Boring Programming Stuff

I got tired of wget obeying robots.txt, so I got rid of a lines of code in the source and recompiled. It took me all of 5 minutes, and most of that was waiting for evil wget to compile. So to save others 5 minutes I’ve thrown the new source and binaries up.

My mother always liked the show Deal or No Deal, and I noticed it’s airing again this week. I don’t have a problem with the actual game show program, just NBC’s implementation. First, the show is incredibly drawn out. Also, the show relies on suspense to keep viewers watching through the commercials. The optimal strategy in the game is easy to memorize, just take the average of the monetary values left and take the deal if it is higher. Still, most of the contestants become incredibly emotional and cave in far too easily. Finally, the contestants have friends and relatives show up to help them decide deal or no deal. These people serve no purpose, and at best participate by relaying the deal reward to the contestant. It’s contrived and completely pointless. Artificially prolonging suspense doesn’t make for an interesting show, it just frustrates viewers. There chip, I updated my blog.