How did Ranters come to say these naughty words? by jgn on Wednesday, January 16, 2008 in Technology

I have been reading some recently about Zed Shaw's rant (incidentally, if you Google for "zed shaw rant" you get his piece on why programmers need to know statistics, which is a good one). But the rant I mean is, of course, his curse on the houses of Rails. I actually live in the 'hood, and it's not that bad, so I don't exactly understand why "ghetto" gets to be the term of opprobrium, but whatever. Also, as I read his rant, I frequently think, WWZD? (What would Zed do?) I don't know. Googling for WWZD does not bring up anything about our Zed, which is too bad.

In any case, Zed really is a smart guy, and Utu is neat. His talk on Utu for the Boston Ruby Group made me think - watch it.

But what's really been bugging me about this, and I bet Zed knows this, is that the Ranters were the good guys. They really just wanted to love everyone:

Maybe that's why they were so hated. I am thinking that a really great Ruby on Rails rant would be more in the spirit of " minaswan," and would remind us of all of the good that Rails has brought the world. Rails can't solve all the problems (though you get your "each") -- but if you're looking for a savior, or the framework equivalent of John Lennon, god help you.