This is the fourth episode of the StackOverflow podcast, wherein Joel and I discuss the following:
- Why we think stackoverflow.com isn't "reinventing the wheel", or at least, reinventing it in a useful way. Failure, however, is always an option.
- We will be using ASP.NET MVC to build stackoverflow, as covered in my recent blog post. Joel and I carry on a long discussion of Model-View-Controller.
- A mention of CSS Zen Garden. Joel thinks it's an unrealistic example, but I don't.
- Defining "skinnability", whether it applies to your application, or if it even matters.
- A mention of this year's Maker Faire, where I met the Wikimedia Foundation's Jay Walsh. Followed by an examination of why we admire Wikipedia and consider it a defining influence.
- Guests welcome! You will be able to participate fully in stackoverflow.com without ever creating an account -- but there will be perks for creating an account.
- A bit about our reputation system -- learning the lessons of PageRank.
- Dealing with the inevitable evil users and users who actively game the reputation system. Not you, of course. We like you.
- Adopting Creative Commons by-nc-sa for our podcast and CCWiki for stackoverflow.com.
- On the contract between Joel and Jeff to form stackoverflow.com : the difference between a C Corporation and Limited Liability Company (scintillating!)
- Do we need lawyers? Yes, we need lawyers. Unfortunately.
- The final results of our logo contest.
- Twitter: is it only useful for "web celebrities?" I personally love Twitter and find it quite useful. Follow me on Twitter, and see for yourself. I'll try to convince Joel to join up.
- Tip of the week: Redgate SQL Compare.
- Thank you for all the questions and for the Wiki edits!
We also answered the following listener questions, with a lot of peripheral discussion on related topics:
- Kyle Neumeier: How will you provide enough content to achieve a critical mass of activity on stackoverflow.com?
- Andrew Morrow: How will you deal with answer ordering and voting? Will it be based on votes alone? If so, how do we follow the thread of a conversation?
- ObviousTroll: Is it worthwhile to go back to school and get a graduate degree in computer science?
If you'd like to submit a question to be answered in our next episode, record an audio file (90 seconds or less) and mail it to podcast@stackoverflow.com.
The transcript wiki for this episode is available for public editing.