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<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve seen it remixed for libraries, where it says, “All modern library cataloging infrastructure” and “MARCEdit Terry Reese has been thanklessly maintaining since 1999.”<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">See: <a href="https://twitter.com/scottythered/status/1295497075417726976/photo/1">
https://twitter.com/scottythered/status/1295497075417726976/photo/1</a> <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Jaime Taylor<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Discovery & Resource Management Systems Coordinator<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">W.E.B. Du Bois Library<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">University of Massachusetts<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">154 Hicks Way<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">Amherst, MA 01003<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="mailto:jaimetaylor@umass.edu"><span style="color:#0563C1">jaimetaylor@umass.edu</span></a><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal">413-577-3401<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">Proud member of the Massachusetts Society of Professors (MSP/MTA/NEA), the union representing faculty and librarians at UMass Amherst, and supporting public education and
labor movements everywhere: </span><a href="http://umassmsp.org/"><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif">umassmsp.org</span></a><span style="font-size:9.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman",serif"><o:p></o:p></span></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><b>From:</b> themaintainers-bounces@lists.stevens.edu <themaintainers-bounces@lists.stevens.edu>
<b>On Behalf Of </b>Casey Boardman<br>
<b>Sent:</b> Wednesday, August 19, 2020 8:07 AM<br>
<b>To:</b> Andrew Russell <andy@themaintainers.org><br>
<b>Cc:</b> themaintainers <themaintainers@lists.stevens.edu><br>
<b>Subject:</b> Re: [Themaintainers] XKCD comic on maintenance<o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">"Criminal" or "grandfathered in" or simply "not broken (yet)"? :) Maybe replace "A project some random person in Nebraska has been thanklessly maintaining" with "a wire some rodent has been chewing on" or "a pipe that's been in the ground
for decades", etc.?<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Making this comic more generic is a good exercise in "what could go wrong?". The stuff that rarely changes and even more rarely breaks can be (and often is) taken for granted in both the digital and physical worlds. As usual, XKCD nails
it. (And if you need a picture to try to justify time/money for a maintenance project, I can't think of a better one.)<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">-Casey<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">On Tue, Aug 18, 2020 at 12:24 PM Andrew Russell <<a href="mailto:andy@themaintainers.org" target="_blank">andy@themaintainers.org</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Thank you Kara & James for sharing! It’s always educational to see what the folks on hacker news think about things :)<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">I’ve been mulling how the cartoon would look if we took out the word “digital” so that it’s captioned “All Modern Infrastructure.” The dependency nicely depicted by XKCD might be apt for the unregulated, unlicensed world of software. <o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">But for electricians or construction workers, who have to comply with all kinds of industry codes and state/federal regulations, this approach to dependencies might be… [trying to think of the right word]… criminal?<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Andy<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">On Aug 18, 2020, at 11:13 AM, James Howison <<a href="mailto:jhowison@ischool.utexas.edu" target="_blank">jhowison@ischool.utexas.edu</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Love it! I always learn something from people discussing these online, like on HackerNews: <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24193278" target="_blank">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24193278</a> (long discussion of ImageMagick
in there)<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">And the explainxkcd wiki): <a href="https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2347:_Dependency" target="_blank">https://www.explainxkcd.com/wiki/index.php/2347:_Dependency</a><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">James Howison<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Associate Professor<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">School of Information<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">University of Texas at Austin<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><a href="http://james.howison.name/" target="_blank">http://james.howison.name</a><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">On Tue, Aug 18, 2020 at 9:13 AM Kara Andersen <<a href="mailto:karalynn.andersen@gmail.com" target="_blank">karalynn.andersen@gmail.com</a>> wrote:<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Hello Maintainers -<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">In case you haven’t seen it already, I thought I’d share this XKCD comic about maintenance.<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Kara<o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><dependency_2x.png><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal"><o:p> </o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">Permalink: <a href="https://xkcd.com/2347/" target="_blank">https://xkcd.com/2347/</a><o:p></o:p></p>
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<p class="MsoNormal">_______________________________________________<br>
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>> matters at <a href="https://links.utexas.edu/rtyclf" target="_blank">https://links.utexas.edu/rtyclf</a>. <<<o:p></o:p></p>
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