Who's driving?

Sometimes I feel like half the trash I read on the agile internet groups and blogs is written by counter-culture contrarian anarchists that smoke pot and sleep in yurts on the Oregon coast (I highly recommend at least the yurt on the Oregon coast). These extremists abhor most formal process and gods forbid someone tried to profit from writing a piece of software – especially software that can help them get their job done.

Most of the rest of the crap on these same groups feels like it comes from neo-McCarthy-ist control freaks that seek to institute PMI-like controls and measures on agile development including mean time between potty breaks (which of course at which you’ll be randomly drug tested). They storm the hallways wielding their ten square meter Gantt chart like a light saber unwilling to accept that any project of material scope or effort could be managed without it.

Why am I so agitated today? I am very worried that something that we built that was a simple and efficient way of building software products is being co-opted and convoluted by the mindless hoard. Can this web-based zeitgeist guide, evolve, and improve Scum and other agile methods? My experience with design, whether it be software or process design, is that elegant designs are not created by committee, they are the result of creative genius that is usually encompassed in a single individual.

Yep. I am a bit tired, grumpy, and burnt out today. Transitioning from a long holiday weekend directly into a 6am flight to SFO will do it to you. So, for the 1% of you that I haven’t offended, please give me a smile, hug, or perhaps buy me a shot of Patron when you see me bleary eyed at the bar at SFO tonight at 8pm.


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