Strange technology flamewars and attitudes

Copper23

I have a question.

I'm not really referring to boards here because there is a nice little group here and I enjoy reading.
But I frequent some other boards and discussion groups and like all of us, sometimes we have a question on something we will just google leading us to an existing discussion on it out there on the web.

One things annoys me though, the "smuggness" on so many forums and groups in relation to technical questions. For some reason when people as straight forward questions or especially newbie questions.

A good example if found recently is this.
I'd call myself pretty competent in technologies like Java, C++, SQL and web technologies but I don't very often find myself doing a lot of scripting. Recently I had what seemed like a straight forward script to write for work but due to how our environment was set up it seemed it wasn't so straight forward so off to the interweb I go.

Google brought back a lot of relevant results of people looking to do the same thing. Unfortunatley I didn't find one thread that ended with a solution.

Every thread went something like this:

Newbie asks a question.

Someone responds with a bunch of code with nothing to do with what was asked.

Someone responds telling the newb that what he asked is not in fact what he wants to do.

Someone else telling him there is no way it can be done (even though it probably can)

Someone who ridicules the newbie for being so dumb and not knowing this.

Someone who responds with something like "I do not understand what you are asking for" due to the newb being unfamiliar with the intricacies of the new languages' semantics and not structuring their question as such, even though the plain English form of the question more than described their requirements.

And any attempt by the Newb to respond asking questions of the answers he got clarifying that they do not answer his question ends up in the thread descending into a flame war.

A great example is a recent linked-in thread where a newbie asked a question about java being pass by value or pass by reference which descended into chaos and flamewars between "experts" who really didn't know what they were talking about. Surely leaving the OP more confused than when they started to ask a relatively straight forward question.

Why does this happen? I find similar things in the workplace. I am a competant developer but often when you join a new team or project there is a lot of "in house" knowledge which you need to do your job properly, you can ask questions until the cows come home but it's not until it goes to the point where another team member realises "something should have been done earlier" that they pipe up and start asking "why didn't you know this", It's a very strange culture. I never found it in other types of places I work or in other hobbies I've been into where people share their knowledge.

Why do technology spark such sort of attitudes?
I hope this is a valid talking point on this forum, I just find it interesting.

NeverSayDie

"Discussions" that take that direction are best avoided altogether IMO, reading that kind of stuff is bad for you. Even when there are nuggets of useful data in the midst of that childish crap, it's just not worth it. Any forum that has a signal/noise ratio that consists of too much of that sort of thing is best avoided as a whole. As to why it happens, that's probably another question best not dwelt on, the whole topic is bad for you

If I was to speculate (strictly on gut feeling and personal opinion), I'd suggest that the kind of folks IT seems to attract has a lot to do with it. While there are of course exceptions aplenty, I've come across a large minority if not a majority of folks in IT (the development and sysadmin areas, specifically) who are perhaps less "socially able" than your average punter. Not to suggest that they're all sociopaths, but behaviours that I'd find mildly reminiscent of autistic disorders (to my strictly untrained eye, I'm not a shrink) seem to crop up a lot in IT circles. When you have folks who are that preoccupied with what they do and presumably derive a lot of their self-worth and self-image from it likewise, combined with an, ah, less than 100% ability on the social interaction front, you'll get problems.

Other more mundane demographics may play a part too - the large overbalance of males, mainly young males, in the business probably doesn't help either in terms of keeping things on an even keel socially and emotionally.

The general elitism and tunnel vision that you can come across in IT is definitely my least favourite aspect of the whole racket. I have a particular dislike for that "rtfm" attitude that seems to pervade certain corners of the business, especially when it's directed at end users, though when it's aimed at beginner tech folks (or otherwise) in a non-constructive way, it's also pretty distasteful. HCI and usability is a bit of an interest of mine, and folks who produce mediocre UIs and then blame the users for their own amateurism rate pretty low on my scale, to put it mildly. I'm thinking of using a "fizzbuzz" type test in interviews someday whereby I ask/tell potential devs about that story re users logging into Facebook via a Google search for its login page; consequently ending up lost and disgruntled on the wrong site (somebody's blog IIRC) when the search rankings changed for some reason. Their reaction to that story should give me a pretty good idea re their attitude to users and usability. Of course, all that probably means that I'd be just another side of those flamewars, if I was in the habit of joining in on such things

p

I think it's a few things.

The internet thing has to do with anonymity. It brings out the worst in people. There's been a few studies that show people wearning masks tends to do things they wouldn't normally do. The same happens on the internet, and is exaggerated further by the fact that it's a textual only medium and it's hard to detect tone, so things escalate pretty quickly.

The second issue is to do with 'smart' people. Many techies are smart, but may not have the best social skills, so they heavily define their indentity on being smart and knowing things. Just as a really beautiful person might define themselves as beautiful and become very vain, many technical people define themselves as knowing alot. Therefore knowing more than others, and trying to prove themselves becomes second nature, and they may not realise or understand why they're offending people. Also, because they define themselves as being 'smart' they can sometimes over estimate their knowledge on subjects and assume because they are, after all 'smart' so they should know.

I think most of us involved in technology will fall into some of that. My take on it is that the important thing is to learn to define yourself by a multitude of different qualities, and respect that there are various types of intelligence, and you may only have one of those.

You might find these bookmarks interesting:
http://geniustypes.com/why_smart_people_do_dumb_things/
http://www.paulgraham.com/nerds.html
http://maxkle.in/your-high-iq-will-kill-your-startup/

Evil Phil

Nails been hit on the head by the previous posters.

I find similar things in the workplace. I am a competant developer but often when you join a new team or project there is a lot of "in house" knowledge which you need to do your job properly, you can ask questions until the cows come home but it's not until it goes to the point where another team member realises "something should have been done earlier" that they pipe up and start asking "why didn't you know this", It's a very strange culture.

I've worked in places like that, and to be honest in my experience the new guy who asks a lot of questions is a better hire. I've worked on one project where we were all very experienced developers, ego's were left at the door, and we produced some fantastic code. One guy left, was replaced with somebody who was to *proud* to ask a question, if you explained anything to him you were told that he know how to do his job, and he very nearly buried the project because he didn't understand basic OOP concepts. He was hired a senior dev!

I don't understand why there's so much aggression, maybe it's something to do with being picked on at school for being a nerd or something, but it's unprofessional at best. Everybody was a newbie at some stage, every time you join a new team with an existing code base your a newbie (my dog is called noob btw). This is one of the reasons I harp on about educational standards and the importance of professional development, following that path suggests a certain maturity. It also suggests that the individual is trying to further their career based on their own merits, and not by pointing out the faults of others.

amen

Many techies are smart, but may not have the best social skills

yes but not because they are techies. It may be due to their smartness( look at all the aloof doctors, lawyers etc) but its normally because no one has said that their behaviour is not acceptable..

conor.hogan.2

Ye thats a mix of real life passion for what you know and love + anonymity.