I've mentioned Richard Gabriel's famous The Rise of "Worse is Better" before (back here ), but only recently did oneof its important lessons coalesce in my thoughts.

"Worse is Better" contrasts what Gabriel calls the MIT approach , with the cornerstoneof 'the right thing', against the New Jersey approach , with a 'worseis better' minimalism (this is a simplified summary). Gabriel arguedthat despite its flaws, the New Jersey approach had significantly bettersurvival characteristics than the

One of the quiet little secrets of university computing is just howdifficult it is to actually punish people for doing bad stuff withcomputing resources. Really bad stuff, things that are criminal orhave serious civil liabilities, can be punished. But mere violations ofpolicies or bad network behavior (including spamming) can run into aseries of problems.

Tenured professors might as well be the left hand of God, of course,especially if they get grant money . But evenstudents (grad and undergrad both) are heavily protected