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I'm giving up on open source

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Re: I'm giving up on open source

#121

Post by fragmede »

karp773 wrote: post #85
ToucanLoucan wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the simple truth of it is that the value of software just doesn't translate to a lot of people's day to day. People will spend tons of money more than willingly for access to streaming libraries full of inane, samey bullshit. People will spend $70 to access the latest AAA game, people will spend thousands on well-tuned PC's, people will spend tens of thousands on cars, hundreds of thousands on homes, with var…

A downvoted but an interesting comment. Years ago I shared this same opinion. When I first learned about Stallman's take on how software should be free, I thought the guy was insane. But with time, it's now obvious he was right about a lot of things. Very few things in the history of humanity made as much impact as OSS and all the things it has inspired and enabled: Linux, gcc, Postges, and so on. Think about how man…

LLaMA isn't open source. it's model available (MA), which is very generous of Mr. Zuckerberg, but it's not Open Source.

bad or good, we're forced to live in two worlds. a digital realm, where things can be copied infinitely for free, and a physical realm, where there's rent and food to pay for. so it's bad, because we haven't established a basic level of existence for everybody so people need to get whatever they can get out of it to pay their bills.

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#122

Post by talldayo »

MBCook wrote: post #91
talldayo wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to coordinate a software project with multiple people, you need good people skills. Open source projects with an unstable core contributor very often fail or get forked into a clone by their community, it's just the nature of the thing. It's a "big culture problem" in the same way profit maximization is the destroyer of modern businesses. Everyone uses Open Source software; annoying teenagers, political d…

Putting up with abuse and good people skills are orthogonal. Also I never said anything about an “unstable core contributor”. I fully disagree that nothing can be done about this. I never said people shouldn’t have to deal with disagreements or unlicensed use. Yeah that’s going to happen. All I’m saying is projects should take a much much harder line on abusive/rude treatment. The people who act that way will never c…

Projects do take a hard line against abusive treatment - the most successful ones ignore or delete those comments altogether. This entire post is about someone reading a comment and not being willing to accept that there's nothing they can do about it besides refute them and move on.

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#123

Post by sevagh »

Take a look a the profile a bit of the rude commenter on your issue. The person is a nobody. The internet is rife with them; any online game, any Discord channel has an asshole that types the same way. All bark, no bite. Block, ban, delete the issue, restrict them from the repo, don't even acknowledge their existence.

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#124

Post by sevagh »

xtracto wrote: post #104
orliesaurus wrote: post #93

I maintain an OSS that is 10x smaller than the author of the post and I have experienced the same absurd community behavior. I feel bad for the state of open source [0] - even when Microsoft literally a couple of weeks ago pulled the "FIX THIS NOW" card on ffmpeg https://trac.ffmpeg.org/ticket/10341#comment:4 [0] https://blog.tidelift.com/maintainer-burnout-is-real

We need a FUCK OFF OSS license: like the do-whatever-tf-you-want but with extra clauses telling people to FO. if they want bugfixes, improvements or features. All the free software I had put out there is kind of like that. I don't care about the fame, glory or user count. I release something I built to scratch an itch just because someone else might find it useful. If you didn't like my code, tough luck, go write you…

The MIT license already bakes "fuck off" into its core. The license does not put any maintenance burden on the creator.

So, choose a regular license, and comport yourself as a maintainer in a manner that tells people to fuck off.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#125

Post by sevagh »

7373737373 wrote: post #34
FpUser wrote: post #23

To summarize - welcome to a real world. If you want to do open source you do it for your own sake / pleasure / whatnot. Do not ever expect anything in return. Ignore complaints you do not feel worth your attention as you owe nothing to complainers. They're free to search for the alternatives.

Time for a code of conduct writeup specifically for non-contributors?

No amount of document will make rude people act appropriately.

Imagine I'm rude and ready to insult this open-source maintainer. Am I looking for a CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md to be like, "Oh, crap, I _can't_ be rude and offensive? Darn, my plan is foiled!"

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#126

Post by BlueTemplar »

MBCook wrote: post #42
haswell wrote: post #25

I'm struggling with the framing of all of this. I think it's clear that the author doesn't want to be involved with the realities (as unfortunate as they are) of maintaining an OSS project. There are very real issues with entitled or abusive users that have been well documented. What I don't understand is the expectation that the money would just flow upon publishing the software with a permissive license. It sounds…

It doesn’t have to be a reality. But people let it be. It’s only a reality because that kind of behavior is widely tolerated enough, or at least not met with harsh enough pushback, that it continues to drive away good contributors and cause burnout.

I wonder how much of this is actually about open source, and how much is about having been willing to engage (too much) with the kind of people still willing to use Github, Reddit, Discord ?

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#127

Post by cycomanic »

bruce511 wrote: post #83
anaxamander wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> most people won't pay for software if ... they don't have a vested interest in the project succeeding. Wouldn't you expect companies that rely on a given project to have a vested interest in the project succeeding? I wouldn't choose to spend who-knows-how-many man hours on migrating to a new technology instead of paying a modest (for a business) fee for licensing something I rely on.

I think the root of your mis-expectation is in thinking that companies behave like people. Your viewpoint is personal "I would do this" and for you it's easy, it's your money so you just write a check. Companies don't work like that. Firstly because individuals get budgets, and there's no point wasting limited resources on free stuff. Secondly because individuals are accountable. There are procurement processes, mult…

I find it interesting how in software we excuse behavior that would be completely unacceptable in most other settings, because "that's how companies operate".

I have yet to hear of a McDonald's sending a truck to the nearest soup kitchen and loading all food into it, to sell at the restaurant, because companies "take maximum advantage of any free resource". Well they don't do it, because it's seen as unacceptable. Why do we see it as acceptable in OSS?

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#128

Post by moribvndvs »

I’m appalled by this, if I’m being honest.

> Working on an open source project is still work, and if you're doing a good job, you should be rewarded for it. I also always believed that if you ever started a project that is valuable for companies, they would support you in return

My friend, then you started in the wrong place. At the risk of getting into a mire over free vs open source software, I think you have fundamentally misunderstood the principles of FOSS, or are picking and choosing parts of it, and ultimately spent a significant amount of time and effort on an inevitable collision course. FOSS tries to be a rising tide that lifts all boats, where by participating in it we all communally benefit from stability, security, lower costs, accessibility, transparency, and so on. Your reward for participating in it is in its continuation and proliferation, where others are doing the same in FOSS software that benefits you by providing non-proprietary solutions. This is real reward[0], apparent to anyone who’s lived through the hell of proprietary software especially before and leading up to FOSS’s golden age. Neither side of a license is entitled to anything beyond what it grants, and expecting more is frankly naive.

Yes, it’s beyond enraging that there are rude, entitled, and lazy end users out there. Welcome to the Internet, just ignore the Issues section like every other repo /s. Yes, it fucking sucks that companies are making trillions off the largely unpaid work by a relatively small group of routinely abused people.

To be absolutely clear, I fully believe you should stop investing time and resources on a project when it’s no longer worth it. I do not believe you owe anyone anything just because you published a project, and you have the contract to prove it. However, I take issue with the “leaving and taking my toys with me”, self immolating previously published software, gating previously open code (I hope you don’t have any contributors you are taking labor from), and throwing your voice behind a dangerous backslide into proprietary hell. If you find yourself fragile enough you’re unable to simply block noisy assholes and move on, then just archive the repo and work on something else.

It’s your project and you can ultimately do what you want, but I’m not gonna applaud you for devolution.

0 - https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/open-source-software-the-nine-tri...

Re: I'm giving up on open source

#129

Post by nitwit005 »

danielmarkbruce wrote: post #43
lordleft wrote: post #6

I will never understand how entitled or mean people can be towards OSS devs. I sympathize with this post a great deal and wish the author all the best in whatever he does next.

It's mostly naivety. There are a lot of people who really don't understand that people are doing something without getting paid, as a side gig, just to be helpful. They just don't get it. An uncle, who is a totally decent human being otherwise would complain loudly and bitterly at folks who ran kids sporting events when things didn't run smoothly. At the time I didn't think much of it, until I was an adult and saw th…

Once you're dealing with a large group of people, you can't assume you're dealing with a basically nice person.

If you interact with a thousand people, you are going to interact with multiple genuine criminals.

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