Open source has won the battle but is losing the war • Hacker News Board

Re: Open source has won the battle but is losing the war

#61

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Mar 16, 2014, 4:21 PM UTC

knappador wrote: post #59

woah wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most web developers are not writing servers or browsers in C, but within the web ecosystem open source is really the only choice (to build with). There could be more people open sourcing their whole startups, but in terms of building blocks, open source reigns supreme in the world of web. I mean, look at the HN frontpage on any given day. A good half of the posts will be about some new open source module or framework…

The behavior in the node community as you have described can be taken as an example of just how community-minded FOSS developers naturally become, and not necessarily even slightly out of some sense of geek-altruism. The choice to support the FOSS community or more closed-source development is as clear-cut to developers as choosing between a lush rain forest or bio-domes scattered throughout the desert. Imagine a wor…

[deleted]

Re: Open source has won the battle but is losing the war

#62

Post by treenyc » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 3:21 AM UTC

dllthomas wrote: post #58

treenyc wrote: post #57

We will NEVER win the FREE software war, no matter how many battles we have won or will win. It will all be irrelevant, as long as the current economic, Geo-political paradigms (central banking model) are in place, then Free/Open Software will never grew to its' maximum effectiveness. In smaller countries like Scandinavia centralization works VERY well. That is due to their homogeneous nature. In US, we may require s…

Why does FLOSS need to be centralized?

Sorry, maybe I miscommunicated something. They don't need to be centralized. Although I do think TRANSPARENT centralization can play a benefit part of the ecosystem.

I just meant in other aspects of government, everything is very centralized in Scandinavia, and it seems to be work very well there. However, that should not be translated to US, where we have much larger and diverse population.

I hope that make sense?

Re: Open source has won the battle but is losing the war

#63

Post by Shorel » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 7:12 PM UTC

saosebastiao wrote: post #17

Android is such a miserable experience that it has made me turn in my phone for the first closed-source computing device I have owned in 9 years. The latency on everything is at least 200-300ms, which makes typing consistently difficult (as if the moronic autocorrect didn't make it impossible anyways). The battery consumption is terrible (I have never been able to go more than 12 hours without a charge, and after a y…

To me the issue is that you have a smartphone that runs a virtual machine instead of native software. What you describe is what I have hated from Java the last 10 years.

Mozilla would be more of the same right now, as Javascript is also not native.

My best bet is Ubuntu Phone, whenever it's ready.

Re: Open source has won the battle but is losing the war

#64

Post by Shorel » Mon, Mar 17, 2014, 7:34 PM UTC

knappador wrote: post #29

Linux is younger than I am. GNU is two years older than I am. Anyone making smart statements about the long-term prospects of a spontaneously organizing tidal wave erupting from a vacuum needs to take a step back, stop talking, and find something worth working on to them personally. Web is mostly a distraction for proponents of FOSS. Web developers consume the foundation of FOSS and, without moving past web developme…

Zoroastrianism is about 2500 older than me, it surely should be thriving!

Honestly I don't see what your first paragraph adds to the discussion besides being an argument of authority of your own opinion being more valid than of anyone younger than you.

About the rest, I can not see how having an end-to-end full open source ecosystem is a worthwhile goal. Open source developers have shown a great propensity towards politics and petty conflicts of personality.

I believe the basic stack of our computing lives should be open source, to have a level playing field where all competitors and collaborators can gain users based on merit. But software applications should be able to be closed source if the users wants them.

Gaming can stay closed source if that creates better games, as a game is almost never a library or an API that can influence other software. And specially: because experience and practicality have shown that closed source games are better.

I want to enjoy the best software possible. In the case of games, I want the best games possible. I don't care if they are closed source. In fact, it's better if they are not, as this will help prevent multiplayer cheating.

I want Valve doing Linux games because that will motivate someone in the future to create some kernel innovation, but I want Valve doing Linux games also because I want good games in my favourite open platform, instead of the crap tux games showcased as better in some way just because they are open source.

Re: Open source has won the battle but is losing the war

#65

Post by woah » Sat, Mar 22, 2014, 5:11 PM UTC

knappador wrote: post #59

woah wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most web developers are not writing servers or browsers in C, but within the web ecosystem open source is really the only choice (to build with). There could be more people open sourcing their whole startups, but in terms of building blocks, open source reigns supreme in the world of web. I mean, look at the HN frontpage on any given day. A good half of the posts will be about some new open source module or framework…

The behavior in the node community as you have described can be taken as an example of just how community-minded FOSS developers naturally become, and not necessarily even slightly out of some sense of geek-altruism. The choice to support the FOSS community or more closed-source development is as clear-cut to developers as choosing between a lush rain forest or bio-domes scattered throughout the desert. Imagine a wor…

Yea, I haven't played a game for like more than 30 minutes in the past 15 years (since I was 12 or so), but I am very excited about what Valve is doing.