I'm excited to get the Surface. I've always wished I could run my IDE on my tablet. Now I can code whilst dropping a deuce!

Very well stated, Mark. I wanted to make the same comment. If all you do is best practice, mediocrity is the best you can hope for.

Underperforming means different things to different companies. If Developer Joe does twice the work of Developer Dan, he has twice the opportunity to create defects. If you work in a zero-defect environment, you don't want to be Joe.

I once wrote a check issuing utility for a mortgage company that was rejected by QA, because the amount line would wrap on some checks that were over one billion dollars...that's quite a mortgage!