[CodeMage]

You're completely right, there is no sense in pointing out what kinds of comments detract from readability and anyone writing about that is a smug jerk.

All sarcasm aside, there's nothing wrong in getting your thoughts together in comments before you actually write code. What the author objects to -- and I agree with that objection wholeheartedly -- is leaving those comments in your code once you're done coding.

Other comments describe and discuss the dangers and downsides of leaving the "what" and "how" comments, so I won't go there. Instead, I'd like to propose a habit to establish when writing code: when you're done coding, remove all the "what" and "how" comments and try to read the code. If you can leave it overnight before trying to read it, even better. If it still looks easy to understand without those comments, then there's a chance it might be good enough for other people. Otherwise, do whatever you can to make it more understandable -- break it up into smaller methods with descriptive names, for example.

The point I'm trying to make is that there are two kinds of WTFs I get when I'm trying to read code: the "why the hell did they do this" WTF and the "what the hell does this do" WTF. The former is the kind of WTF you have to solve with comments, because no amount of comments is going to explain why you've done things this way, whereas the latter should be solved by writing more readable code.