J-Walk & Associates, Inc.

Spreadsheets Are No Good?

PC Magazine columnist John C. Dvorak on The 30th Anniversary of the (No Good) Spreadsheet.

2009 marks the 30-year anniversary of the now-ubiquitous spreadsheet program. And society as a whole has deteriorated ever since its invention. It was the spreadsheet that triggered the PC revolution, with VisiCalc the original culprit. Can anyone say that we've actually benefited from its invention?

He blames all of the world's financial problems on the spreadsheet. For example...

This is what caused the mortgage crisis: Spreadsheets instead of people were making decisions on loans. Soon these loans were wrapped up into neat financial packages all based on spreadsheet accounting. Brokers gave these packages high, triple-A financial ratings because the spreadsheet told them to. All spreadsheets, except the most mundane, are flawed in one way or another. You guess what the growth rate might be. You guess at the future cost of goods. You play what-if until you get what you want. There's a lot of guessing games played with spreadsheets. This is a flaw.

- Reader Comments -

Following are comments in response to this item.
The most recent comment is at the bottom.

1. By Jon Peltier. Comment posted 12 January, 2009 10:26pm

   He's got nothing better to whine about?
2. By JP. Comment posted 13 January, 2009 5:54am

   I've read PC Mag for years, he's always been like that. I think it's his job to piss people off.
3. By Haffy. Comment posted 13 January, 2009 6:18am

   Moron - oh, so it wasn't anybody's fault, it was the spreadsheet? How on earth does he think business would manage without spreadsheets?
   
   One answer - it would be a different computer program. Well, are all these fancy business decisions made based on spreadsheets or other computer programs? Let's scrap the whole lot and go back to the abacus.
   
   Then there'd be no PCs and this imbecile would lose his job.
4. By Jason Sanchez. Comment posted 13 January, 2009 2:01pm

   My teacher once told me "businesses are not greedy its the people who work there are greedy." Spreadsheets calculate the numbers but its the user that makes the decisions.
5. By Alexander Aizenberg. Comment posted 15 January, 2009 7:57am

   It has the same sense as blaming a hammer when you hit your finger.
6. By Lance. Comment posted 20 January, 2009 4:19am

   Here's an article that blames computers in general rather than spreadsheets specifically:
   
   http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/dominic-lawson/dominic-lawson-i-blame-computers-for-this-crisis-1451417.html
7. By Rahul. Comment posted 31 July, 2009 2:21am

   Instead of blaming the Corrupt Guys who run the show and looked the other way when things were happening, this guys blames the wrong thing altogether.