In the process of making a comment on someone else's blog I pulled up Wikipedia to look up and make sure that I was citing a bit of internet "law" correctly. Reading the article led me to further "laws" and adages common to the net, and I thought I'd collect my findings here.
Godwin's Law: "As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one."
Quirk's Exception: intentional invocation of Godwin's Law with the sole intent to end a thread results in Quirk's Exception, rendering the invocation invalid (see the Wikipedia article on Godwin's Law).
Benford's Law of Controversy: "Passion is inversely proportional to the amount of real information available."
Brooks' Law: "Adding manpower to a late software project makes it later."
Dilbert Principle: "The most ineffective workers are systematically moved to the place where they can do the least damage: management."
Hanlon's Razor: "Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity"
Ockham's Razor: "Explanations should never multiply assumptions without necessity. When two explanations are offered for a phenomenon, the simplest full explanation is preferable."
Stigler's Law of Eponymy: "No scientific discovery, not even Stigler's law, is named after its original discoverer."
Labels: oddities, silliness
