Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform • Hacker News Board

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#211

Post by goodpoint » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:09 AM UTC

bayindirh wrote: post #56

xnorswap wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These things almost never are, and the purists risk a purist death spiral. It reminds me of the closed source drivers debate. Someone has a proprietary component they want to incorporate into an open source system. The purists demand they open source that proprietary software if they want it integrated into the open source. The developer wants a compromise, but the purists won't allow it, so the developer is left to…

> The purists demand they open source that proprietary software if they want it integrated into the open source. ...and as a result we got GPLv2, GPLv3, open Intel, AMD and Broadcom drivers. Lastly Paragon donated NTFS source code to kernel tree (...and probably many smaller examples I've forgot). > The developer wants a compromise, but the purists won't allow it, so the developer is left to pick up their ball and go…

> MIT/permissive licenses are for developer freedom, but xGPL and other strong copyleft licenses are for users' freedom.

GPLv3 also provides plenty of protection for developers unlike other licenses, especially around patents.

Also, all developers are users of development tools and libraries.

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#212

Post by miguel_cordeiro » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:10 AM UTC

elviejo wrote: post #177

blagie wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies aren't people. The set of people in Microsoft is completely different in 2022 than it was in 1995. A quarter-century has passed. It's not the same organization as it was back then. It has very little relationship to it. I've been consistently surprised by Microsoft doing non-evil things over the past decade, until I accepted that I no longer had reason to hate it. Conversely, for a while, I was surprised by…

Second the people selected for a company are selected based on their conformance to that companies culture. So even if not a single human in Microsoft is the same, the company culture is the there. This reminds me of an old story, might be fiction, that conveys the idea. five chimpanzees were put in a cage, bananas in the center everytime one tried to get a banana they would get cold water untill they simply stoped t…

Video illustration of the 5 monkeys experiment: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y-PvBo75PDo

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#213

Post by bayindirh » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:13 AM UTC

goodpoint wrote: post #211

bayindirh wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The purists demand they open source that proprietary software if they want it integrated into the open source. ...and as a result we got GPLv2, GPLv3, open Intel, AMD and Broadcom drivers. Lastly Paragon donated NTFS source code to kernel tree (...and probably many smaller examples I've forgot). > The developer wants a compromise, but the purists won't allow it, so the developer is left to pick up their ball and go…

> MIT/permissive licenses are for developer freedom, but xGPL and other strong copyleft licenses are for users' freedom. GPLv3 also provides plenty of protection for developers unlike other licenses, especially around patents. Also, all developers are users of development tools and libraries.

Yes. All developers are users of the said tools, applications and libraries, but the reverse is not true. i.e. not all users are developers.

So, while I see this is a clarification, I don't think what I've said is blatantly wrong.

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#214

Post by hansword » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:14 AM UTC

jka wrote: post #170

someotherperson wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Opinions like this have always been weird to me. Not wrong, but weird. Any contribution that M$ (remember when people would sub the S for a dollar sign?) makes to open source or open standards is to support their own bottom line and we shouldn't expect anything else. The directors have a legal responsibility to the company and to boost the share price, not for the betterment of humanity. To this effect, companies wil…

> The directors have a legal responsibility to the company and to boost the share price, not for the betterment of humanity. That's an often-repeated maxim, but it's not universally agreed to be true. Quoting https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/08/24/stakeholder-gover... for example: "The fiduciary duty of the board is to promote the value of the corporation. In fulfilling that duty, directors must exercise their bu…

The big point in what you quote is "and the attendant risks and opportunities for the corporation."

I read this Harvard text to basically say: "Don't cheat if the cheating will be coming to bite you later. Be generous if you expect additional profits to come from this generosity."

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#215

Post by hdjjhhvvhga » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:16 AM UTC

I don't understand one thing. Miguel saw the all the ugliness of MS since the late nineties. He is fully aware what EEE means and how MS successfully used this strategy to crush any kind of competition they wanted over the decades. Still, he decided to base all his open projects and professional career on faith they could be the good guys. Guess what, they've never been. We were trying to tell this to Miguel for years, but he paid no attention. He loved the COM and DCOM architectures, the registry, and many other MS-specific things that we either hated, saw no benefit of, or perceived as threats because of patents. He still wanted to go ahead. Well, at least he can't say he didn't see it coming.

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#216

Post by pjmlp » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:19 AM UTC

throwaway2048 wrote: post #198

pjmlp wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It appears offering free beer forever isn't sustainable, even when one has deep pockets, go figure.

I somehow doubt that Microsoft has any pressing need to return profits from the python LSP

It gets to share the same code with Visual Studio proper.

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#217

Post by meheleventyone » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:20 AM UTC

someotherperson wrote: post #183

tzs wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That companies (or their officers or directors) have a legal obligation to boost share price (or maximize profits or similar) is one of the most widely believed myths about companies. Google for something like "obligation to maximize shareholder value" if you want to find numerous articles debunking the myth. Here's a good one [1]. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/04/16/what-are-co...

That comes across as a straw-man. The myth from the linked article is that they should maximize share price "even if this means skirting ethical rules, damaging the environment or harming employees." Agreed, this is a myth. But nobody said they need to break the law, or hurt employees. Given the constraints of the law, they have a single mission of maximizing the share price. Which is exactly what Microsoft and other…

Right the myth is that companies need to scrape the legal minimums because they have a legal obligation to do so. When in reality it's directly a choice as with your oil company example or Uber wanting the benefits of treating their employees as contractors without giving them the associated benefits. Often skirting ethical rules and in quite a lot of cases breaking legal ones.

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#218

Post by legulere » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:27 AM UTC

simonh wrote: post #160

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> IKEA has had an outsized positive impact IKEA has been illegally logging forests in romania for decades. The first public conpany was involved in slavery. Show me a large enough company and there will be a history of fraud, illegality and human rights abuses.

They've bee caught using wood from companies logging illegally yes, but that's just as much an enforcement issue in these countries as it is on IKEA to manage it's supply chain. Also using tainted wood isn't the only thing IKEA has ever done, just as breaking the speed limit or parking illegally isn't he only thing I've ever done. If you were held to a "one strike and you're out" good/evil standard would you really s…

Intermediaries are often just an easy way to get out of liability. It can happen to small companies that you don't know about or are powerless to your supplier's illegal practices. With big companies you know and have the power, which makes it your responsibility and you being part of the problem.

There's also a trend to give big companies liability for their supply chains. Germany just enacted a supply chain law last year and there are talks about similar laws for the EU: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supply_Chain_Act

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#219

Post by davedx » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:30 AM UTC

someotherperson wrote: post #183

tzs wrote: post #175

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That companies (or their officers or directors) have a legal obligation to boost share price (or maximize profits or similar) is one of the most widely believed myths about companies. Google for something like "obligation to maximize shareholder value" if you want to find numerous articles debunking the myth. Here's a good one [1]. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/04/16/what-are-co...

That comes across as a straw-man. The myth from the linked article is that they should maximize share price "even if this means skirting ethical rules, damaging the environment or harming employees." Agreed, this is a myth. But nobody said they need to break the law, or hurt employees. Given the constraints of the law, they have a single mission of maximizing the share price. Which is exactly what Microsoft and other…

He provided a citation. Please provide one to back up your argument

Re: Despite best efforts .NET is still not an open platform

#220

Post by jka » Thu, Jun 16, 2022, 11:34 AM UTC

hansword wrote: post #214

jka wrote: post #170

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The directors have a legal responsibility to the company and to boost the share price, not for the betterment of humanity. That's an often-repeated maxim, but it's not universally agreed to be true. Quoting https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/08/24/stakeholder-gover... for example: "The fiduciary duty of the board is to promote the value of the corporation. In fulfilling that duty, directors must exercise their bu…

The big point in what you quote is "and the attendant risks and opportunities for the corporation." I read this Harvard text to basically say: "Don't cheat if the cheating will be coming to bite you later. Be generous if you expect additional profits to come from this generosity."

Fair point, yep. Generalizing your statement slightly:

> Be generous if you expect additional to come from this generosity.

Options for reward could include (without being limited to): "profit", "platform adoption", "trust".. and those rewards often affect each other over time.