Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

github.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

191–200 of 348 posts

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#191

Post by sokoloff »

kypro wrote: post #184
jeswin wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I mean, how is this that possible? The Node.JS library ecosystem (for better or worse) is modeled as small libraries which do only one thing, and often have dozens of dependencies. And those in turn, have their own dependencies. So when you import a library, you're bringing in a lot of other libraries as well. Some large companies have stringent audits (for licenses etc), but most care (or are aware) only about the…

I completely understand this reasoning for smaller companies, but a company like Spotify will care deeply about the dependencies in their project. Just because core-js is a dependency of a dependency simply doesn't matter and if anything, makes it even more essential. Unless they're extremely incompetent, any 3rd party code that's to be deployed to their entire user base is presumably being reviewed in detail. And I…

Your estimate of the competence and thoroughness of various actors in this industry is significantly higher than mine.

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#192

Post by toyg »

btown wrote: post #67

From this article, Denis Pushkarev seems to be a remarkably principled developer in a horrible situation, and I admire his commitment to this project. Setting that aside, though, is anyone else alarmed that such a widely used project has exactly one maintainer who is able to push arbitrary changes without review? Especially one already in legal trouble and significant debt, unable to travel, for a project embedded in…

> Especially one already in legal trouble and significant debt, unable to travel

... and living in a country involved in war, run by a regime for which respect for the rule of law is a "nice to have".

If I were in FSB, I'd be banging at this guy's door right now, and making his life as comfortable as I can. Imagine dropping an obfuscated killswitch on half the global web, that is Real Power right there; or silently siphoning out credentials from FAANG-level companies; or or or...

We are incredibly lucky that Herr Putin's henchmen are actually not very good.

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#193

Post by pcthrowaway »

unwind wrote: post #147
fragmede wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://xkcd.com/2347/ for any readers that didn't get the reference

This was in the OP, the article we're commenting on. Also, I never saw it as a house of cards , since the blocks have varying sizes they just look like abstract blocks to me. Interesting.

I think the idea is that pulling out that one tiny support can cause all the layers above it to fall apart.

At the very least, it would destabilize them.

Kind of like a house of cards

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#194

Post by sokoloff »

aembleton wrote: post #169
Whiteshadow12 wrote: post #154

Daily reminder that humans are not good to each other (this doesn't mean we don't have the ability to be good to each other, but we generally are not)

How does Wikipedia or Open Street Map work if in general we are not good to each other?

The motivation to correct someone else who is (IYO) incorrect or to express your point of view is stronger in many people than the motivation to transfer money from your pocket to someone else’s without a direct quid pro quo.

More people will spend 30 minutes looking after an infant that might be abandoned in the cold than would give $1 to a beggar in the same weather, even though that 30 minutes is far more valuable. I will often shovel my neighbor’s sidewalk and steps while I’m already out there doing mine. I’d never pay someone $20 to shovel their walk. You can look at those differences and decide if humans are good to each other or not depending on which part you focus on.

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#195

Post by maccard »

kilburn wrote: post #131
nevernude wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But the thing is he DID ask for help, quite a few times and was only met with the hate and vitriol you mentioned. Depressing indeed.

You have to ask to the appropriate forum though, and that's what he got completely wrong. Getting npm to scream for help when a developer installs your package is equivalent to asking your peer for a raise. I'd say that over 99.999% of the people who saw that message, created memes about it, etc.. did not have a corporate credit card and the power to use it at their discretion. If you want money from corps, THOSE are…

> I'd say that over 99.999% of the people who saw that message, created memes about it, etc.. did not have a corporate credit card and the power to use it at their discretion. If you want money from corps, THOSE are the guys you need to find and ask money from.

So he should be cold emailing netflix, airbnb, linkedin purchasing managers?

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#196

Post by toyg »

aembleton wrote: post #169
Whiteshadow12 wrote: post #154

Daily reminder that humans are not good to each other (this doesn't mean we don't have the ability to be good to each other, but we generally are not)

How does Wikipedia or Open Street Map work if in general we are not good to each other?

For many companies, throwing a bit of cash at Open Street Map is incredibly cheaper than going with commercial alternatives.

Wikipedia, I honestly don't know. I suspect they live on charitable grants by institutional actors.

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#197

Post by slowmotiony »

newswasboring wrote: post #182
slowmotiony wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know, I don't think Nike will sponsor athletes who, despite the war, returned to Russia solely due to better financial prospects.

While your argument is kinda bad, its also incorrect. They moved to russia before the current war. Also its their home country, the world isn't progressive enough that this isn't every immigrant's default choice.

Right, but it was after the invasion of Georgia, green men in Donetsk, and the annexation of Crimea? So 3 wars started in the span of 10 years and the guy returns because things are cheaper than in the west.

Well, I hope he enjoys his beloved home country now. He will have to stay there for quite a while.

Edit* looks like he does indeed enjoy it. Good for him. https://twitter.com/roman01la/status/1625254253156528147/pho...

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#198

Post by toyg »

Live by MIT license, starve by MIT license.

This is not the type of FOSS ecosystem that Stallman wanted to achieve; it's the ecosystem that big business wants: people work for free and profits multiply and accumulate at the top. That is what MIT licensing fosters. If you want a different world, use a different license model.

Unfortunately, the JS world is effectively built on freeloading, so any licensing restriction is seen as a capital sin against "the community" of temporarily-embarrassed-FAANGs. Meanwhile, actual FAANGs laugh all the way to the tax-haven-based bank, and the lone guy in Nebraska/Russia continues to starve.

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#199

Post by maccard »

flumpcakes wrote: post #149
hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #64

I understand and expect most of the comments here would be about the state of open source, and I know we of course, by definition, are only getting one side of the story, and I also know that no country is perfect. But holy shit, I had immense sadness and sympathy for his legal woes and the fact that he was imprisoned . Again, obviously the US is no panacea when it comes to incarceration, but holy shit, first thing I…

He was imprisoned because he hit pedestrians and one died. I don't know about you, but the way I drive I wouldn't hit pedestrians if they were laying in the road, maybe if they ran out in front of me. It doesn't sound like he has any sympathy for killing a woman at all, so the "woe is me I'm not a governor's son so I went to jail when others wouldn't have" is distasteful at best.

I live in the middle of a medium sized city in the UK, and drive late at night a couple of times a year for various reasons (day out in another city, late gig, visiting friends, etc). On pretty much every artery road here, if someone was sitting in the middle of the road and I was travelling at 60mph, there's absolutely no chance whatsoever that I would see them. For example, see [0] - this is a major road within a few miles of Edinburgh that is completely unlit with a sidewalk/pavement on one side.

[0] https://www.google.com/maps/@55.8891577,-2.9952163,3a,75y,14...

Re: So what’s next (personal news from developer of popular CoreJS polyfill)

#200

Post by michaelt »

kypro wrote: post #106

I always heard people talk about how "open source is broken", but I'm honestly in shock after reading this. Is this normal? That one guy can contribute code that is used on thousands of the top websites worldwide and not one of the numerous multi-billion dollar companies that use his code are even willing to donate an amount equivalent to an average developer's salary? I mean, how is this that possible? It's not like…

> That one guy can contribute code that is used on thousands of the top websites worldwide and not one of the numerous multi-billion dollar companies that use his code are even willing to donate an amount equivalent to an average developer's salary?

Well, every multi-billion-dollar company has a mechanism for paying for commercial software. If they need Windows or Photoshop or Solidworks they're more than happy to pay the asking price.

The problem with open source software is the asking price is zero.

Most multi-billion-dollar companies also engage in some charitable giving. They probably use their entire charity budget every year - maybe they're supporting food banks, or earthquake victims, or cancer research.

But getting the Russian polyfill guy out of jail probably isn't a registered charity. And even if it was - there's a lot of charities out there.

Some multi-billion-dollar companies have budgets to sponsor open source projects. Apple, Microsoft, Google and others donate >$125k/year to the Apache foundation, for example [1].

But that money is spread very thinly - how many developers do you think contributed to, say, a basic Ubuntu installation? And plenty of companies don't budget for this at all.

Some open source projects use options like 'dual licensing' where you have to pay to use them in closed source projects (Qt, for example) or offer support contracts or paid add-on products (Ubuntu Pro, for example)

But it's not like Qt are rolling in cash - or that the community had any great love for Ubuntu Pro.

As you'll note, all these options sound a lot more difficult than just getting a job at one of these big corporations.

[1] https://www.apache.org/foundation/thanks

Post reply on HN