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GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

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Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#331
post #325
post #321

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> why they ruined GitHub Are we living in the same world? GitHub is not ruined at all, it still works great (as in it’s completely usable), it’s still where 99% of open source projects are hosted, and it’s still a no brainer to use it for public or private repos (having used Gitlab extensively, GitHub is just so much more user friendly). There is more competition, which is good, but GitHub is still the default option…

I think maybe we're not living in the same world. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46131406 "Zig quits GitHub, says Microsoft's AI obsession has ruined the service" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47487584 "GitHub appears to be struggling with measly three nines availability" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45037365 "The GitHub website is slow on Safari" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44799861 "Wh…

So some people say it feels slower, there's been some incidents recently, you're missing a few features and Zig moved out, that's it? Wow, ruined, completely unusable, I have no idea how I've been working 8 hours a day using Github in these conditions.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#332

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to white-knight microsoft here, but I think the problem they run into with every product is that because of their ubiquity, they rapidly reach saturation with most every specialized product they sell. You cannot grow a business if your market is saturated, even if you're the only one selling. So they have to find a way to expand their market. With specialized tools, that's done by generalizing, right? And anyone…

>And anyone who has ever driven a screw with a swiss-army knife can tell you, generalized tools never work as well as dedicated tools >Windows ultimately sucks I actually want a generalized tool for my OS, a specialized OS sounds like a pain in the ass.

Generalized in the sense of "this interface works as well on a tablet as a desktop computer", or "we can also generate ad revenue with this operating system" or "there should be constant invasive AI integration, even for users who don't want to and should not use such features, and who would pay a premium to avoid it if possible".

Not specialize in the sense of "here's your civil engineering operating system, which is different from your structural engineering operating system, and neither bear any similarity to your gaming operating system".

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#333
post #225

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Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated, especially if the top dogs are allowed to use manipulative advertising and sales tactics.

> Maybe resources shouldn't be distributed purely using a free market that can easily be manipulated Which kind of resource allocation do you suggest? At least one can clearly tell that existing experiments with planned economies went really bad, so how do you want to overcome the problems that plagued existing big-scale experiments of planned economies?

Why does everyone on the right always read "not totally free economy" as "planned economy".

Regulate the markets. Have the government own natural monopolies. Have large government sellers and buyers in all markets. Break up monopolies. Ban harmful products and services. Ban marketing to children. Ban dishonest marketing. Ban planned obsolescence. Increase the capital gains tax to companies are incentivized to invest in production rather than pay out dividends. Ban stock buybacks. Have CEOs be personally responsible for crimes (remove the LL from LLC).

Those are good places to start.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#334

I’ll never understand why they ruined GitHub. They had everything they needed - the one place in the world where 99% of open source projects were hosted, where all the discussions happened. A product that people were so used to that it was a no brainer when it came to hosting private repos. And they had to ruin it and give space to GitLab and other competitors. What a waste…

Ah, I think this is due to human nature. People came in and wanted to "do" something with GitHub. To give it their stamp, to help boost their career/ego.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#335
post #321

I’ll never understand why they ruined GitHub. They had everything they needed - the one place in the world where 99% of open source projects were hosted, where all the discussions happened. A product that people were so used to that it was a no brainer when it came to hosting private repos. And they had to ruin it and give space to GitLab and other competitors. What a waste…

> why they ruined GitHub Are we living in the same world? GitHub is not ruined at all, it still works great (as in it’s completely usable), it’s still where 99% of open source projects are hosted, and it’s still a no brainer to use it for public or private repos (having used Gitlab extensively, GitHub is just so much more user friendly). There is more competition, which is good, but GitHub is still the default option…

Based on Microsoft's past behavior, I foresee many companies outright banning developers from using GitHub. Especially now with multiple agents reading/writing against GitHub. It just takes one "bug" for Microsoft to ignore all privacy options and contracts it has signed, and instantaneously ingest every piece of code and intellectual property into its AI model.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#336
post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was much better than the closed source SourceForge which existed before it. A lot of small projects dont have the energy to self host. Plus for small projects the barrier of entry is an issue. I recently found a typo in an error message in Garage but since they run their own Forgejo instance and OpenID never really became a thing I never created a PR. It is first now with Codeberg there is a credible alternative.…

Well - my perspective is the KDE project, which has a team of capable admins who take care of hosting. The project has always been more or less self-hosted (I remember SUSE providing servers) and even provided hosting for at least one barely associated project, Valgrind. I think Valgrind bugs are still on KDE Bugzilla. It's admittedly not really practical for most projects, but it could be for some large ones - Rust,…

KDE uses Phabricator, or at least did the last time I contributed. Worked pretty well in the collaboration aspect for submitting a change, getting code owners to review and giving feedback. I was able to jump in as a brand new contributor and get a change merged. The kind of change that would have been a PR from a fork in GitHub.

However I got the distinct feeling the whole stack would not fit as well into an enterprise environment, nor would the tooling around it work well for devs on Windows machines that just want to get commits out there. It's a perfect fit for that kind of project but I don't think it would be a great GitHub replacement for an enterprise shop that doesn't have software as it's core business

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#337

I’ll never understand why they ruined GitHub. They had everything they needed - the one place in the world where 99% of open source projects were hosted, where all the discussions happened. A product that people were so used to that it was a no brainer when it came to hosting private repos. And they had to ruin it and give space to GitLab and other competitors. What a waste…

Not to white-knight microsoft here, but I think the problem they run into with every product is that because of their ubiquity, they rapidly reach saturation with most every specialized product they sell. You cannot grow a business if your market is saturated, even if you're the only one selling. So they have to find a way to expand their market. With specialized tools, that's done by generalizing, right? And anyone…

If you can't grow your business then maybe you should just be satisfied with what you have. Growth without limit has a name: cancer.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not to white-knight microsoft here, but I think the problem they run into with every product is that because of their ubiquity, they rapidly reach saturation with most every specialized product they sell. You cannot grow a business if your market is saturated, even if you're the only one selling. So they have to find a way to expand their market. With specialized tools, that's done by generalizing, right? And anyone…

> You cannot grow a business if your market is saturated At some point, a business should shift from growth state to a steady state. The idea that businesses have to grow forever is a sad consequence to how we fund companies. The only thing that grows forever unchecked is cancer.

Hah, thank you, that's exactly my sentiment.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can be a capitalist without ruining your product.

Capitalism means ownership by investors, and it is the investors who ruin your product.

Investors don't run the company, they don't make product decisions on a day to day basis. They may demand growth and they may be able to fire the CEO if enough of them band together but that requires them to convince the board first (and if they can't then they may be able to fire some or even all of the board). Anyway, as long as none of that has happened I think this is an academic position at best.

Re: GitHub backs down, kills Copilot pull-request ads after backlash

#340
post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure. But a startup could, in theory end up profitable and self-sufficient without a public offering. It's not impossible.

Startups are about making money, take they capital with a promise of making more capital, and the logic of capital is uniform, no matter where it comes from. It always, without exception, will end up the same, with the only difference how much time it will take.

It really depends on what kind of investment they took. Venture is probably worse than going public with the desire to moonshot. A loan is pretty harmless, since they want you to repay a fixed amount with as much stability as possible.
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