9 ms·
This is like claiming books change the world. In one sense they do, but in a a bit more real sense it’s people reading books who change the world. A crucial d
by teddyh 2y ago
This is like claiming books change the world. In one sense they do, but in a a bit more real sense it’s people reading books who change the world. A crucial distinction.
- teddyh 2y agoTo elaborate on the analogy: Books cannot change the world if they lie unread on a shelf or are confiscated or impounded and kept out of people’s hands. In the same way, software cannot be useful to you if your hardware will not run it. Therefore we cannot think that by being programmers making software, we are directly helping people; we can only help those people who can, and will, run our software.