this is a 'haha Americans so dumb' myth that's been blown up - it's the result of a NY Times article that outline a private restaurant chain focus group result.
So tldr; some people in a private focus group questioned the value of a 1/3 pound burger over the same priced 1/4 pound burger. It's not indicative of any system numerical illiteracy.
I will add there were no actual data released - it's solely based on an anecdote from a A&W restaurant executive.
I gotta say that your distinction between 'hackers' and 'developers' is pretty ill-informed - just out of curiosity, have you primarily worked in start-ups?
Sprints when used correctly are invaluable to a development team. Source: My own experience as a junior dev and a lead dev on teams working in this methodology.
Note it's not useful in all (most?) scenarios or in all stages of a product's development.
When you are in support mode for a product that's stable, standing up something from scratch, working on a POC or experimenting with frameworks or libraries - it's not useful, use kanban or something else.
But when you are working on a/b tests or adding features to an existing product it's extremely useful.
When done correctly:
You get a two-way promise between leadership and a dev team. The dev team commits to getting stuff done within that <sprint-length> time - therefore they must carefully decompose work where that makes sense. Leadership commits to LEAVING THE DEV TEAM ALONE for that <sprint-length> time - no priority changes, no "Product Manager Chad had a dream if we implement X we get 1000% more revenue!", none of that nonsense. This means for bigger efforts, you get <sprint-length> chunks of working code "done" at time. This in practice means the devs drive how much they can get done in a certain amount of time - if a PM wants an earlier date out the door, that's <x> fewer sprints of decomposed work that gets done.
The tricky thing here is the use of the term "correctly" above. Sprint-based methodology isn't a tool for management to dictate or predict performance and it's not a tool to micromanage tasking. If leadership DOES have this distorted view of it, then it is useless overhead to no benefit for anybody.
It's also not useful at all if only the dev teams practice it - everybody has to respect the commitments required to do sprint correctly - if they don't, use kanban or something else.
Pull quotes from the summary:
"Cat bones from many trading centres show cut marks from skinning and highlight the value of cat fur. In contrast, the occurrence of cats in male burials points rather to a function as exotic and prestigious pets. "
I know this is a joke, but pottery is kind of the road sign of archaeology. Pottery can tell all kinds of stories about technology levels, trade routes, cultural patterns, foods eaten and agriculture (from seed impressions and residues), the list goes on. Pottery is pretty important.
Yeah, as much as I think the whole concept of social media influencers is sad and dumb, this smells like one of those 'dang kids and their <x>' articles that have cursed us since Aristotle.
As a Gen-Xer, I don't know how many times I read similar things growing up about my own generation, except it was metal or hair bands or glam rockers that garnered the worry.
I get nostalgic for some of the toys I had during the late 70s and 80s too, but really, I am super jealous, if that's the right word, of my kids for the toys available to them. Toys today are superior in nearly every way to toys from my childhood.
I would have KILLED for some of the robotics and electronics kits that are widespread today.
"We conclude that it is impossible to say that taking SSRI antidepressants is worthwhile, or even completely safe. People need all this information to make informed decisions about whether or not to take antidepressants."
You are only safe when you don't have bosses and all responsibility and power rests on yourself.