[idrios]

Regulations are like lines of code in a software project. They're good if well written, bad if not, and what matters more is how well they fit into the entire solution

[gessha]

A major difference with regulations is there’s no guaranteed executor of those metaphorical lines of code. If the law gets enforced, then yes, but if nobody enforces it, it loses meaning.

[int_19h]

The worst possibility is selective enforcement.

[estimator7292]

If the law is code, then law enforcement is a JITter

(joke)

[pbh101]

Not only in the executive/enforcement, but in the actual impact of the regulation in practice as applied by millions in a distributed system. Regulations influence decision paths as opposed to encoding deterministic code paths.

[Kostchei]

The problem with laws that both the enforcer and the subject (enforcee?) agree are bad, is that enforcement is variable. And that leads to corruption. Every damn time.

[erikerikson]

Bad law enforced perfectly is also undesirable.

[lucketone]

And lines of code is like the mass of an airplane.

[aallaall]

Just put all code on one line then. Statements (or tokens) is what matters.

[samdoesnothing]

In general you want as few as possible of both.

[econ]

You could also optimize everything for future updates that optimize things even further for even more updates...

Humm.. that was supposed to be a joke but our law making dev team isn't all that productive to put it mildly. Perhaps some of that bloat would be a good thing until we are brave enough to do the full rewrite.

[banana_sandwich]

this is wrong for the same reason using single letter variable names to keep things concise is usually wrong.

i’d rather something a bit more verbose and clear than cryptic and confusing. there are many actors in the world with different brains.

[AceJohnny2]

that's right. This is the reason all my code looks like an entry to PerlGolf. /s

The world's complicated. "Every complex problem has a solution which is simple, direct, and wrong"

Simplicity is a laudable goal, but it's not always the one thing to optimize for.