Introduction
I am going to let you in on two little secrets. First, for the past 9 months, I’ve been engaged in a fierce sibling rivalry with my long-lost brother. His name is David VonderHaar, and if you need proof of our brotherhood, just read this article.
Who is Winning the Rivalry?
David is kicking my a$$, any way you look at it. Figure 1 shows our Twitter followers over the past 9 months.
Figure 1 – The sibling rivalry dashboard. Notice how I cleverly use the log scale to make the competition look reasonably close? That is a great trick you learn through the years of being a computational scientist! (Note to self, you are pathetic when you can’t even beat your little brother in a simple percentage competition!)
While I have skyrocketed by over 200 new Twitter followers (Figure 2), David has managed to only add over 346,000 followers (Figure 3) during the same time. He has increased his followers by over 80% whereas I have only increased over 57%.
It hurts when you are losing to your little brother. Even if David had lost those 346,000 followers rather than gained them, he would still be beating me about 80,000 followers rather than the 3/4 of a million followers he is whipping me by now! When you are getting whipped like, this, worrying about small mathematical details like a few tens of thousands of followers is no big deal.
Figure 2 – Ken has managed to skyrocket over the 550 follower threshold!
Figure 3 – David has managed to only add a paltry 346,000 followers over the past 9 months.
I guess my Alteryx ACE award didn’t generate as much popularity as his upcoming and newest release of Black Ops III (Figure 4). I can only image what is going to happen come November when Black Ops III gets released. I guess I’m going to have to sign up for the Nuketown bonus map so that I can get out of town before the damage is done. If I can’t do that, I’m going to be in for some serious pain.
Figure 4 – The Call of Duty Black Ops III website (click to go to the website, buy the software, and make my brother more money please!).
The Second Secret(s)
(1) Who do you think is the real brain-trust behind the BLACK OPS concept? Secret answer: I think it might just be a guy named Ken BLACK!
(2) Why do you think David uses a predominately Jet Black color scheme? Secret answer: David is paying homage to his nephew, Mr. Jett Black!
Those are two unknown facts that you can only learn by reading this blog. Maybe there is more to this connection than you realize – it’s kind of like the Kennedy/Lincoln coincidences.
Final Thoughts
The good news is that David is looking more like his big brother with each passing month (Figure 5)!
Figure 5 – DV and KB. Hey, I know the pictures aren’t flattering but it is all that I could find in the few minutes I spent writing this.
Finally, somewhere through the years I must have missed the point in time when people stopped calling us “computer programmers” and started calling us “developers”. I have always called myself a “computer programmer”. David probably calls himself a “developer”. I think that is the difference.
So from now on, this is what I am going to do. I no longer will announce myself by saying: “I can program a computer in 10 different computer languages!”. I’m going to say: “I am a developer”. I’m not going to say: “I am a software developer”. I’m going to make people think I am a “real estate developer” a “game developer” or some other kind of developer.
I’m going to be mysterious. I’m going to make people wonder what I do. I’m going to mention that my work is top secret and that somehow I’ve got a connection to the Black OPS mission. I’ll tell them that if I told them what I do, I’d have to kill them. That is probably what David does.
David probably tells people that he will secretly steal their ammunition if they get on his bad side. He probably walks around like he has the power. He’s got the control. That is why everyone follows him on Twitter. He ACTS like a Leader. He has got the secret figured out. Who says that you can’t learn things from your little brother (Figure 6)?
Figure 6 – David and Me, or Me and David.
Until next time, the rivalry continues…
P.S. Every once in a while I have to make blogging fun. Thanks for being a good sport, David.
