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When Rob Pike first met rms

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Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#21

Post by [deleted] »

fffggg wrote: post #20
huggyface wrote: post #11

"of which the worst is that AT&T has never threatened to sue anyone over the patent" Earlier in the piece it describes AT&T sending off demands to prospective licensees, and then those licenses being "politely" returned. Is Mr. Pike really so naive that he doesn't understand that the demand for a license is entirely backed by the implicit threat of a lawsuit to force the same? If that weren't the case the participati…

This comment stood out for me as well, and strikes me as extremely disingenuous. Another that caught my eye was "Free Software is like Free Love, a hippie pipe dream in which computing is free from venality, commercial interests, even capitalism" I was upset that Pike could write such things in 2006 as this is demonstrably untrue -- contrary to being a pipe dream, Free Software has completely replaced the space previ…

[deleted]

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#22

Post by kamaal »

fffggg wrote: post #20
huggyface wrote: post #11

"of which the worst is that AT&T has never threatened to sue anyone over the patent" Earlier in the piece it describes AT&T sending off demands to prospective licensees, and then those licenses being "politely" returned. Is Mr. Pike really so naive that he doesn't understand that the demand for a license is entirely backed by the implicit threat of a lawsuit to force the same? If that weren't the case the participati…

This comment stood out for me as well, and strikes me as extremely disingenuous. Another that caught my eye was "Free Software is like Free Love, a hippie pipe dream in which computing is free from venality, commercial interests, even capitalism" I was upset that Pike could write such things in 2006 as this is demonstrably untrue -- contrary to being a pipe dream, Free Software has completely replaced the space previ…

>>Free Software has completely replaced the space previously occupied by ATT unix. But, then I realized this piece was authored in 1991, which makes this opinion merely lacking in foresight.

I think it would difficult for anybody to predict how things would pan out. Linux wasn't yet there. Perl was still just the sysadmin's tool, yet and extremely powerful one though but still looked like a little advanced awk. Not until a couple of years later, when Linux was everywhere. Perl had eaten severely in most languages share.

No body could have predicted somebody could co ordinate an effort like building of a language or kernel from distributed locations, yet managing to build high quality software that would go on to rule the world.

And also look at the kind of people who built it. Although I agree that Linus Torvalds and Larry Wall had strong university background. Development of things like Linux and Perl happened in the most unconventional environments, to solve the most unexpected problems. Software design was taken over by hackers from academics and researches in big labs run by corporates.

For most talented people who didn't participate in those movements at that time, they basically a lost a shot at making their mark in history. Rob Pike is just one of such many smart people who missed the boat. That fact will always remain.

Rob Pike might be a genius. But the future generations of software won't seem him in the same light as RMS, Linus or Larry Wall.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#24

Post by stcredzero »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #2

Software patents are bad, okay? He got into them before that became obvious. Now it is. He is too stubborn or too blind to state this truth; instead he hides behind "business community is still excited". Stallman organizing protest can not be more wrong than Pike not acknowledging the problem.

As a devil's advocate, I'll ask, would software patents be as bad if:

    1) The Patent Office gave proper attention to prior art
    2) The Patent Office implementation of "obvious" was sane?
I'll posit that, given these two stipulations, most of the bad in software patents wouldn't be with us.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#25

Post by gruseom »

stcredzero wrote: post #24
guard-of-terra wrote: post #2

Software patents are bad, okay? He got into them before that became obvious. Now it is. He is too stubborn or too blind to state this truth; instead he hides behind "business community is still excited". Stallman organizing protest can not be more wrong than Pike not acknowledging the problem.

As a devil's advocate, I'll ask, would software patents be as bad if: 1) The Patent Office gave proper attention to prior art 2) The Patent Office implementation of "obvious" was sane? I'll posit that, given these two stipulations, most of the bad in software patents wouldn't be with us.

That would help, of course, but what about the situation where A works hard to solve a difficult problem and puts out a product, only to find out later that B had already patented that solution? If A's work was independent of B's, why should B own it? Especially in the egregious and common subcase where B never actually produced anything other than a patent.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#26

Post by willvarfar »

pasbesoin wrote: post #14

These reader-oriented top-level Blogspot domains are really starting to piss me off. (The posted URL is blogspot.se, while the author is Pike, who is in the U.S. and most likely uses blogspot.com for his access.) What, again, is the rationale for this? Other than enabling some sort of lame country-specific filtering? P.S. Or is it in part specifically to provide a route around the U.S.'s arbitrary domination/control…

my bad, didn't spot that when I posted it; hadn't even noticed I got redirected to a .se version before. I'm presuming its the same content.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#27

Post by gcb »

babarock wrote: post #6

I enjoyed the story, but something bothers me (just a little bit). I don't like his attempts at sensationalizing the event: > The protesters were surprised, I think, that my subject was interesting to them. At one point they all applauded spontaneously when I described a feature of the system. Rob Pike is a renown scientist, at the time working on Plan9 , the most exciting project of the moment. He tried to portray t…

Rob Pike is one of my software architects idols. but he is a AT&T/google ambassador.

and a public figure. this is a good propaganda piece. it's interesting, but you can't ignore the semiotics of how it makes stallman looks pathetic (no eye contact) and the events all turn out to play right to the good side (a more pragmatic analysis would say that 100% of the audience were people already intending to attend anyway and they just decide to do so carrying signs).

all that said, i believe having both sides is healthy. and i'm not against patents. i learn a lot about reading them. my only 3 grips with the patent system are 1) patents have more legalese than technical details 2) patents last damn too long 3) because of #1 they give out patents for too generic stuff.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#28

Post by gcb »

willvarfar wrote: post #3
guard-of-terra wrote: post #2

Software patents are bad, okay? He got into them before that became obvious. Now it is. He is too stubborn or too blind to state this truth; instead he hides behind "business community is still excited". Stallman organizing protest can not be more wrong than Pike not acknowledging the problem.

That post shows Rob's opinion in 1982, 1991 and 2006. I wonder what his opinion is now. Whatever it is, its going to be considered. But it doesn't mean it hasn't evolved.

my bet, it's an opinion that helps google monetize on software research. whatever that is.

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#29

Post by stcredzero »

gruseom wrote: post #25
stcredzero wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a devil's advocate, I'll ask, would software patents be as bad if: 1) The Patent Office gave proper attention to prior art 2) The Patent Office implementation of "obvious" was sane? I'll posit that, given these two stipulations, most of the bad in software patents wouldn't be with us.

That would help, of course, but what about the situation where A works hard to solve a difficult problem and puts out a product, only to find out later that B had already patented that solution? If A's work was independent of B's, why should B own it? Especially in the egregious and common subcase where B never actually produced anything other than a patent.

I'd argue that what you propose is covered by a sane approach to "obviousness."

Re: When Rob Pike first met rms

#30

Post by willvarfar »

stcredzero wrote: post #29
gruseom wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That would help, of course, but what about the situation where A works hard to solve a difficult problem and puts out a product, only to find out later that B had already patented that solution? If A's work was independent of B's, why should B own it? Especially in the egregious and common subcase where B never actually produced anything other than a patent.

I'd argue that what you propose is covered by a sane approach to "obviousness."

So you can defeat a patent by claiming you invented it independently later?

... how would that work?

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