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A comment on The beginning of the end for copper wire. Parent comment

Re:The beginning of the end for copper wire by cperciva on Sunday November 26, 2017 @05:38PM (#15783490)
Right, my extreme understatement was my British sense of humour coming through. I was forgetting that HN has people whose only exposure to Tanenbaum is via the Linus-Tanenbaum debate (or possibly not even that) and for whom his sarcasm and my characterization of it would be less obvious.

My favourite Tanenbaumism, while I'm on the topic: Aircraft carriers are modular. If a toilet gets clogged, it doesn't start launching nuclear missiles.

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Re:The beginning of the end for copper wire by dfc on Sunday November 26, 2017 @07:21PM (#15783909)
The quote would be so much better if the subject were submarines instead of carriers.
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Re:The beginning of the end for copper wire by cperciva on Sunday November 26, 2017 @08:00PM (#15784044)
Perhaps... but the non-modular software equivalents of aircraft carriers routinely do launch metaphorical nuclear missiles despite not being intended to ever have that functionality.
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Re:The beginning of the end for copper wire by abysmalfitzg on Sunday November 26, 2017 @10:56PM (#15784696)
I do agree that aircraft carriers have stronger claims to being British :)
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