Although I find this fellow's blog has strings of provocative ideas, I have to throw a bit of coolish water on the significance of "cognitive dissonance." It's an old concept from social psychology - and it's just one way of looking at some behavioral phenomena.

For alternatives, study up on what social psychologists call "attribution theory."

As I remember, the main difference between "attribution theory" and "dissonance theory" is that dissonance theory postulates a motivation or drive to reduce dissonance between different types of information...

Whereas AT just postulates different information - something to think about for IT-type folks...

I see all types of applications (software, IT, startups!) for some basic familiarity with social/behavioral psychology.

It's all new to me, a friend who graduated with a psychology degree quite a few years back pointed me to cognitive dissonance after I discussed my other post (Can Awareness of our Biases Clear our vision). After we talked, I decided it was definitely worth sharing.

After all is said and done, it's simply a model for behavior no more and no less. Thanks for pointing out attribution theory I'll give it a cursory read. It's liberating not being an professional in the field of behaviorial psychology, I haven't over indulged in preferred theories or been biases towards "current thinking".