Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Don't Be a Sharecropper

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the stuff-to-read dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Tim Bray, best known as an XML Heavy, has an entertaining rant about why you should be developing for *n*x, OSS, or (especially) the Web. Because if you're on a proprietary platform, you're a "sharecropper"."

13 of 431 comments (clear)

  1. I'm not a sharecropper by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Since I haven't paid for a Microsoft license since Windows 95, I consider myself a squatter.

    1. Re:I'm not a sharecropper by awol · · Score: 5, Funny

      Since I haven't paid for a Microsoft license since Windows 95, I consider myself a squatter.

      Well if you're still there by Windows 2007 you will have adverse posession and it will be yours forever.

      Particularly since the landlord has done nothing to improve the property since you started your occupation

      --
      "The first thing to do when you find yourself in a hole is stop digging."
  2. *n*x? by fafaforza · · Score: 5, Funny

    OK I have to ask. What the heck is this?

    I was willing to tolerate *nix, since it might, however remote and esoteric, be an attempt to gather all Unixes under a single label. But *n*x?

    I sure hope it does not deteriorate to a four-letter-word-like ***x. Or maybe *x or x^ ?

    1. Re:*n*x? by SunPin · · Score: 4, Funny

      FUCX...The new, dynamic OS from IBM featuring Carrie-Anne Moss.

      --
      Laws are for people with no friends.
    2. Re:*n*x? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      how does HP-UX fit into this wildcard scheme?

      and did you ever wonder what would have happened if Dave Packard won the coin toss? We'd have PH-UX... try to pronounce THAT one!

      If Tux phux, then we'll have little tuxes running around!

    3. Re:*n*x? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      New here?

    4. Re:*n*x? by sharkey · · Score: 3, Funny
      how does HP-UX fit into this wildcard scheme?

      D*GSH*T.

      --

      --
      "Outlook not so good." That magic 8-ball knows everything! I'll ask about Exchange Server next.
  3. New depth of meaning to MCSE... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny
    Microsoft
    Controlled
    Slave
    Element

    I can hear the squealing begin. Must be cutting too close to the bone...

    1. Re:New depth of meaning to MCSE... by t0ny · · Score: 1, Funny

      wow, thats really clever. did it take you and your whole newsgroup to think up that one?

      --

      Manipulate the moderator system! Mod someone as "overrated" today.

  4. Join the Democratic People's Collective OS Farm by mikeophile · · Score: 4, Funny
    Do not place yourself under the boot of the capitalist pig-dog proprietary platforms any longer!

    Rise programming proletariat, rise and be free!

  5. Envision the future by geekmetal · · Score: 5, Funny

    Where the land shall belong to the farmer
    Where the system software is transparent
    Where the programmer can develop without fear (of the owner)
    Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way
    Into the dreary desert sand of dead habit
    Where the mind is led forward by thee
    Into ever-widening thought and action
    Into that heaven of freedom, my Father, let my country awake

    adapted from Rabindranath Tagore's Geetanjali
    --
    There are two kinds of egotists: 1) Those who admit it 2) The rest of us
  6. Re:The Least Confusing Regular Expression by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Not containing the letters m, i, c, r, o, s, f, or t?

  7. Right then - I'll just write me own OS by putaro · · Score: 2, Funny

    No sharecropping for me luv! I'll be off to the basement now. See you in about 10 years.