I sit here and look at the DAZZLE video hardware I'm packing up to take back for a refund at Best Buy. It's the 3rd one I've tried, it doesn't work. And I sigh - is it me, or is a lot of the technology we have today only half-baked products and a lot of the so-called "professionals" like doctors or engineers just mediocre hacks who are bumbling around without a freakin clue?

It's almost like we have a whole generation of developers and engineers, etc. who are sloppy, incompetant, or just too darn lazy to take any pride in their work.

Microsoft is an example in the software industry - if there's a new application that consumers want, they hurry up and toss out a kludged-up one to retail that only works 70% at best. This is to kill any competition - to hook people on it first. Afterwards, they issue a patch or two to get the product up to maybe an 85% reliability level. The fact is, they never make anything work 100% and kill off competition that is working on the same type of product that is 100% reliable.

Microsoft is not alone - computer hardware manufacturers, car manufacturers, pharmaceutical firms, building contractors, electronics brand names like Sony and Panasonic ...... pushing junk that doesn't work as advertised or is so cheaply made that it doesn't last more than a few months if it even worked at all. But they want top dollar for it. I made the mistake of buying a Ford Contour - 16 recalls for defective parts or bad engineering designs. Stuff that some engineer should have had the common sense to NOT do or some parts supplier shouldn't have made so cheap. Ever get in a crowded elevator and hope that OTIS actually *tested* that it could the weight its certified for? Or get in a plane and hope that some schmuck at Airbus didn't rivet 4 rivets out of 6 on a wing, then say screw it because he was tired and wanted to knock off work early? Or that doctor taking your appendix out really knows what he's cutting?

Doesn't anyone *care* anymore? Doesn't anyone *test* anything anymore? Has our society become so lazy that it's content with half-baked junk and stupidity?