Knuth is so revered among computer scientists that they won't cash his checks. | Hacker News Reader

Knuth is so revered among computer scientists that they won't cash his checks.

futilitycloset.com

19 pointsTriinT12 comments

Does anyone know who wrote that blog? If so, can you tell him that the routing number and account number on the bottom of the check are sufficient information to print demand drafts out for Knuth's account, which will let you drain it at will?

[Edit: Nevermind, found the contact link.]

I think Knuth already had problems with that.

P.S. Knuth is old news.

Don't sweat it. Knuth now writes checks for brownie points, drawn on a fictional bank.

http://www-cs-faculty.stanford.edu/~knuth/news08.html

"Instead of writing personal checks, I'll write personal certificates of deposit to each awardee's account at the Bank of San Serriffe, which is an offshore institution that has branches in Blefuscu and Elbonia on the planet Pincus."

Dr. Knuth has a sense of humor...

Myself, I liked turns out that only 9 of the first 275 checks that I've sent out since the beginning of 2006 have actually been cashed. The others have apparently been cached. (from the same page)

They look just like regular checks, though, to the casual viewer. I'd scan mine and post it, but the check is at the office and the scanner is at home...

this is why he no longer issues the checks in real money :)

This is old news.

In any case, does that apply to the cheque on the wiki article?

Intelligence: Finding an error in a Knuth text.

Stupidity: Cashing that $2.56 check you got.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knuth_reward_check)

Live and learn, I thought the reward for bugs in Tex increased by a nickel for each new one found. Could this Wikipedia entry be wrong?

In any event I wouldn't cash a check like that, it's a nice keepsake.

He could start a company without cash flow since none of his employees would ever cash their paychecks!

so his books contained 8000 errors?

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