Self-licking ice cream cone

In political jargon, a self-licking ice cream cone is a self-perpetuating system that has no purpose other than to sustain itself. The phrase appeared to have been first used in 1992, in On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones, a paper by Pete Worden about NASA's bureaucracy.[lower-alpha 1]

Illustration of ice cream cone licking its own nose.

Recently, it has been used to describe the support from internal IT organizations.

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ but was later confirmed to have been said by Ed Niedorf in 1982. Mr Niedorf was an engineer with The Mitre Corporation[1]

References

  1. ↑ "On Self-Licking Ice Cream Cones". Cool stars, stellar systems, and the sun, Proceedings of the 7th Cambridge Workshop, ASP Conference Series (ASP: San Francisco),vol. 26, p. 599. 1992. Retrieved March 10, 2008.


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