February 05, 2009

New Microsoft bug debuts at Bill Gates TED Talk
posted by middleclasstool 15 years ago
  • Ha. I suspect those bugs weren't carrying malaria, though, so it's hardly a fair comparison he's making.
  • It's funny because MS software is known for its flaws, commonly known as "bugs", and Bill Gates released actual bugs, in this case mosquitoes, at a TED speech. This is a common tool of humor known as "semantic ambiguity," and now that you know that you can clearly see how goddamn funny this is.
  • And what really makes it for me is that the term "bug" to identify a flaw in a software application might be derived from usage among machine operator where sometimes actual bugs would cause a problem with equipment by getting stuck in the mechanism or shorting a circuit or something. The etymology of the entomology.