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Finding a 27-year-old easter egg in the Power Mac G3 ROM

(www.downtowndougbrown.com)
388 points zdw | 2 comments | 24 Jun 25 13:06 UTC | HN request time: 0.792s | source
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RomanPushkin ◴[24 Jun 25 14:38 UTC] No.44366760[source]▶
It's kinda cool and shows that there are real people behind corporations. Some folks with lots of $$$ say "I build this" (Zuck often says that), stealing the credit of accomplishment from small little people. While real small little people leave the note in history - "nope, it's us who put our souls into making this happen". Of course, Steve Jobs would ban this.
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dcminter ◴[24 Jun 25 14:50 UTC] No.44366886[source]▶
You know I'm not a huge fan of Jobs, but I do think he was a lot more complicated than the pantomime villain he sometimes gets characterised as. On this particular topic he was, on the contrary, the progenitor of this:

https://www.folklore.org/Signing_Party.html

So no "of course" about it.

Note also that Microsoft had a "no easter eggs" policy starting in the early 2000s. It's not really a Jobs thing.

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1. pm215 ◴[24 Jun 25 15:24 UTC] No.44367239[source]▶
Yeah. I think the "signed case" also has some distinctions compared to a typical software easter egg:

- the effects of it are clear

- there's basically no chance of unexpected side effects (I suppose in theory it could structurally weaken the case if the signatures were carved too deeply...)

- if a user stumbles upon it the intention is pretty clear and obviously harmless

- it's not something that might get snuck in without approval of senior management, because it's not hidden in that sense, so there is a limiter on how many of them accumulate and how complicated they might get

which help to explain why you might by policy forbid software easter eggs while still being an advocate for "signing your work".

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2. dcminter ◴[24 Jun 25 15:29 UTC] No.44367281[source]▶
It's also, I think, worth bearing in mind the extraordinary growth that the computer industry has had. To be CEO of a major computer company in the mid 80s versus the late 90s was a very different level of responsibility.

What people will put up with in a hobbyist and small business environment is very different to what's acceptable in enterprise and beyond. It's all fun and games until someone has to sell to the US government...