what is software engineering?

It is rare to come across a conference video that talks about the history of the technology and craft of building software.

http://confreaks.net/videos/282-lsrc2010-real-software-engineering

This talk gives an interesting look at the history of the software industry, and talks about how the waterfall method -- now widely regarded as a failure -- was inspired by a gross misreading of a paper that was trying to explain why such a ridiculous method would never work. As a bonus, you can have a good cry when you learn that Agile methods were being discussed decades ago, until they were pushed aside by broken academic theories, like waterfall.