Leith’s Laws
(First Published in 1996; the more things change the more they stay the same.)
I have been less than technical over the last few months. I have strayed from science and technology to policy and culture. I will make up for that now by sharing some new scientific laws.
Web Page Inverse Square Law
1. The longer a page takes to load the less important the content.
2. The more important the content, the harder to find the page.
3. The more awards a site has, the more advertising it contains.
The First Law of Bandwidth Dynamics
The more bandwidth you have, the more you need.
The Second Law of Bandwidth Dynamics
The less bandwidth you have, the more work you get done.
Gates’ Constant
Software complexity increases faster than wetware complexity. Software usability is inversely proportional to software complexity. By the year 2020 software complexity will approach infinity and usability will approach zero.
Mac corollary: We stole the interface first!
Media Induced Technology Currents
The longer the Media-Wavelength for a technology, the more you can charge for useless information about that technology.
The shorter the Media-Wavelength for a technology, the greater the number of people who will be rendered redundant by the technology.
Congressional Equation
The more a technology allows people to communicate privately, the more energy congress will expend to control the technology.
The more a technology dislocates workers, the less energy congress will expend to control the technology.
The higher the profits that can be made by small technology businesses, the higher their taxes.
The higher the profits that can be made by corporate technology businesses, the higher their government subsidies.
Computer Hardware Rule
New hardware costs about the same as old hardware did last year. (Ten years ago a top of the line computer cost about $2000, now a top of the line computer cost about $2000.) If the price for hardware components fall, they cease to be used in computers and a new more expensive component will be found as a replacement.
