I entered the "Windows 7 tent" on campus to witness the horrors that lie within.

Someone immediately approached me to demonstrate the new window-snapping features. Cute, I guess.

So I played around with things. <super>R, "cmd" still opens a dreadfully useless terminal. Launched Office, or a "trial version", a term I never get to see on my platform of choice. Looked at the network settings part of the control panel, since that's the part I usually need to be familiar with to fix others' troubles. It doesn't look like much has changed since XP.

Another spectator stepped in, and another representative jumped at the chance to show him the window-moving gestures. The rep frowned. "I wonder why it's not working." He moved to another demo machine and failed to get the snap to happen.

A machine next to me sobbed gently as its screen displayed the BSOD.

I was opening a lot of windows, and things were getting cluttered. I asked someone if Windows had workspaces yet. No, he said, but he wished it did. Windows 7 was apparently not his idea. "You can probably get a third-party plugin."

Okay, so, let's see if Windows is usable for basic tasks. Start with something simple. "How do I SSH into a machine?" The response was disappointing, expected, and ironic. "You can go to Google and download something for that." Microsoft, you might want to train your evangelists to say "Bing" whenever they think "Google".

So, um... just a terrible demo. Of course, the real goal of this effort is not to show off the next iteration of this product, but to hand college students a small piece of paper naming the $30 student price to make them feel like they're getting a great deal.

I'm graduating in the spring. Most of my difficult requirements are already satisfied. Instead of being like a normal person and taking some easy courses that will get me out of here, I decided to sign up for things that sounded interesting. Three of them are grad classes. One of those is quantum computing. They all have time-intensive homeworks and projects.

But instead of working on that stuff, I figured, why not carve Bowser's face into a pumpkin?

Design inspired by (shamelessly pilfered from) some guy on the internet.

Wikipedia takes a lot of flak for its processes and politics. I'll skip the debate on which of these complaints have merit, because what I want to discuss is some of the specific policies that the community has adopted. Like everything else, the policy pages were developed over time by the crowd, and I think they well reflect some essential guidelines necessary when a wide group of people must reach agreements (as is the case wherever humans share a space, whether that entails writing in the same wiki article or living in the same nation). In article histories and discussion pages, the policies are frequently referenced by well-known abbreviations, and I have found myself wishing I could do the same in non-Wikipedia contexts.

Other stuff exists (WP:OSE) - Sometimes articles get deleted. These decisions are often preceded by lengthy controversy, and some argue by citing precedent. "There's an article on x, and that's just as famous as this." This one comes to mind when people use US military spending to justify other federal expenditures. "We spend x dollars on a useless war, and universal healthcare costs less than that." The argument lacks validity because it hinges on the correctness of some "other stuff" which may have been wrong in the first place.

Verifiability, not truth (WP:V) - Although the concept may seem obvious, it can be difficult to accept that even if your knowledge is true, it has no place in the encyclopedia unless you can provide reputable references. Wikipedia ackowledges that capital-T "Truth" is beyond its grasp, because each article's content must be agreed upon by a bunch of opinionated people from the Internet. Instead, information is judged solely on whether it is backed up by reliable sources. I was reminded of this policy when a professor dismissed hidden variable theories of quantum mechanics as irrelevant even if they might be accurate. He described the purpose of science as "finding efficient models", claiming that laymen are wrong to take scientific results as truths. In any arena, we operate with some contextual redefinition of truth which represents but does not entirely concur with reality.

Civility (WP:CIV) - This policy is not wildly insightful, but I think it's worth a mention because I appreciate the way Wikipedia deals with negativity. It's a hell of a challenge - one that is not always met - but it's cool to see people choosing civil behavior because it is more effective than aggression.

Possibly related to the abandonment of their old slogan: "Got annoying children? Knock them out - with benadryl."

Tech Tower is the big building on Cherry Street. It is not the architecture building.

Your Tech-given right to steal a "T" does not apply to every sign you come across. Peeling the second letter off of "Stinger" while you are waiting for the bus is not a heist, it is douchebaggery.

This is not clever, skillful, bold, or funny. It is tacky. Stop vandalizing your own university.