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By bloid
via knowing.net
Published: Jan 15 2008 / 22:19
No Silver Programmers
Someone who should know better gave a commencement address based on the premise "5% of programmers are 20x more productive than the other 95%." This is utter BS and it's important to say so.
First, as boring as it may be to say "we don't have the data," go to scholar.google.com and find me a peer-reviewed study of individual programmer productivity among professionals not students. I'll wait.
Comments
robse replied ago:
That 5 / 20 "rule" did seem very suspect...
ninj replied ago:
Surely the premise is still true? Some programmers are definitely more productive than other programmers, and let's face it - there are a whole lot of really unproductive and bug-writing coders out there...
Topnotch replied ago:
I never really agreed with this assertion: "5% of programmers are 20x more productive than the other 95%."
This guy has an absolutely hilarious post on his site as well about programmer Bob:
http://www.knowing.net/PermaLink,guid,36ed6cec-0ba3-4dde-9509-f3cb4310dbf4.aspx
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