Discussing a problem today, we tossed around some solutions that involved generating a lot of transactions on the back end, and I stopped and said “You know, we’re casually discussing an option that requires more computing power than existed in the world in like… 1985.” And the people I was talking to all cracked huge grins.

I’m not actually sure that’s true, after trying for a while to figure out what the world’s computing power was in 1985 and how many processor instructions a web request actually generates, I believe that may not have been that far off. 1982, maybe. I should ask this as an interview question for a program manager and see what they come up with.

I started out my tech career for real working on a web=based telesales application for inbound call center agents for AT&T Wireless, and we had to deal with a couple hundred people placing orders slowly, moving screen-to-screen as they talked to the customer or helped them pick an option.

And while that had its own set of challenges, they aren’t remotely as cool as the ones I get at Expedia.