The answer (or at least the proximate cause) may be that the Europeans rode on the crest of a powerful new idea: allowing those who made a lot of mon… - Paul Graham

The word "screed" is a sign of intellectual dishonesty. In practice it means no more than "something someone wrote that I disagree with," but by hiding this in the noun you use to describe the work, you make it seem as if this were some intrinsic feature of it.

People commonly use the word 'procrastination' to describe what they do on the Internet. It seems to me too mild to describe what's happening as merely not-doing-work. We don’t call it procrastination when someone gets drunk instead of working.

Prestige is an ok motivator, but curiosity is a better one. Curiosity never lies.