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its amazing to me how stable the list of 'best' CS schools over the years

The sub-genres of CS have radically changed over the years , there often is no overlap between them , i.e. computer security vs computer graphics vs quantum computing , yet the top schools remain the top schools

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It's a flywheel. The best scholars want to work for the best universities which makes them the best universities which makes it easier to recruit the best scholars.

I got the opposite impression when reading, at least when I was looking at the tabulation of "best paper." The top institution isn't a university at all. The second best is a school just down the road, not one of the super-top ranked schools elsewhere.

Oh sure, MIT is closer to the top of the list than the bottom, but it does make me wonder if they're boosted more by their reputation than reality.

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