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“Open source” is broken

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Re: “Open source” is broken

#281

Post by CaptArmchair »

thwarted wrote: post #207
CaptArmchair wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think this argument massively ignores the underlying message of this blogpost: addressing that the human beings that make and use software aren't always treated as, well, human beings. > A maintainer goes to jail for vehicular manslaughter and a bugs needs fixing, no problem The author didn't seem to hint that open bugs in core-js or its usefulness to its community of users are / is problematic. They hinted that ma…

> Yes, open source licensing allows forking, but that's not something you'd do, for instance, because a maintainer fails to respond to your issues on GitHub. Huh? Not getting satisfaction, however you want to define that, from upstream is the main reason forking occurs.

Yes, forking occurs. But before you, you would reach out, ask permission, offer a solution and try to come to a compromise with the original authors.

Downright forking while ignoring the original authors and then putting it out there as an independent alternative to theirs? Well, that's just entitled behavior.

The "fork" button on GitHub exist primarily to make it easier for contributors to create pull requests and contribute back to the original project. It's not meant to wholesale copy projects and run them as if they were your own.

Re: “Open source” is broken

#282

Post by phendrenad2 »

Once there was a company who's main office had a water leak. Actually, water was leaking into the building from the basement. Turns out, it was built on a natural spring.

The water was perfectly drinkable. The employees on the lower floors started going into the basement and filling their canteens from the water there.

Eventually the company stopped paying the water company, because they were able to source all of their water locally.

But every once in awhile, there was an algae bloom somewhere upstream, the water was contaminated, and all of the employees got sick and had to stay in bed for a week. The company essentially shut down while the employees recovered.

The building manager tried to have the municipal water reconnected, but he was promptly fired, because they had free water in the basement.

Heck, they ran some tests and found that the water in the basement was actually, technically, more pure than the water from the taps. Except, you know, when it was making people sick.

Some local villagers who knew about the spring even showed up and helped maintain the basement spring. Not being paid employees, they were not beholden to the interests of the company, and weren't paid, but they still tried to sway management at the company to continue using the well. Coincidentally, they all had "well tender for 4 years" as their resume headlines.

Some employees, tired of getting sick and losing work, started building rain collectors on the roof. Management shut that initiative down quickly, because they were falling into "Not Invented Here" syndrome, and "reinventing the wheel" instead of pushing features.

Re: “Open source” is broken

#283

Post by Juliate »

mbrodersen wrote: post #209
Juliate wrote: post #2

It's not "Open Source" (making code public and free to use and modify) that's broken. It's how people rely on it without any consideration about the sourcing of it. It's not that it's free to pick and to use. It's that some/most people too often associate "it's free" to be equivalent to "I don't need to care about it, like, at all". It's that some/most people don't understand that, whatever they take, they become dep…

It absolutely is $0 free to pick and use. So that’s what people/companies will obviously do. Why should they pay more than $0 for something that is worth $0 in the market place?

Why? Because they not only pick something that helps them, they also pick the legacy that comes intrinsically with it.

If they want this legacy not to be a burden, they need to take appropriate steps: contribute to it, through the means of their choice: developer time, advocate time, money, structure, anything.

It's (a bit) like all industries sourcing from the environment (trees, vegetables, minerals, oil, gaz, etc.): it's all available for free, let's pick it. Only, if you're not careful about the sustainability of it, and the consequences of sourcing these, it will backfire at you at some point. Badly.

Re: “Open source” is broken

#285

Post by denton-scratch »

mbrodersen wrote: post #251
city41 wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't the reverse hold true too? If you rely on software you paid $0 for and it fails you, you got what you paid for.

Absolutely. However in reality if you give away your work for $0 then people value your work at $0 which means that they expect you to fix problems for $0. The problem is the maintainers giving away their work for $0. OSS is not about free (as in $0) it is about Open Source.

> OSS is not about free (as in $0) it is about Open Source.

FOSS has an 'F', which stands for "Free" in the sense that anyone can fork, modify, build and distribute the software. Without the 'F', you have code that is only open-source in the sense that you are allowed to read it. If you include the 'F', you have software that anyone can distribute, either for money or for $0. The market price is going to converge on $0.

Plainly some devs are willing to work for nothing, whether out of passion, for the props, or because the software is important to them. So the market price of any software that isn't ringed with patent and copyright fences is going to tend towards $0.

I favour a Universal Basic Income. Many people will leech; but many users of free software are leeching now. I believe people do productive work because they want to, not because they're paid mega-salaries. In fact, that's the only plausible explanation for free software. So make taxpayers finance a UBI. Admin costs are tiny (no eligibility checks, you just pay everyone). You can also get rid of most Social Security infrastructure.

I think UBI is unpopular mainly because people hate the idea that the taxes on their income from work will be paid-out to people who don't care to work. That's understandable, but is it reasonable? Do they also complain about the number of people who are paid out of tax revenue just to check claimants' eligibility for SS support? I haven't heard that complaint.

Re: “Open source” is broken

#286

Post by IiydAbITMvJkqKf »

zaarn wrote: post #278
IiydAbITMvJkqKf wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have zero clue about what slave labour is.

I have plenty of clues of what slave labor is and big companies exploiting the hard work of people working for free without paying them is definitely pretty damn close.

This is reddit tier derangedness, any one of the millions of people living under real slavery, where you get lined up to a wall and shot if you refuse to work would gladly switch places with anyone living under what you dream up to be "slavery".

Re: “Open source” is broken

#287

Post by justsaying9 »

esarbe wrote: post #29
blondin wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

thank you. it's a well written article and you got me agreeing with what you are saying. it's surprising to read comments here that start with "open source is not broken" but proceed to repeat everything you wrote in the article...

The title of the article is "Open Source is broken" and its subtitle is "Why I Don't Write Useful Software Unless You Pay Me" And I disagree with both of these statements. Open source is not broken and I'll continue to write useful software, even if you don't pay me, because it's fun. The actual problem is concisely present in the article: > There is this culture of taking from open source without giving anything bac…

[flagged]

Re: “Open source” is broken

#288

Post by [deleted] »

mbrodersen wrote: post #210
ece wrote: post #180

It would be nice to see public grants like those in the EU for software here in the US. If you want to replicate SV, get rid of non-competes first, then try doing something like this along with tax breaks.

Hey there is a system in place that can already take care of all of this. It’s called “the market place”. Put a licence in place that force companies to pay for the code but leaves it free for everybody else. That’s it. It isn’t rocket science.

[deleted]

Re: “Open source” is broken

#289

Post by l72 »

It is clear that the private sector is always going to take more from open source than it will ever give back. Instead of trying to convince individuals or companies to donate to open source, or trying to get open source developers to come up business plans, can we just step back and admit that open source is a huge benefit for society? It allows us to reuse and build upon strong foundations.

In my opinion, it is time for our governments to look into funding open source directly. Governments should have an organization that helps promote open source, incentivizes missing open source projects to be built, and gives out grants to developers for continued work on building and maintaining open source projects.

Re: “Open source” is broken

#290

Post by the_af »

IiydAbITMvJkqKf wrote: post #286
zaarn wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have plenty of clues of what slave labor is and big companies exploiting the hard work of people working for free without paying them is definitely pretty damn close.

This is reddit tier derangedness, any one of the millions of people living under real slavery, where you get lined up to a wall and shot if you refuse to work would gladly switch places with anyone living under what you dream up to be "slavery".

Agreed, calling this slavery is a level of hyperbole that doesn't help the debate at all.
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