It's quite possible for someone to be a mediocre CEO and still do good, smart things. This is a good thing, and smart.
i'm not sure why the dig at him was a necessary foreword
Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
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Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#32The article mentions that the data shows a huge allocation of resources to education. Why is education publicly funded in the USA, and not left to market forces? Can't that be considered a "socialist" policy?
A public company generally cares about quarterly performance. A private company might have its sights as far as a few years out. However, with education it takes about 20 years to start seeing a return on investment. It just doesn't make sense to approach education from a business standpoint, both because the ROI is very low, and you need to have stability in education, you can't have someone like ITT Tech all of a s…
You're telling me Exxon doesn't look 20 years out? Burlington Northern, a railroad, was looking 30 years out when my dad worked for them. Is there a more classic example of American "big business"?
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#33I just bought a domain for something similar. Oops
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#34And in related news, Trump killed open.gov today.
https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20170414/13382037153/trump...
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#35I really never liked Ballmer, but I did love him for the Developers dance, and now, well, this is awesome. I hope he does it in a long-term sustainable way.
Funny and satirical as it is, [1] completely changed my opinion of Steve Ballmer for the positive. > Steve Ballmer. You open the door to his enormous grinning face, and before you know it he’s in the hall handing over a bottle of something cheap (but with such confidence you don’t notice) and he’s giving you the handshake of your life. Then he’s in. Loving it. Loving the music. Loving the food and drink. He’s going u…
> handing over a bottle of something cheap (but with such confidence you don’t notice)
Three commas?
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#36The article mentions that the data shows a huge allocation of resources to education. Why is education publicly funded in the USA, and not left to market forces? Can't that be considered a "socialist" policy?
> Can't [publicly funded education] be considered a "socialist" policy?
Are there people who think it isn't?
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#37m$ has got so much better since he left.
Seems to me lots of companies make $ Do they all get a derogatory psuedonym? adob$ amaz$ face$ goog$ mailchim$ etc etc etc or is the negativity reserved for M$ Suggesting there is something wrong with a software company because it makes money seems to be a blow in from 1990's militant open source philosophy and probably best left in the 1990s.
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Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#38I am very eager to see what's in store here when it goes live. If indeed it contains accurate, unbiased and factual data then it is a great project. And it is about time someone did it. I wish it was citizen funded instead of rich individuals (even if the intentions are good). But I will take what I can get for now.
Is Steve Ballmer not a citizen? Do you mean crowd-funded? Assuming you're worried about self-interest tainting the project, a crowd-funded project doesn't necessarily eliminate that since someone still has to be in charge. Open-source for peer review would be necessary.
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#39This makes me wonder, has the data been public all this time?
Re: Steve Ballmer serves up a data trove about government spending in the US
#40The article mentions that the data shows a huge allocation of resources to education. Why is education publicly funded in the USA, and not left to market forces? Can't that be considered a "socialist" policy?
Pretty sure the point of parent comment was to make us think about the hypocrisy that the USA can't have single payer healthcare because it's "socialist", but education is perfectly ok to be "socialist."