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Meet the Guy Who Holds the Guinness World Record For Collecting Spreadsheets (fastcompany.com)
harrymcc writes: Ariel Fischman, a financial advisor in Mexico City, has been using spreadsheet software for 30 years. And in recent years he's been collecting it: VisiCalc, 1-2-3, Excel, Quattro, and lesser lights in their once-familiar boxes, in a dizzying array of variants stretching back to the 1970s. Last year, Guinness World Records certified that his collection is without peer. I recently spoke to him about it -- starting with the obvious question -- Why spreadsheets? -- for Fast Company.
Else they'd have spread!
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
And I thought stamp collecting was the world's geekiest hobby, we have a new winner!
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
He's collecting spreadsheet software.
Bringing a graphical spreadsheet with graphing capability on a 64 was a tour de force. Not mentioned in this article?
Here's a weird little web page about it
http://geowriter.blogspot.com/...
So, which spreadsheet program does this guy use to organize and manage his collection?
https://app.box.com/WitthoftResume Code: https://github.com/cellocgw
Because its tech related. Because a Guinness Book record is interesting in a light-hearted way. Cause the guy could actually speak intelligently about his hobby and tie it to the history of the mundane yet important market of consumer software?
Exactly how much time does it take for one to ignore a slashdot article?
Spreadsheets...everywhere. Of all kinds, doing all kinds of evil. There are still some embedded because no one can figure out how they actually work or what the numbers actually mean, only that they need to compare new numbers against old numbers in one capacity or another.
I drink a lot.
Mod me down with all of your hatred and your journey towards the dark side will be complete!
for preserving a slice of software history. Not only has he collected a rich historical collection preserving the evolution of spreadsheet software, but from the article he's also interviewed and corresponded with the software pioneers from the field, most of whom are in their 80s and 90s now, preserving their historical testimony. Without him an important part of software history might otherwise have been forgotten. I suspect his collection, and his research into the field, will be an invaluable archive for those interested in computing history. It's a shame that his interest in preserving software history is being met with more mockery than support by the slashdot community.
Clearly he does it to impress the ladies
The sad thing is, some of them probably get excited when he offers to pivot for them.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Ok, the Guinness World Records have become a bit ridiculous, registering records for some very trivial things, but at least this guy is not collecting "spreadsheets", but boxed spreadsheet software. He has over 500 according to the "strict" record parameters, or 800 otherwise.
It's still rather trivial of course, when I was a kid (almost 3 decades ago), I had asked for the Guinness Book of records for christmas and enjoyed reading about the tallest man, the fastest animal etc, but the biggest spreadsheet software collection is nothing like that. I mean, you could have thousands of records under the category "biggest xx software collection", or things like "biggest kellogs cerial box collection" etc. Maybe I should also apply, I have the worlds biggest "software written by myself" software collection...
Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. Polar Scope Align for iOS
I concur with you entirely, but I think there is a snicker-and-giggle factor here for this guying specializing in collecting spreadsheet programs.
John Trimmer self-published the book How to Avoid Huge Ships and every online reference to this rare book is filled with jokes. How do you avoid huge ships? Simple, don't cross their paths, and so on. Trimmer's book, however, was pitched towards the captains or operators of small vessels such as fishing boats and pleasure craft, who indeed give gray hairs to the captains and pilots of tankers and container ships that must traverse the same coastal waters and harbors. Maybe it is like pedestrians and motorists cutting in front of trains, where it doesn't register that a train cannot stop on a dime and neither can one of those huge ships.
The book tries to explain from the perspective of a former harbor pilot why it is not a good idea for a small boat to cut in front of a huge ship, and this explanation is necessary because I lot of small boat operators do just that. I am not able to get ahold of this book so there may be more to it than that -- maybe a small craft can get sucked into the bow wake of a much bigger ship and Captain Trimmer gives instructions on how to stay clear?
This collection of spreadsheet programs is a historical treasure, and spreadsheet software is one of the most used apps on small computers. But spreadsheet software is not kewl and computer users who do stuff with spreadsheets instead of writing custom Perl scripts are not leet, hence all of the jokes and people placing this poor man on the autism spectrum.