Anecdotal, Yet Outdated and Incorrect

As a closed group of friends knows how much I read and the 150+ blogs blessed with my reading, I spend most of my time reading something, anything technical.

I have seen a phenomenon occurring over and over for the last few months. It is my habit to read a blog back to front when it is blessed :). And during those flash backs to past posts for the writer, I frequently encounter links which have been broken, out dated information, design decisions which never made to light of day etc.

As four (yes,four not just one) examples, consider these blogs (all are from Microsoft employees). The Old New Thing, Larry Osterman’s Weblog, Brad Abrams and IRhetoric (this blog has been moved since).

First two are really old times for Microsoft. Their blogs are proud story tellers, recounting the events they had had over their career. But they don’t stink, because they are not littered with broken links, code which will no longer compile, examples which do not apply to what is running right now on my computer. Well, honestly, Raymond’s stinks a little because of his dry (sarcastic, add any others you may like) jokes.

On the other hand, consider the other two. Brad Abrams is the oldest one from any Microsoft  employee I have read so far. But being old should count as a negative point. Earliest posts are from even before the PDC 2003 era. Most of the links are broken because they refer to GotDotNet. Some of the information about Longhorn (read Vista) is entirely incorrect.

Similar analysis can be done for IRhetoric. The links are broken all over the place. Information is entirely incorrect in earlier posts. What used to be Avalon, has posts containing sample which will never compile with the RTM bits.

But there has been no urge to update the code, fix the links or at least point out in the post that those links will no longer work, the code will not compile etc.