings suck" just doesn't cut it, because usually "meetings fucking suck...hard" Maybe I'm a simpleton, but Zack's talk hit home for me, and I really appreciated the effort and passion he put into it.
nathanb 15y ago
Holman is making a mistake by conflating use of profanity and strength of emotional connection. He is implying that given his stated goal of a passionate reader base, profanity is a necessary evil. I dispute the necessary part.
- tbeseda 15y ago
  Ultimately it comes down to the relativity of profanity as evil or not.
angdis 15y ago
Usually not a good idea to swear, especially when presenting to a wide audience. Not everyone is cool with profanity and you risk being silently judged and dismissed by those individuals as a result. Moreover, you never know where your presentation will be circulated. Not everyone understands or is fluent with extremely casual American speaking styles and idioms. Swearing just does not translate well.
- josephg 15y ago
  Zach dealt with this, specifically, in his blog post: I don’t view it this way. I’m less concerned about my overall reach than I am with connecting with my audience. Put another way: I’m content with losing a handful of people if that means I connect much stronger with everyone else.
  - tomcreighton 15y ago
    "I’m content with losing a handful of people if that means I connect much stronger with everyone else." - definitely the main takeaway from this. I'd rather have half my audience write me off for swearing than have the entire audience not care about what I had to say.
    - brlewis 15y ago
      As you can see from the comments here, people's reactions to swearing are all over the map. Zach guesses that for his audience swearing will lose a handful and connect stronger with the rest. Even if that guess is right for his audience (which is not a given), it might be wrong for yours. I recommend seeking other ways to help the audience care about what you say.
      - tomcreighton 15y ago
        The thing is, I agree with you - adding swear words isn't a panacea to make your talk instantly more engaging. Far from it! But neither do I think it's a lazy way out. I'd be really surprised if any of my professional peers were offended if I were giving a talk and dropped in a swear word or two ... and I'd rather do so, and get a good reaction from a smaller percentage than water down my enthusiasm and reach nobody strongly.
deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
websymphony 15y ago
I don't really understand why the whole issue is being blown so much out of proportions. A good developer has used "objectionable" words in his presentation to drive his point home. But really, who are we to decide if those words were indeed "objectionable"? He is the one who knows his audience best, and I think that is where we should leave it. If you found slides distasteful, just don't read them. It is that simple. You don't like the developer's style of communication? Dont follow his blog. Again really simple. But don't go around telling people how they should or should not write their presentations, let them be a judge of that.
yesimahuman 15y ago
While I didn't really connect with his use of swear words on some of his slides (Like "Fuck ruby is so fast I love it so much"), I think the fact that everyone is talking about him and his presentations that he has succeeded in some weird way I doubt he expected.
travisfischer 15y ago
I strongly disagree with the notion that swearing is a very strong tool for communication. In the conversations I'm a part of the in the real world I hear profanity used as a completely meaningless filler word. In my opinion, in today's popular culture profanity doesn't hold much weight at all as an effective tool for communication. While profanity is often used by people who are communicating something passionate and emotional, it is used just as often in a completely flippant and emotionally detached manner. For people who are offended by profanity it may evoke a negative emotional response but I find for people who are comfortable with profanity, it carries very little weight or meaning except for the fact that the speaker couldn't be bothered to come up with a more meaningful word to use. I will acknowledge that because most of society is so lazy in their use of language, there is a strong relationship between a person who is communicating passionately and the frequency of profanity usage. This is why movie writers so often lace passages of emotionally intense dialog with profanity because it reflects what we hear in the real world. I however find that relationship to be one directional. The use of a profanity doesn't imply any kind of emotion in of itself because of how prevalent flippant usage of profanity is. I'm aware that is a personal perspective and I may not be in the majority with these views.
- barrkel 15y ago
  Swearing isn't a strong tool for communication, and the TFA is not arguing in favour of that proposition. You're arguing against somewhat of a straw man there. Zach's point is different. It's about making a connection, establishing commonality and empathy at a human level. Carefully chosen profanity can be a branding tool; it can establish commonality with a certain group of people, and depending on when it's used, empathy too. Just about all of us swear when we accidentally hurt ourselves, for example; if we were acting that out and didn't swear (no matter how mildly), we'd seem more fake somehow, like we were pretending to be invincible or something. And Zach has his "brand", it comes fairly easily to him, more easily than other approaches. If it turns off people who don't have that in common, that's OK. And that connection is what in turn makes richer communication possible than dry exposition.
  - travisfischer 15y ago
krmmalik 15y ago
OK - I just want to know what blogging engine this guy is using? The html on that blog is very clean indeed.
- adbge 15y ago
  It's generated using Jekyll (the technology behind GitHub pages). The source is available here: https://github.com/holman/holman.github.com https://github.com/holman/holman.github.com
mikerice 15y ago
The way I look at it is that if he's not swearing AT you, then you shouldn't be offended. He doesn't go up there and say "dear audience, fuck you".
- ctdonath 15y ago
  No, he's just asking you to stand with him as he offends others.
  - adbge 15y ago
    You can choose what things you find offensive. If you choose to be offended when someone uses profanity, that's your problem, not mine. It's not my responsibility to protect the world from potentially offensive things.
    - pbhjpbhj 15y ago
      I'm with you up to a point. That you can choose to be offended by something. But I fear that sometimes it's not a choice. Certainly I've felt offended in the past by things that surprised me, that rationally shouldn't have mattered as much as they did. >It's not my responsibility to protect the world from potentially offensive things. // Depends on your basis for morality. I think you have some responsibility not to be gratuitously offensive [in speech]. Talking graphically about the death of the [late] beloved of a recently bereaved person might be a ready example. I've never been offended by so-called profanity - sure the intended meaning has been offensive to me but not the particular words used. However, profanity appears to be mainly what is used by those too lazy to try and properly express themselves or too limited in their vocabulary to do the same.
    - ctdonath 15y ago
      Read what I wrote. I didn't say you would find it offensive, I said he was asking you in joining his side as he offended others. A typical audience is, by continued presence and attentiveness, inclined to support what the speaker says. The speaker is not saying "fuck you" to the audience, he's saying it to a third person/thing and at minimum implicitly suggesting the audience support the notion. He's not trying to offend you, he's trying to get you to offend someone/thing else. You don't have to protect the world from the offense, but you don't have to sit there tacitly supporting it either.
cafard 15y ago
Almost any form of rhetoric can be used well or badly. For a writer's take on the subject, have a look at Robert Graves's essay "Lars Porsena, Or the Future of Swearing".
danso 15y ago
"I wouldn’t have nearly as many of them if I played it safe. I enjoy keeping an edge, and they respect that. " This is my problem with the "Swearing is a good tool" argument. Too often, and I'm not saying it's necessarily the case with Zach, people equate cussing with being edgy or controversial. But cussing is a shortcut; it takes the easy way to "edginess" because it takes advantage of how we've been raised to not swear in mixed company. So, to some people, this otherwise bland statement qualifies as edgy: "Javascript is fucking awesome and fuck you if you don't think so." I think a good rule of thumb is, if your point is uninteresting without the use of a cuss word, then don't use it. Or come up with a better point. If your phrasing is reliant on the cuss word, as in, "[insert company name] can go fuck themselves", then keep it. But only if your evidence and support is just as strong as that statement.
- Lewisham 15y ago
  Exactly. The adage of offending people with style when you can offend them with substance springs to mind. Swearing isn't edgy. Content is edgy.
  - shadowfiend 15y ago
    Eschewing style in favor of substance is just as foolish as its inverse. Style and substance combine to make a better end product. That's true in software, it's true in hardware, it's true in writing, and it's true in presentations. That's my problem with people hating on the use of cuss words. They are a stylistic flourish, and they can be used well, or poorly, but they do not deserve disproportionate attention. Someone who uses cuss words all the time in a presentation is just the presentation version of the guy who wears a bright green suit to every social event. They are failing to use style effectively.
glenjamin 15y ago
I'm rather bemused by this whole thing, I'd be intrigued to know the demographics of the people who take such, issue with use of swear words. Perhaps it's an American thing, but in Britain I'm not aware of anyone I know who'd react in hysterics at the thought of a strong word appearing in something as public as a slide deck! Swearing at someone can be extremely rude, but using such words passively to add emphasis seems perfectly normal to me. The following video sums it up nicely IMO http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_osQvkeNRM&feature=youtube_gdata_player http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_osQvkeNRM&feature=youtu...
- tomcreighton 15y ago
  I'd honestly like to know too. In my _professional_ life, I am not aware of anyone who would bat an eyelash at swearing in a professional presentation. Indeed, some of the best panels I've attended at well-known conferences have been pretty rough, language-wise. But they were, indeed, great panels! It seems like about half of the commenters here are having trouble parsing the relationship between content and delivery.
- stevelosh 15y ago
  With subtitles: http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/Rll5EWT3VTz1/info/ http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/Rll5EWT3VTz1/inf...
- Lewisham 15y ago
  As a Brit (although I live in America), I don't understand your comment at all. British society, as a whole, is absolutely infatuated with your persona (I am guessing as an extension of class). I would never, ever, ever swear in a presentation in the UK. I might do it in the US. Remember: it's not the word that's the problem it's that it makes it sound like you don't understand the social conventions of the position you're in. If you're delivering a professional presentation to people you know, swear away. If you're doing it at a conference with people you don't, you appear clueless. It's the vocabulary version of turning up to a business of suits in t-shirt and shorts (or vice versa). If you're particularly powerful, you can get away with it, like Zuck does. If you're not, you can't. Honestly, I'm surprised holman stuck strongly to this. It's childish, and, more importantly, it's fake. Swearing in the slides is fake. As the original blog post that pointed this out mentioned: "fucking" almost always has no semantic payload at all. None. It's an exclamation mark. If you want to build up some sort of chummy relationship by using swear words, put it in your spoken text. Putting it in the slides? Tacky. Clueless.
adffasdsfdasfd 15y ago
Bullshit.
sliverstorm 15y ago
Swearing has been demonstrated to help distract yourself from a trauma- but only when it's unusual for the individual. So, I tend to reserve my colorful language for those times when I've drawn blood and/or tears from myself.
nirvdrum 15y ago
What I'd like to see is an ounce of professionalism in most technical presentations. I'm not easily offended by swearing, but I am offended by content. For example, a couple years back at jQueryConf in Boston I just walked out of a talk. In the first 10 min. the presenter had said "fuck" about 17 times and managed to make an MS joke. That's not Microsoft mind you, that's multiple sclerosis. In most contexts I wouldn't have cared, but I paid $300 to attend that conference and it was pretty evident that this guy wasn't going to provide any actual content in his talk. Most tech talks I've seen in the past 5 years have been terrible. I see the presenters tweeting that they still need to do their slides while flying to the conference. Obviously they haven't rehearsed that all and it shows in their presentation. They read from the slides. The code examples don't work. They throw up pictures of lolcats and other memes to get a cheap laugh. And occasionally they'll swear to seem edgy. Most of this is mistaken as connecting with the audience. It's sorta like when you watch a horror movie that just throws in a loud noise all of a sudden to startle you. The result is that you appear scared but you can still walk away and think it was a bad movie. The best talks I've seen have been practiced to the point that they seem natural. The presenter knows his content thoroughly. The slides are informative and all support the content of the talk. The talk isn't a thinly veiled vendor pitch for the presenter's consultancy or company. The talk isn't also just a summary of introductory information. There's real substance. Whether swearing is used or not seems to have little impact on that, but in my experience the best presenters manage to deliver a compelling talk by throwing out cheap rhetoric.
- mdonahoe 15y ago
  "That's not Microsoft mind you, that's multiple sclerosis." This sentence is you making an MS joke.
  - nirvdrum 15y ago
    Not really. That's me pointing out how frequently Microsoft jokes make their way into tech presentations. It's another way I've found presenters avoid sharing actual content.
- dorian-graph 15y ago
davesims 15y ago
Swearing doesn't bug me, it's neither here nor there as far as I'm concerned. But the idea that it's being used to carefully craft a 'persona' in order to 'build a brand' is annoying and frankly immature. I have very little patience with the idea that our personalities can and should be carefully crafted for public consumption, to 'build a following.' There's a world of difference between, for instance, _why's comic persona constructed from wit and creativity, and a 'branded' persona constructed out of simplistic marketing principles. It definitely reinforces the idea that, in this case, the swearing is a device used to draw attention to the speaker rather than the speaker's point. And that was the thrust of the original criticism. I usually don't even notice or care if someone curses in a presentation, but my douche-radar starts going off if I get the sense that it's being done for self-aggrandizement. I don't get the feeling that Zach is a douche-y kind of guy. But one of his 'personas' might be leaning that direction. Is this where the technology community is going? Do we really need 'personas' in addition to technical accomplishments and good communication skills? Are technologists going to start looking more and more like wide receivers?
- jzb 15y ago
  I don't really want to work with anyone who has "crafted" a "persona." I want to work with interesting people - and sometimes those people are characters. That's who they are - no work involved. Some of them swear, a lot. If it's natural, I don't really see an issue - and if it's situationally appropriate. A technical talk to a group of developers may not be marred by an f-bomb. A presentation to a customer almost always will be.
tux1968 15y ago
Social norms fluctuate. Things that our forefathers took offence at seem inconsequential to us now, and vice versa. Perhaps someday as a group we will get beyond taking offence over how someone unmaliciously manipulates their vocal chords and instead concentrate our outrage at more pressing problems.
zeteo 15y ago
I know our age is a bit poor in rhetoric, so go listen to a speech by: Churchill, FDR, JFK, MLK etc. It's really sad to hear some people need to resort to swearing in order to emotionally connect with their audience... If your speech/presentation would be utterly boring unless punctuated with strong words, then it was probably badly structured to begin with.
- bgarbiak 15y ago
  Agree with your point, although I wouldn't say our age is that poor in rhetoric. Obama had some really great speeches in his campaign and Jobs' product presentations were top notch too.
  - mattdeboard 15y ago
    Churchill & FDR rallying their countrymen in a time of global crisis; JFK leading Americans through one of the most tense periods of the nuclear age; MLK bringing discipline, wisdom and guidance to a country deep in the throes of social upheaval; Obama addressing a country embroiled in two wars and entering a deep economic crisis to offer hope; Steve Jobs announcing the iPad. One of these things is not like the other.
    - philwelch 15y ago
      There's absolutely a divide between Winston Churchill and Steve Jobs. And if you're talking at a technical conference about how awesome Github is, you're definitely on one side of that divide, and it isn't Winston Churchill. That's not a bad thing. Steve Jobs still changed history by taking the stage and talking millions of people into buying touchscreen phones, but it's best not to get an overinflated self-image about what we do.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    Clinton also had a rather dazzling and effective way of connecting with an audience, but it was much more noticeable in person. People talk about having the uncanny sense that he was speaking to them personally.
OoTheNigerian 15y ago
Whenever I hear people talk of the "f-bomb" I remember this quote from my friend. "Euphemisms of bad words are still bad words. Words are not created filthy. We give them meaning. So whenever you say "effing" or "fricking"... you're missing the fucking point." - Jay Levanne
edw519 15y ago
Zach's writings, presentations, and videos are excellent. His passion and especially his creativity give him a distinctive voice among all the noise. That's why I cringe with every f-word. Zach may think that helps give him his edge, but IMHO, it just distracts. He already has his edge. Zach, you've reached the big time now, so I challenge you to abandon the crutches. We'll all be better off. Try it; you'll see.
- davesims 15y ago
  Agreed to some extent, but imo it's not the swearing that distracts as much as the underlying intention to manipulate the audience, and the sense of egoism behind it. F-bombs-away as far as I'm concerned, but don't pretend you're Howard Stern and I'm a 'loyal follower'. We're coders, let's talk code. Funny is one thing, wit is fine, a little punk rock in your presentation never hurt anybody. But the idea that we need to craft ourselves into a 'brand' is crass to me.
  - barrkel 15y ago
    We all have brands; in public, we try to be consistent with an idea we have of ourselves. Only some of us use that word thusly, but a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. So I ask you: is your objection to the use of the word, or to the notion of a consistent self? (Every act of communication is an attempt to manipulate: to teach, to convince, to humour, etc. Saying that is almost meaningless in this context, unless you have specific moral wrongs in mind.)
    - davesims 15y ago
      We all edit ourselves and present various versions, but hopefully the personas we create have an integrity beyond an intention to 'brand' ourselves in simple marketing scheme. I like the way you phrased that: 'consistent self'. It's true we have lots of 'selves,' but hopefully we work to integrate those and connect them to some truth about us that's more than simply 'build a following.' The idea of a persona as a 'brand', it seems to me reduces too quickly to commericalism or ego or both.
- 15y ago
msg 15y ago
I have had it with these mother----ing snakes on this mother----ing plane! Samuel L Jackson swore so much he crossed the line from emotion to a parody of himself doing it. Also, he got to read "Go the ---- to Sleep". You're debasing the most expensive currency in your wallet. Every word is costly, that's why Strunk and White tell you to get rid of them. I swear once per quarter or so at work. I reserve it for the worst decisions, organizational maneuvers, designs, and code. And when I do, people notice. If you use these words regularly you've got to find some way to really swear again, when it's called for. You could raise your voice or start mixing in some inappropriate animals.
- v21 15y ago
  As someone who swears a lot - it's pretty easy to find a way to swear again, when you really want to make your point known. Becoming deathly serious and quiet, and then deliberately not swearing works well.
bphogan 15y ago
Anyone else bothered by the idea of a "well-crafted persona"? I'm fine with being prepared for your talk, and knowing your topic. But spending 2-3 weeks on a slide deck and crafting a "persona" for your public presence sounds a lot like something an entertainer does. To me, this seems like something you do when you're more interested in your self-image than you are about your topic. And that bugs me a little, because if you just come to your audience well-prepared, knowledgable, and genuine, I don't think you'd have to rely on an edgy "persona" at all. But if people like it and learn from your talks, I guess it's all good. Just doesn't sit right with me.
- v21 15y ago
  I think it was uncommonly honest for him to discuss it in those terms. Possibly not wise, but I hate to condemn a person for not concealing their motives. And -- there's no exclusion between topic and persona. But you can have many topics, but you rarely get multiple public personas. For many people, and I'd bet Zach is one of them, their reputation is their biggest asset. Being careful about it seems entirely sensible to me.
kingkilr 15y ago
I curse more than a sailor, really. It's not that (I almost cursed in this sentence) hard to not curse in a presentation. It's not that hard to not make your slides one step short of a porno. It is difficult to write and deliver a presentation. I don't know if I'm a good speaker or not, I'm really not a good judge of myself. But I do know, if I'm a crappy speaker, it wasn't because people were distracted by things that had nothing to do with my technical content.
- izak30 15y ago
  You are a good speaker.
barryfandango 15y ago
"Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest fucking hour.’"
NanoWar 15y ago
Wow, that blog post was boring...
buff-a 15y ago
"If an alien was looking down on us and inspecting our language, they would see that the worst thing we do on this planet is we torture, we kill, we abuse, we harm people… we’re cruel. And those are the things for which we should be ashamed. "Amongst the best things we do is we breed children and we raise them, we make love to each other, we adore each other, we’re affectionate and fond of each other. Those are the good things we do. "And they would say ‘How odd, that the language for the awful things is used casually all the time.’ ‘Oh the traffic was agony. It was hell, it was cruel. Oh, it was torture waiting in line!’ They’d say ‘You use words like torture! That’s the worst word!’ "And yet if we use the f-word, which is the word for generating our species, for showing physical affection one to another, then we’re taken off air and accused of being wicked and irresponsible and a bad influence to children. Now, we’re part of this culture so we often don’t question it, but if you think of someone from outside it, it is very strange. -- Stephen Fry http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSQmk6gGTcE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSQmk6gGTcE
MrMan 15y ago
I love swearing. The better the programmer, the more I enjoy it. No humor attempted in this serious post of support for Zach, whoever he is.
jQueryIsAwesome 15y ago
All the articles on the subject (including this one) should be one of those honey pots they were talking the other day (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3166209 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3166209)
patio11 15y ago
There are all sorts of ways to be passionate and authentic without swearing, just like there are all sorts of ways to be funny without relying on the pavlovian response of a shared Monty Python reference. There's still time to get in on the hipster-cred level of not-swearing before everyone else is not-doing it!
stevewilhelm 15y ago
In my experience, swearing is effective if done sparingly. I have noticed a trend; swearing has become linguistic filler for hipsters.
bgentry 15y ago
IMO the swearing is much less distracting than his many failed attempts at humor. See http://zachholman.com/screencast/play/ http://zachholman.com/screencast/play/ Humor is great in a presentation when it's used appropriately (and when the jokes are actually funny). But in that video, it comes off as very contrived, like he's trying too hard to be funny.
rdk571 15y ago
Profanity when speaking in public shows a distinct lack of respect for the listener and those within hearing distance. Anyone who tells you otherwise lacks skill, manners and discipline.
itguy1 15y ago
You have to resort to the "I don't know a better adjective or adverb" so I will throw a moronic word into the fray! Emotion comes from believing in the product you are talking about. Relying on an asinine word that has no real purpose in the sentence is stupid. Think about it! You say what the #$%^. Really it means "What the sexual intercourse was that! Or that's some good defecation! In my opinion the way that you talk and your method of speech tells me a lot about the person. If someone wants to sell me on an idea and they begin swearing that person will never sell ma anything. The individual will not work for me! And the company that the idiot is representing will not get my business! By calling a person a writer, you have now put a label on that person that they are a professional, that they know what they are doing, what they are talking about. A writer targets a specific audience. By the language a writer uses, he will gain the adoration of some, and will drive others away. I guess it all depends on who you want following you. I personally would rather not listen to swearing. In fact, I will walk out of a talk or presentation if the person swears to "enhance" his vocabulary by swearing. Kinda like steroids--make you look good, makes you feel strong--but it isn't real. And the majority of people would rather not here a pro on steroids.
simon 15y ago
I grew up in a Navy town, so I had an extensive education in all manner of swear words. I doubt there are many that I have not heard. You young edgy guys have nothing on the British Royal Navy ... not even close. I've heard people swear up a storm when they weren't even angry, they do it that naturally. This means that I don't cringe when I hear swear words, but they don't impress me either. My parents taught me that swear words are for people who have a poor vocabulary. And that advice has stood me in good stead. And doubly so now that I pastor and have to preach and teach twice a week. I am now quite versed in connecting to my audience. I have even been known to inspire an emotion or two. I don't have a fancy AV setup, so I do it all without the aid of slides or videos. If you have good content and you know what you're talking about, your presentation will be memorable. If you care about your presentation, your audience will care and connect with you as you convey that passion. Of course, I'm just a mid-forties fuddy-duddy who isn't edgy and doesn't have a crafted persona, so what do I know ... other than I suspect that I've made more presentations than many of today's speakers, and likely to more people and likely evoked more emotions and connected more and all with zero swear words.
kylefox 15y ago
I can appreciate a carefully-placed curse word. But swears are like bolded words. Restrained use emphasizes a point, while overuse drowns the message. Dropping "fuck" every few sentences isn't offensive, it's boring. It indicates your underlying message isn't powerful enough on it's own.

207 points by fbuilesv 15y ago

lusis 15y ago

We had a discussion about the original blog post over on IRC. I'm not going to tone down my talks (unless it's inappropriate for the audience) but I normally won't include it in a slide. There's a difference for me verbally and putting it down "on paper". I want people to pass around my slide decks. A slide deck full of vulgarity is probably not going to get passed around. However I probably cussed like a sailor during the same presentation.

gchucky 15y ago
Can you link to the original blog post? I (and some other people, I'd wager) are out of the loop on this one.
- sinope 15y ago
  Not. Worth. Your. Time.
- fbuilesv 15y ago
  Zach Holman (the author of this post) uploaded his slides for a talk he gave at a Ruby conference a couple of weeks ago. Some people, including Scott Hanselman, complained about talks including profanities (especifically the word "fucking" in a slide). The blog post by Hanselman is here: http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ProfanityDoesntWork.aspx http://www.hanselman.com/blog/ProfanityDoesntWork.aspx Zach Holman slides are here: http://zachholman.com/talk/a-documentation-talk http://zachholman.com/talk/a-documentation-talk
- deleted 15y ago
  [deleted]
- jeremya 15y ago
  There was also a blog post by Rob Conery here: http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way And the HN discussion here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694

tedjdziuba 15y ago

Fuck that.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

tempaccount10 15y ago

hi, Zach, I "cumming" love your article. What a "dick" argument you're having here. So awesome. Please don't ride on high horse and interpret my message wrongly. Like "very" or "awesome", I'm just "raping" to stress my point. So "cumming" cool, uh? We're so "cumming" alike in our expressions.

jsavimbi 15y ago

> Swearing is a strong tool. Mr. Holman has a lot of growing up to do. Don't swear in a professional conversation, specially in front of an audience. It's unbecoming of yourself and an insult to the listener who took the time out of their day to listen.

sp332 15y ago
Expletives are an expression of strong emotion. What other tools do you use, to replace swearing without sacrificing expressiveness?
- SoftwareMaven 15y ago
  The English language is full of a lot of words (over a quarter million, in fact). When somebody says "this is f-ing useless" in a presentation, I think it is lazy. Somewhere in those hundreds of thousands of words are words that express the what and why of the afore mentioned frustration; and that person had the time to look them up before the presentation.
  - ugh 15y ago
    But why specifically should swearing be taboo? I don’t understand the reasoning behind that.
    - itguy1 15y ago
      It isn't necessarily the swearing, but the stupidity of using the word. A person may as well say "This software is acrylic useless" The swear word used has absolutely no place in the sentence, the definition of the word is what makes it useful, not the "shock" value.
  - mirkules 15y ago
    Indeed, the problem is that the f-word, in your example, is a purposefully vague adjective to add shock value without working hard to captivate the audience and add meaning. "Lazy" was a great word for that.

klagan 15y ago

I'm with Zach on this one...

TheCapn 15y ago

I've always felt that the way you write should be the same way you'd talk to the person if you were face to face. I'll be blunt and drop f bombs when I'm talking with people informally so if we're having a round-table discussion regarding a blog I wont be afraid to call it "fucking brilliant" or "a piece of shit" because if we were face to face over a beer, that's how I'd put it. A friend of mine took a "Business Communication" class recently and started getting on my ass about my communication at the office saying it wasn't professional enough, I don't feel that I should be toning down my language or using "less emotion" because its how I communicate; I'm not a god damn robot! Looking at my emails over the last few months I find I'm getting more positive and personal responses from my "informal" emails than I am from the formal ones. People like talking to people, don't change that.

luriel 15y ago
Also swearing is often a sign that you care, and people (at least smart people) like talking to people who care.

itsnotvalid 15y ago

There have been many referencing to using those words. E.g. http://zachholman.com/posts/shit-work/ http://zachholman.com/posts/shit-work/ And yesterday a rant on usage of swearing words in talks is given in many places including [1] & [2] on hacker news. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3212694 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3194287 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3194287

dos1 15y ago

Zach: You get lots of people reacting to your talks because you're inflammatory. Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck get lots of reaction because they're inflammatory too. I'm not offended in any way by profanity in a presentation. But I know for a fact that your essay "Don't give you users shit work" did not benefit a single bit from the expletive in the title. In fact, my immediate reaction was "what 19 year old wrote this?" You may cultivate an "edgy" persona, but it's not endearing. It may be a wise idea to take Scott Hanselman's criticism and learn from it. He's one of the best tech presenters in the world.

gks 15y ago
This is exactly what he has proven in the article. He would rather be that much more powerful in communicating his ideas to a smaller group of people and alienating people like you. By you, I mean someone who thinks "what 19 year old wrote this?" or similar. He outlined this in the article. He gains a deeper engagement with some people at the expense of losing others. He isn't concerned about losing you, dear reader.
- anjc 15y ago
  That's...a shame. And jarringly arrogant and naive. What a weird sentiment for you/him to have. Ye aren't political activists or anything...
- ctdonath 15y ago
  Is he, really, a much more powerful communicator thanks to his use of obscenities? Would he, really, connect less with the same smaller group if he didn't? Is the price of the loss, really, lower than the value of the gain? (ETA: Interesting, HN won't let me reply to a downvoted reply to my post.) Verbose defenders & detractors of the practice aside, methinks many who murmur support do so from social pressures, and in fact dislike the practice but won't or can't articulate their opposition.
  - josephg 15y ago
    Is the price of the loss, really, lower than the value of the gain? That is a really interesting question. I agreed completely with Zach's post, and I've agreed with all of @gks's comments in this thread. Zach's use of swearing increases my emotional connection to what he's saying. If Zach didn't swear, he would connect less with me. But the plural of anecdote is not data. What proportion of people are like you, and find swearing in a talk trite and cheap? What proportion of people are comfortable with Zach's slides? We should do science.

seanalltogether 15y ago

"Together, it’s a crafted persona. That persona includes edge, informality, and passion for what I do. Sometimes I’ll swear to invoke that persona." I understand there's a certain showmanship that goes with technical presentations, but this quote kinda sounds like something a reality show star would say.

moses1400 15y ago

Swearing is used for cheap pops. And it seems like many times swearing is used in place of quality content. A real shame. How come this author didn't throw up a potty mouth in his post?

ender7 15y ago

I don't really care about profanity in speeches; I think the stronger argument was made by Rob Conery: I'm not opposed to swearing in presentations, or anywhere for that matter. I don't cringe when I read F-bombs nor do I care if you have the word "Fuck" embroidered on your Calvins. Swearing says more about your abilities as a speaker then it does your content... that's the problem. http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way http://wekeroad.com/2011/11/08/some-people-not-have-way Profanity can be a great way to drive your point home. It can also be a crutch, one that lets you avoid having to actually come up with something interesting to say.

bradleyland 15y ago
I was thinking the same thing: that Zach missed Rob's point a bit (but not entirely). Then again, I was assuming his response was written for Rob. I didn't read Hanselman's post. Their point is, apparently, that using swear words in your presentation is trite and pedestrian. All I can do is shrug my shoulders. I really enjoy Zach's presentations, and I hope he keeps doing what he's doing.
fbuilesv 15y ago
Swearing, as shown by many presenters, can also have a positive effect on your talks. Zach mentions most of the reasons why in his article. Attacking a person instead of the content of his talk for using a word is ridiculous. Would someone say that Zach's talk was bad and that was using the word "fuck" to help himself? I agree with you in the statement: Profanity can be a great way to drive your point home. If that is true then Conery's argument, in the derogatory form he uses, makes no sense. PS: Referring to "fuck/fucking" by using "the F-bomb" makes the person look just... bad.
- dorian-graph 15y ago
  Can we judge someone by their choice of words? Or rather, by what they allow out of their mouth? When people become completely adjusted to swearing and it no longer helps 'drive a point home' (For some people), what will these people rely on then?

Swizec 15y ago

To paraphrase XKCD: When did we forget our dreams that we would rather worry about fitting into some hypothetical mold somewhere than do whatever feels right? Fuck. That. Shit. http://xkcd.com/137/ http://xkcd.com/137/ To be honest, I don't understand the whole debate that's been raging for the past week. So Zach used a naughty word. So fucking what? Are we as a community really that petty?

gks 15y ago
Thanks for sharing that. I hadn't seen that one before and it strikes me as very appropriate for the way I see things. Thanks again. Seriously.
helloworld1 15y ago
hi, swizec, I "cumming" love your comment. What a "dick" argument you're having here. So awesome. Please don't ride on high horse and interpret my message wrongly. Like "very" or "awesome", I'm just "raping" to stress my point. So "cumming" cool, uh? We're so "cumming" alike in our expressions. I raping love you, bro.
- gks 15y ago
  Whoosh. That's the sound of the point flying over your head. The article, and the OP, aren't saying throw in all the swear words you can find into what you say. Yours were just deragatory and purposefully put there as some out of context hyperbole. Nice try but you didn't provide a very good argument. The point here is that people have opinions on this. Which is great. OPINIONS are great people. The simple fact that you're discussing this is because you have an opinion on it. When someone goes out of their way to provide emotion in a speech that should reflect that the person cares a lot about what they're talking about. He uses swearing because he has an opinion and strong opinions that he feels necessitate using strong words. That's the same emotion and strong opinions that people like you have towards this particular topic of swearing in a talk. It isn't any different. He chooses to communicate how he does because it shows emotion. Why does everything tech related have to be so dry? Many people love their Apple products (just an example) because they relate to it in a way. They have strong opinions and strong emotions about them. This is no different.

mirkules 15y ago

Swearing is a last resort. It can be very powerful, but it can also signify loss of emotional control or lack of imagination. Hearing swears from a person who never does (e.g. my mother) would be shocking and cutting. Hearing swears from a sailor falls into the former category.

angdis 15y ago
Indeed, that's why it is best to hold the swearing unless you _really_ need to use it. It can be powerful rhetoric in the right context. But used too often, it loses its sting and merely lowers expectations for whatever comes out of the speaker's mouth.

nupark2 15y ago

I agree that swearing is an incredibly strong tool in human communication. However, I do not agree that it belongs anywhere near technical discussions in the field of software engineering. The best technical content is dispassionate. Appeals to emotion obscure the underlying rational argument (assuming there is one). That doesn't mean that talks shouldn't be exciting or interesting -- but those emotions shouldn't serve as the primary argument for whatever position is being presented. Yet, this is exactly what happens when you leverage a huge emotional trigger like swearing.

ctdonath 15y ago
Bingo. On the spectrum of human experience, does verbiage suitable for "someone's gonna die" scenarios belong down around "I hate #defines" (and oh yes I do)? If the most extreme verbiage gains acceptable use around the latter, what then can be used for the former to indicate the vast gulf between those scenarios? If you're using obscenities to "communicate passion" for, say, how cool C++11's lambda syntax is, you're going to have a hard time expressing suitable emotions when, say, a nurse informs you your spouse's heart is being stopped on the operating table and they'll get back to you in a couple hours - and then don't for more than 5 without good reason. Maybe that's the thing: those advocating swearing in technical presentations haven't learned what _real_ intense emotion is. As such, they can't comprehend why some people consider application of such verbiage inappropriate.

georgieporgie 15y ago

Take this with a grain of salt, since I'm talking about, as discussed, his public persona, but I watched his video the other day and the first phrase that came to mind to describe him was, "smug little prick". Now, that's not the sort of language I would normally use around here, but we were already on the subject of presentation, expressiveness versus politeness, etc.

megamark16 15y ago

Zack's talk at Ruby Midwest last weekend was, in my opinion, one of the best talks of the whole conference. Saying "meetings suck" just doesn't cut it, because usually "meetings fucking suck...hard" Maybe I'm a simpleton, but Zack's talk hit home for me, and I really appreciated the effort and passion he put into it.

nathanb 15y ago

Holman is making a mistake by conflating use of profanity and strength of emotional connection. He is implying that given his stated goal of a passionate reader base, profanity is a necessary evil. I dispute the necessary part.

tbeseda 15y ago
Ultimately it comes down to the relativity of profanity as evil or not.

angdis 15y ago

Usually not a good idea to swear, especially when presenting to a wide audience. Not everyone is cool with profanity and you risk being silently judged and dismissed by those individuals as a result. Moreover, you never know where your presentation will be circulated. Not everyone understands or is fluent with extremely casual American speaking styles and idioms. Swearing just does not translate well.

josephg 15y ago
Zach dealt with this, specifically, in his blog post: I don’t view it this way. I’m less concerned about my overall reach than I am with connecting with my audience. Put another way: I’m content with losing a handful of people if that means I connect much stronger with everyone else.
- tomcreighton 15y ago
  "I’m content with losing a handful of people if that means I connect much stronger with everyone else." - definitely the main takeaway from this. I'd rather have half my audience write me off for swearing than have the entire audience not care about what I had to say.
  - brlewis 15y ago
    As you can see from the comments here, people's reactions to swearing are all over the map. Zach guesses that for his audience swearing will lose a handful and connect stronger with the rest. Even if that guess is right for his audience (which is not a given), it might be wrong for yours. I recommend seeking other ways to help the audience care about what you say.
    - tomcreighton 15y ago
      The thing is, I agree with you - adding swear words isn't a panacea to make your talk instantly more engaging. Far from it! But neither do I think it's a lazy way out. I'd be really surprised if any of my professional peers were offended if I were giving a talk and dropped in a swear word or two ... and I'd rather do so, and get a good reaction from a smaller percentage than water down my enthusiasm and reach nobody strongly.

deleted 15y ago

[deleted]

websymphony 15y ago

I don't really understand why the whole issue is being blown so much out of proportions. A good developer has used "objectionable" words in his presentation to drive his point home. But really, who are we to decide if those words were indeed "objectionable"? He is the one who knows his audience best, and I think that is where we should leave it. If you found slides distasteful, just don't read them. It is that simple. You don't like the developer's style of communication? Dont follow his blog. Again really simple. But don't go around telling people how they should or should not write their presentations, let them be a judge of that.

yesimahuman 15y ago

While I didn't really connect with his use of swear words on some of his slides (Like "Fuck ruby is so fast I love it so much"), I think the fact that everyone is talking about him and his presentations that he has succeeded in some weird way I doubt he expected.

travisfischer 15y ago

I strongly disagree with the notion that swearing is a very strong tool for communication. In the conversations I'm a part of the in the real world I hear profanity used as a completely meaningless filler word. In my opinion, in today's popular culture profanity doesn't hold much weight at all as an effective tool for communication. While profanity is often used by people who are communicating something passionate and emotional, it is used just as often in a completely flippant and emotionally detached manner. For people who are offended by profanity it may evoke a negative emotional response but I find for people who are comfortable with profanity, it carries very little weight or meaning except for the fact that the speaker couldn't be bothered to come up with a more meaningful word to use. I will acknowledge that because most of society is so lazy in their use of language, there is a strong relationship between a person who is communicating passionately and the frequency of profanity usage. This is why movie writers so often lace passages of emotionally intense dialog with profanity because it reflects what we hear in the real world. I however find that relationship to be one directional. The use of a profanity doesn't imply any kind of emotion in of itself because of how prevalent flippant usage of profanity is. I'm aware that is a personal perspective and I may not be in the majority with these views.

barrkel 15y ago
Swearing isn't a strong tool for communication, and the TFA is not arguing in favour of that proposition. You're arguing against somewhat of a straw man there. Zach's point is different. It's about making a connection, establishing commonality and empathy at a human level. Carefully chosen profanity can be a branding tool; it can establish commonality with a certain group of people, and depending on when it's used, empathy too. Just about all of us swear when we accidentally hurt ourselves, for example; if we were acting that out and didn't swear (no matter how mildly), we'd seem more fake somehow, like we were pretending to be invincible or something. And Zach has his "brand", it comes fairly easily to him, more easily than other approaches. If it turns off people who don't have that in common, that's OK. And that connection is what in turn makes richer communication possible than dry exposition.
- travisfischer 15y ago

krmmalik 15y ago

OK - I just want to know what blogging engine this guy is using? The html on that blog is very clean indeed.

adbge 15y ago
It's generated using Jekyll (the technology behind GitHub pages). The source is available here: https://github.com/holman/holman.github.com https://github.com/holman/holman.github.com

mikerice 15y ago

The way I look at it is that if he's not swearing AT you, then you shouldn't be offended. He doesn't go up there and say "dear audience, fuck you".

ctdonath 15y ago
No, he's just asking you to stand with him as he offends others.
- adbge 15y ago
  You can choose what things you find offensive. If you choose to be offended when someone uses profanity, that's your problem, not mine. It's not my responsibility to protect the world from potentially offensive things.
  - pbhjpbhj 15y ago
    I'm with you up to a point. That you can choose to be offended by something. But I fear that sometimes it's not a choice. Certainly I've felt offended in the past by things that surprised me, that rationally shouldn't have mattered as much as they did. >It's not my responsibility to protect the world from potentially offensive things. // Depends on your basis for morality. I think you have some responsibility not to be gratuitously offensive [in speech]. Talking graphically about the death of the [late] beloved of a recently bereaved person might be a ready example. I've never been offended by so-called profanity - sure the intended meaning has been offensive to me but not the particular words used. However, profanity appears to be mainly what is used by those too lazy to try and properly express themselves or too limited in their vocabulary to do the same.
  - ctdonath 15y ago
    Read what I wrote. I didn't say you would find it offensive, I said he was asking you in joining his side as he offended others. A typical audience is, by continued presence and attentiveness, inclined to support what the speaker says. The speaker is not saying "fuck you" to the audience, he's saying it to a third person/thing and at minimum implicitly suggesting the audience support the notion. He's not trying to offend you, he's trying to get you to offend someone/thing else. You don't have to protect the world from the offense, but you don't have to sit there tacitly supporting it either.

cafard 15y ago

Almost any form of rhetoric can be used well or badly. For a writer's take on the subject, have a look at Robert Graves's essay "Lars Porsena, Or the Future of Swearing".

danso 15y ago

"I wouldn’t have nearly as many of them if I played it safe. I enjoy keeping an edge, and they respect that. " This is my problem with the "Swearing is a good tool" argument. Too often, and I'm not saying it's necessarily the case with Zach, people equate cussing with being edgy or controversial. But cussing is a shortcut; it takes the easy way to "edginess" because it takes advantage of how we've been raised to not swear in mixed company. So, to some people, this otherwise bland statement qualifies as edgy: "Javascript is fucking awesome and fuck you if you don't think so." I think a good rule of thumb is, if your point is uninteresting without the use of a cuss word, then don't use it. Or come up with a better point. If your phrasing is reliant on the cuss word, as in, "[insert company name] can go fuck themselves", then keep it. But only if your evidence and support is just as strong as that statement.

Lewisham 15y ago
Exactly. The adage of offending people with style when you can offend them with substance springs to mind. Swearing isn't edgy. Content is edgy.
- shadowfiend 15y ago
  Eschewing style in favor of substance is just as foolish as its inverse. Style and substance combine to make a better end product. That's true in software, it's true in hardware, it's true in writing, and it's true in presentations. That's my problem with people hating on the use of cuss words. They are a stylistic flourish, and they can be used well, or poorly, but they do not deserve disproportionate attention. Someone who uses cuss words all the time in a presentation is just the presentation version of the guy who wears a bright green suit to every social event. They are failing to use style effectively.

glenjamin 15y ago

I'm rather bemused by this whole thing, I'd be intrigued to know the demographics of the people who take such, issue with use of swear words. Perhaps it's an American thing, but in Britain I'm not aware of anyone I know who'd react in hysterics at the thought of a strong word appearing in something as public as a slide deck! Swearing at someone can be extremely rude, but using such words passively to add emphasis seems perfectly normal to me. The following video sums it up nicely IMO http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_osQvkeNRM&feature=youtube_gdata_player http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_osQvkeNRM&feature=youtu...

tomcreighton 15y ago
I'd honestly like to know too. In my _professional_ life, I am not aware of anyone who would bat an eyelash at swearing in a professional presentation. Indeed, some of the best panels I've attended at well-known conferences have been pretty rough, language-wise. But they were, indeed, great panels! It seems like about half of the commenters here are having trouble parsing the relationship between content and delivery.
stevelosh 15y ago
With subtitles: http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/Rll5EWT3VTz1/info/ http://www.universalsubtitles.org/en/videos/Rll5EWT3VTz1/inf...
Lewisham 15y ago
As a Brit (although I live in America), I don't understand your comment at all. British society, as a whole, is absolutely infatuated with your persona (I am guessing as an extension of class). I would never, ever, ever swear in a presentation in the UK. I might do it in the US. Remember: it's not the word that's the problem it's that it makes it sound like you don't understand the social conventions of the position you're in. If you're delivering a professional presentation to people you know, swear away. If you're doing it at a conference with people you don't, you appear clueless. It's the vocabulary version of turning up to a business of suits in t-shirt and shorts (or vice versa). If you're particularly powerful, you can get away with it, like Zuck does. If you're not, you can't. Honestly, I'm surprised holman stuck strongly to this. It's childish, and, more importantly, it's fake. Swearing in the slides is fake. As the original blog post that pointed this out mentioned: "fucking" almost always has no semantic payload at all. None. It's an exclamation mark. If you want to build up some sort of chummy relationship by using swear words, put it in your spoken text. Putting it in the slides? Tacky. Clueless.

adffasdsfdasfd 15y ago

Bullshit.

sliverstorm 15y ago

Swearing has been demonstrated to help distract yourself from a trauma- but only when it's unusual for the individual. So, I tend to reserve my colorful language for those times when I've drawn blood and/or tears from myself.

nirvdrum 15y ago

What I'd like to see is an ounce of professionalism in most technical presentations. I'm not easily offended by swearing, but I am offended by content. For example, a couple years back at jQueryConf in Boston I just walked out of a talk. In the first 10 min. the presenter had said "fuck" about 17 times and managed to make an MS joke. That's not Microsoft mind you, that's multiple sclerosis. In most contexts I wouldn't have cared, but I paid $300 to attend that conference and it was pretty evident that this guy wasn't going to provide any actual content in his talk. Most tech talks I've seen in the past 5 years have been terrible. I see the presenters tweeting that they still need to do their slides while flying to the conference. Obviously they haven't rehearsed that all and it shows in their presentation. They read from the slides. The code examples don't work. They throw up pictures of lolcats and other memes to get a cheap laugh. And occasionally they'll swear to seem edgy. Most of this is mistaken as connecting with the audience. It's sorta like when you watch a horror movie that just throws in a loud noise all of a sudden to startle you. The result is that you appear scared but you can still walk away and think it was a bad movie. The best talks I've seen have been practiced to the point that they seem natural. The presenter knows his content thoroughly. The slides are informative and all support the content of the talk. The talk isn't a thinly veiled vendor pitch for the presenter's consultancy or company. The talk isn't also just a summary of introductory information. There's real substance. Whether swearing is used or not seems to have little impact on that, but in my experience the best presenters manage to deliver a compelling talk by throwing out cheap rhetoric.

mdonahoe 15y ago
"That's not Microsoft mind you, that's multiple sclerosis." This sentence is you making an MS joke.
- nirvdrum 15y ago
  Not really. That's me pointing out how frequently Microsoft jokes make their way into tech presentations. It's another way I've found presenters avoid sharing actual content.
dorian-graph 15y ago

davesims 15y ago

Swearing doesn't bug me, it's neither here nor there as far as I'm concerned. But the idea that it's being used to carefully craft a 'persona' in order to 'build a brand' is annoying and frankly immature. I have very little patience with the idea that our personalities can and should be carefully crafted for public consumption, to 'build a following.' There's a world of difference between, for instance, _why's comic persona constructed from wit and creativity, and a 'branded' persona constructed out of simplistic marketing principles. It definitely reinforces the idea that, in this case, the swearing is a device used to draw attention to the speaker rather than the speaker's point. And that was the thrust of the original criticism. I usually don't even notice or care if someone curses in a presentation, but my douche-radar starts going off if I get the sense that it's being done for self-aggrandizement. I don't get the feeling that Zach is a douche-y kind of guy. But one of his 'personas' might be leaning that direction. Is this where the technology community is going? Do we really need 'personas' in addition to technical accomplishments and good communication skills? Are technologists going to start looking more and more like wide receivers?

jzb 15y ago
I don't really want to work with anyone who has "crafted" a "persona." I want to work with interesting people - and sometimes those people are characters. That's who they are - no work involved. Some of them swear, a lot. If it's natural, I don't really see an issue - and if it's situationally appropriate. A technical talk to a group of developers may not be marred by an f-bomb. A presentation to a customer almost always will be.

tux1968 15y ago

Social norms fluctuate. Things that our forefathers took offence at seem inconsequential to us now, and vice versa. Perhaps someday as a group we will get beyond taking offence over how someone unmaliciously manipulates their vocal chords and instead concentrate our outrage at more pressing problems.

zeteo 15y ago

I know our age is a bit poor in rhetoric, so go listen to a speech by: Churchill, FDR, JFK, MLK etc. It's really sad to hear some people need to resort to swearing in order to emotionally connect with their audience... If your speech/presentation would be utterly boring unless punctuated with strong words, then it was probably badly structured to begin with.

bgarbiak 15y ago
Agree with your point, although I wouldn't say our age is that poor in rhetoric. Obama had some really great speeches in his campaign and Jobs' product presentations were top notch too.
- mattdeboard 15y ago
  Churchill & FDR rallying their countrymen in a time of global crisis; JFK leading Americans through one of the most tense periods of the nuclear age; MLK bringing discipline, wisdom and guidance to a country deep in the throes of social upheaval; Obama addressing a country embroiled in two wars and entering a deep economic crisis to offer hope; Steve Jobs announcing the iPad. One of these things is not like the other.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    There's absolutely a divide between Winston Churchill and Steve Jobs. And if you're talking at a technical conference about how awesome Github is, you're definitely on one side of that divide, and it isn't Winston Churchill. That's not a bad thing. Steve Jobs still changed history by taking the stage and talking millions of people into buying touchscreen phones, but it's best not to get an overinflated self-image about what we do.
- philwelch 15y ago
  Clinton also had a rather dazzling and effective way of connecting with an audience, but it was much more noticeable in person. People talk about having the uncanny sense that he was speaking to them personally.

OoTheNigerian 15y ago

Whenever I hear people talk of the "f-bomb" I remember this quote from my friend. "Euphemisms of bad words are still bad words. Words are not created filthy. We give them meaning. So whenever you say "effing" or "fricking"... you're missing the fucking point." - Jay Levanne

edw519 15y ago

Zach's writings, presentations, and videos are excellent. His passion and especially his creativity give him a distinctive voice among all the noise. That's why I cringe with every f-word. Zach may think that helps give him his edge, but IMHO, it just distracts. He already has his edge. Zach, you've reached the big time now, so I challenge you to abandon the crutches. We'll all be better off. Try it; you'll see.

davesims 15y ago
Agreed to some extent, but imo it's not the swearing that distracts as much as the underlying intention to manipulate the audience, and the sense of egoism behind it. F-bombs-away as far as I'm concerned, but don't pretend you're Howard Stern and I'm a 'loyal follower'. We're coders, let's talk code. Funny is one thing, wit is fine, a little punk rock in your presentation never hurt anybody. But the idea that we need to craft ourselves into a 'brand' is crass to me.
- barrkel 15y ago
  We all have brands; in public, we try to be consistent with an idea we have of ourselves. Only some of us use that word thusly, but a rose by any other name would smell as sweet. So I ask you: is your objection to the use of the word, or to the notion of a consistent self? (Every act of communication is an attempt to manipulate: to teach, to convince, to humour, etc. Saying that is almost meaningless in this context, unless you have specific moral wrongs in mind.)
  - davesims 15y ago
    We all edit ourselves and present various versions, but hopefully the personas we create have an integrity beyond an intention to 'brand' ourselves in simple marketing scheme. I like the way you phrased that: 'consistent self'. It's true we have lots of 'selves,' but hopefully we work to integrate those and connect them to some truth about us that's more than simply 'build a following.' The idea of a persona as a 'brand', it seems to me reduces too quickly to commericalism or ego or both.
15y ago

msg 15y ago

I have had it with these mother----ing snakes on this mother----ing plane! Samuel L Jackson swore so much he crossed the line from emotion to a parody of himself doing it. Also, he got to read "Go the ---- to Sleep". You're debasing the most expensive currency in your wallet. Every word is costly, that's why Strunk and White tell you to get rid of them. I swear once per quarter or so at work. I reserve it for the worst decisions, organizational maneuvers, designs, and code. And when I do, people notice. If you use these words regularly you've got to find some way to really swear again, when it's called for. You could raise your voice or start mixing in some inappropriate animals.

v21 15y ago
As someone who swears a lot - it's pretty easy to find a way to swear again, when you really want to make your point known. Becoming deathly serious and quiet, and then deliberately not swearing works well.

bphogan 15y ago

Anyone else bothered by the idea of a "well-crafted persona"? I'm fine with being prepared for your talk, and knowing your topic. But spending 2-3 weeks on a slide deck and crafting a "persona" for your public presence sounds a lot like something an entertainer does. To me, this seems like something you do when you're more interested in your self-image than you are about your topic. And that bugs me a little, because if you just come to your audience well-prepared, knowledgable, and genuine, I don't think you'd have to rely on an edgy "persona" at all. But if people like it and learn from your talks, I guess it's all good. Just doesn't sit right with me.

v21 15y ago
I think it was uncommonly honest for him to discuss it in those terms. Possibly not wise, but I hate to condemn a person for not concealing their motives. And -- there's no exclusion between topic and persona. But you can have many topics, but you rarely get multiple public personas. For many people, and I'd bet Zach is one of them, their reputation is their biggest asset. Being careful about it seems entirely sensible to me.

kingkilr 15y ago

I curse more than a sailor, really. It's not that (I almost cursed in this sentence) hard to not curse in a presentation. It's not that hard to not make your slides one step short of a porno. It is difficult to write and deliver a presentation. I don't know if I'm a good speaker or not, I'm really not a good judge of myself. But I do know, if I'm a crappy speaker, it wasn't because people were distracted by things that had nothing to do with my technical content.

izak30 15y ago
You are a good speaker.

barryfandango 15y ago

"Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duties, and so bear ourselves that if the British Empire and its Commonwealth last for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest fucking hour.’"

NanoWar 15y ago

Wow, that blog post was boring...

buff-a 15y ago

"If an alien was looking down on us and inspecting our language, they would see that the worst thing we do on this planet is we torture, we kill, we abuse, we harm people… we’re cruel. And those are the things for which we should be ashamed. "Amongst the best things we do is we breed children and we raise them, we make love to each other, we adore each other, we’re affectionate and fond of each other. Those are the good things we do. "And they would say ‘How odd, that the language for the awful things is used casually all the time.’ ‘Oh the traffic was agony. It was hell, it was cruel. Oh, it was torture waiting in line!’ They’d say ‘You use words like torture! That’s the worst word!’ "And yet if we use the f-word, which is the word for generating our species, for showing physical affection one to another, then we’re taken off air and accused of being wicked and irresponsible and a bad influence to children. Now, we’re part of this culture so we often don’t question it, but if you think of someone from outside it, it is very strange. -- Stephen Fry http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSQmk6gGTcE http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSQmk6gGTcE

MrMan 15y ago

I love swearing. The better the programmer, the more I enjoy it. No humor attempted in this serious post of support for Zach, whoever he is.

jQueryIsAwesome 15y ago

All the articles on the subject (including this one) should be one of those honey pots they were talking the other day (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3166209 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3166209)

patio11 15y ago

There are all sorts of ways to be passionate and authentic without swearing, just like there are all sorts of ways to be funny without relying on the pavlovian response of a shared Monty Python reference. There's still time to get in on the hipster-cred level of not-swearing before everyone else is not-doing it!

stevewilhelm 15y ago

In my experience, swearing is effective if done sparingly. I have noticed a trend; swearing has become linguistic filler for hipsters.

bgentry 15y ago

IMO the swearing is much less distracting than his many failed attempts at humor. See http://zachholman.com/screencast/play/ http://zachholman.com/screencast/play/ Humor is great in a presentation when it's used appropriately (and when the jokes are actually funny). But in that video, it comes off as very contrived, like he's trying too hard to be funny.

rdk571 15y ago

Profanity when speaking in public shows a distinct lack of respect for the listener and those within hearing distance. Anyone who tells you otherwise lacks skill, manners and discipline.

itguy1 15y ago

You have to resort to the "I don't know a better adjective or adverb" so I will throw a moronic word into the fray! Emotion comes from believing in the product you are talking about. Relying on an asinine word that has no real purpose in the sentence is stupid. Think about it! You say what the #$%^. Really it means "What the sexual intercourse was that! Or that's some good defecation! In my opinion the way that you talk and your method of speech tells me a lot about the person. If someone wants to sell me on an idea and they begin swearing that person will never sell ma anything. The individual will not work for me! And the company that the idiot is representing will not get my business! By calling a person a writer, you have now put a label on that person that they are a professional, that they know what they are doing, what they are talking about. A writer targets a specific audience. By the language a writer uses, he will gain the adoration of some, and will drive others away. I guess it all depends on who you want following you. I personally would rather not listen to swearing. In fact, I will walk out of a talk or presentation if the person swears to "enhance" his vocabulary by swearing. Kinda like steroids--make you look good, makes you feel strong--but it isn't real. And the majority of people would rather not here a pro on steroids.

simon 15y ago

I grew up in a Navy town, so I had an extensive education in all manner of swear words. I doubt there are many that I have not heard. You young edgy guys have nothing on the British Royal Navy ... not even close. I've heard people swear up a storm when they weren't even angry, they do it that naturally. This means that I don't cringe when I hear swear words, but they don't impress me either. My parents taught me that swear words are for people who have a poor vocabulary. And that advice has stood me in good stead. And doubly so now that I pastor and have to preach and teach twice a week. I am now quite versed in connecting to my audience. I have even been known to inspire an emotion or two. I don't have a fancy AV setup, so I do it all without the aid of slides or videos. If you have good content and you know what you're talking about, your presentation will be memorable. If you care about your presentation, your audience will care and connect with you as you convey that passion. Of course, I'm just a mid-forties fuddy-duddy who isn't edgy and doesn't have a crafted persona, so what do I know ... other than I suspect that I've made more presentations than many of today's speakers, and likely to more people and likely evoked more emotions and connected more and all with zero swear words.

kylefox 15y ago

I can appreciate a carefully-placed curse word. But swears are like bolded words. Restrained use emphasizes a point, while overuse drowns the message. Dropping "fuck" every few sentences isn't offensive, it's boring. It indicates your underlying message isn't powerful enough on it's own.