A Little Over the Top

Posted Jan 4, 2007 6:58 UTC (Thu) by lysse (subscriber, #3190) [Link]

Funnily enough, I was listening to a fascinating programme on BBC Radio 4 the other morning; Melvyn Bragg was investigating the prose style of different celebrities past and present, and it turned out that the better the writer, the more Anglo-Saxon and everyday English they used (up into the early 80%s and early 90%s respectively for Shakespeare, whom a number of people seem to think was quite good). Effective communication doesn't require a wide vocabulary; what counts is being able to use the words you know in exciting ways.

As to a vegan version... I don't think plants reproduce quickly enough. Maybe a bacterial version - the more you split your code bases freely amongst as wide a host population as possible, the more quickly your code can evolve and develop new strains and resistances, but the less likely it is that you'll have to start over because you've metaphorically either hit a growth of penicillin or killed your host?

Yeah, it needs work... ;)