Top all-time · #870
Bruce F. Webster
Personal blog · brucefwebster.comprogrammingcareer
Bruce F. Webster's personal blog at brucefwebster.com covers programming and career. Since 2008, 78 different Hacker News readers have linked it 110 times, most often “The Wetware Crisis: the Dead Sea effect (2008)”. The last post was in 2019, but the archive is still widely read.
Most-linked posts?
- The Wetware Crisis: the Dead Sea effect (2008)42 people · 56 mentions · first linked 2008-04-13
- The Wetware Crisis: the Thermocline of Truth13 people · 21 mentions · first linked 2010-02-10
- The Thermocline of Truth (2008)10 people · 11 mentions · first linked 2021-03-28
- The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect (2008)5 people · 5 mentions · first linked 2022-02-09
- Anatomy of a runaway IT project (2008)2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2008-06-17
- The Longest Yard: Reorganizing IT for Success2 people · 2 mentions · first linked 2008-05-25
What Hacker News says?
> It's painful to work with people who don't care if you care a lot, and eventually I left because of it. I have a few people on my team that do not care and seem to be incapable of caring. I'm trying to get them removed but it takes months . In the meantime, I'm deeply worried that the solid performers will find other opportunities and leave because they can find new jobs in a few weeks. The Dead Sea effect in acti…
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Nobody cares”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: the Dead Sea effect (2008) as a story · 127 points
HN discussionhttps://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-...
Comment linking /2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/
on “Female Founder Secrets: Men Clamming Up”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect (2008) as a story · 60 points
HN discussionAnother word for "Clamming Up" is "The Thermocline of Truth." https://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-... "Clamming Up" because of power dynamics is inherent to hierarchy. This is why relationships with co-founders and employees need to be nurtured carefully. It's the same set of dynamics that happen inside a band. If you always want candid advice, honest feedback, and critical though unpleasant…
Comment linking /2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/
on “Female Founder Secrets: Men Clamming Up”Submitted The Thermocline of Truth (2008) as a story · 43 points
HN discussion> If you are experienced and notice that things at your company are broken, you either try to advocate for fixing things or just leave out of desparation. See also the Dead Sea effect: http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d...
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Facts every web dev should know before they burn out and turn to painting”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: The Thermocline of Truth (2008) as a story · 38 points
HN discussionmight not be the technical term for the bigotry involved. If you look at the signs, there was a black man concerned with the identitarian nature of Black Lives Matter. Are you trying to tell me that he's bigoted? Rather, I think he's concerned with bigotry masquerading as activism. aside from the fact that the person who asked him to "bless" the statue Again, this is weak "guilt by association." I have no idea if th…
Comment linking /2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/
on “Show HN: I made a platform for journalists to “open source” their fact checking”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: TEPES (2008) as a story · 22 points
HN discussionAs an aside, his other posts of the Dead Sea effect - http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d... And Anatomy of a runaway IT project https://brucefwebster.com/2008/06/16/anatomy-of-a-runaway-it... Those are fun reads too.
Comment linking /2008/06/16/anatomy-of-a-runaway-it-project/
on “How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum”Submitted The decline in computer science students (part 2) as a story · 18 points
HN discussionXP was developed in the Chrysler Comprehensive Compensation project. The project began in 01993 and brought in Kent Beck to reboot it in 01996, at which point they still hadn't gone live; they went live in 01997 and continued work on the project until 02000. Frequent releases are one of the cornerstones of XP — every 2 weeks, I think, on C3. You can read about it in https://martinfowler.com/bliki/C3.html and https:/…
Comment linking /2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/
on “How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect as a story · 14 points
HN discussionA clear implementation of the Thermocline of Truth - https://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-...
Comment linking /2008/04/15/the-wetware-crisis-the-themocline-of-truth/
on “How big tech runs tech projects and the curious absence of Scrum”Submitted Some thoughts on "Up or Out" as a story · 8 points
HN discussionThis is called the Dead Sea Effect: http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d...
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Automattic is closing its San Francisco office as most employees work remotely”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: the Dead Sea effect as a story · 8 points
HN discussion> "the smart people leave, the dumb people stay and promote other dumb people" This is sometimes referred to as the 'Dead Sea Effect'.[1] The same way that water carries salts and other minerals to the Dead Sea, and then the water evaporates while the salts accumulate. Similar effect with hiring a mix of good and bad people, and over the time the good ones leave because they have options while the bad ones stay and…
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “A rising sentiment that IBM’s Watson can’t deliver on its promises”Submitted The Dead Sea effect (2008) as a story · 5 points
HN discussionYup this is known as the Dead Sea Effect [0]. Your best people leave and you're left with the worst performers. Do this a few times and you end up with a barely functioning organisation. [0] http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d...
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Dropbox to cut 11% of its global workforce”Submitted Patterns in Litigation: IT Systems Failure (1976-2000) (2000) [pdf] as a story · 3 points
HN discussionI see this happening in places too. I have seen it described as the Dead Sea effect. http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d...
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “How learned helplessness happens in engineering teams”Submitted The Dead Sea Effect (2008) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionThe curse of the expert beginner: https://daedtech.com/how-developers-stop-learning-rise-of-th... And the Dead Sea Affect: http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d...
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Programmers: Before you turn 40, get a plan B (2009)”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect (2008) as a story · 2 points
HN discussionIt is a "mistake" as soon as the work gets to be too much for one developer and the company brings in some more developers. By this time, that one inexperienced developer gets promoted to "Architect" because he knows where all of the bodies are buried. Now one of two things happens. He brings in more inexperienced developers because he doesn't know what a good developer is and they keep adding on to the UserManager…
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “Ask HN: How to learn best practices when you have no one to teach you?”Submitted The Wetware Crisis: The Dead Sea Effect (2008) as a story · 2 points
HN discussion> But what actually happened was that people who were good at their job, and could find work elsewhere, left. So they would have had all of the top talent leave the company and the remaining employees would be the people who did just enough to get by. This reminds me quite a bit of a blog post from The Wetware Crisis on what he deemed The Dead Sea Effect ( http://brucefwebster.com/2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-d…
Comment linking /2008/04/11/the-wetware-crisis-the-dead-sea-effect/
on “210 Zappos employees – 14% of the staff – take buyouts after CEO ultimatum”Submitted Anatomy of a runaway IT project (2008) as a story · 2 points
HN discussion
