Joel Spolsky

"Full service brokers, in this day and age of low cost mutual funds and discount brokers, are really nothing more than machines for ripping off retail investors."

"If something seems possible, thats probably because someone is already doing it. When something seems that it cant possibly work, nobody tries it. Real innovation happens when someone tries anyway, overlooking an obvious flaw, and finds a way to make an idea work."

"Remember, just because Microsoft can do something, doesnt mean you can. Microsoft makes their own gravity. Normal rules dont apply to them."

"The secret of Big Macs is that theyre not very good, but every one is not very good in exactly the same way."

"Beware of Methodologies. They are a great way to bring everyone up to a dismal, but passable, level of performance, but at the same time, they are aggravating to more talented people who chafe at the restrictions that are placed on them."

"Most college students, fortunately, are brash enough never to bother asking their elders for advice, which, in the field of computer science, is a good thing, because their elders are apt to say goofy, antediluvian things like "the demand for keypunch operators will exceed 100,000,000 by the year 2010" and "lisp careers are really very hot right now."