here's where i disagree with you, and here's why. there comes times - hopefully rarely - where tricks like metaclasses and monkey patching actually REDUCE over

here's where i disagree with you, and here's why. there comes times - hopefully rarely - where tricks like metaclasses and monkey patching actually REDUCE overall code complexity, if done right and in a limited way. it takes a lot of experience, education, and skill to do this, but when you see it done right it greatly reduces overall code complexity by isolating the "odd" bits into small, confined spaces, and this can lead to more readable code overall. the other day a link was posted here on HN about metaclasses in python, and dpkt was one of the examples (see the _metapacket class). i think that's a good example of the above: the scary, hard to grok stuff is isolated, and overall the code becomes more readable for it. i've seen - and written - code that could benefit from these things, and it's less maintainable than code with them used appropriately. also, i think it's great if people read this and learn. i want more talented programmers on my team, people who know how to do these things, when to do them (e.g. limited), and where to do them. i've seen the opposite, and it's not pretty. that said i'm unqualified to use the "bad ideas" in this presentation appropriately, and so i wont. one facet of wisdom is knowing your limits.