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Trouble With Open Source?
George Russell writes "Stephen J Marshall, writing in the BCS online magazine, provides a cogent argument detailing the ills of Open Source Software for the software industry - namely, the lack of conceptual integrity, professionalism, and innovation together with the issue of ownership of OSS developed under the current Intellectual Property laws. Do these issues concern you?"
Ditto.
Bittorrent is OSS and its about the most innovative thing in P2P that's happened in the last few years.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
> too much conceptual integrity, professionalism, and innovation
I've thought about this a bit, and you're exactly right. One would think that OSS would suffer from there being "too many cooks in the kitchen", but this just doesn't happen in good projects. In Linux, for example, Linus keeps the cooks in check and doesn't add anything to the vanilla kernel without good reason. This keeps Linux clean and un-bloated. This is really counter to one's initial conception of OSS -- anyone can cvs commit anything, so it's going to be disorganized and bloated. It just doesn't happen that way, though.
Commercial software, interestingly enough, does show that there are too many cooks in the kitchen. Look at all the useless features in Excel and Word that nobody needs or asked for. Some guy wrote it one day for fun, and then it's in the next version. Look at that stupid dog that comes up when you do a search in XP? Who thought that was a good idea?
Obviously not all OSS projects are the same, nor are all proprietary projects, but it's interesting to look at examples like these.
My other car is first.
I apologize to everyone that I am about to offend. I am sure you are all very nice people. Most of the people on this board are probably only really good at one thing. Programming. Open Source software kicks as and it is a great thing. But lets assume for 1 second that you succeed and take down closed source software for good. That is take down the software industry as we know it. You will successfully have sealed your own fate. Most of you couldn't smooth talk your way out of anything. Most of you got bullied by the pointy head that is your boss. Most of you don't have even close to what it takes to run a company. You can scream support all you want but mostly you will all be bad at it because you are geeks not human resource people. Being a geek is a great think. But know your place. Do you really want to get paid crap wages to provide support to a some less smart person who is making millions? If you said yes you are by and large full of total shit. Yeah there are some altruistics on the board, but we all have needs. One of those needs is a paycheck. Do you really think you are going to change the world of capitalism because you don't like the current system? Do you really think that all software is going to be open source? Do you really think that the source code that can finally determine what is or is not a drug is going to be freely given away? What world are you people from. You are much smarter than the average person...leaps and bounds really. You should be paid for you hard work and your creativity. Yes capitalism breeds creativity. I did not say patents. I said capitalism. What is wrong with making a million dollars off your hard work. You studied 10 times harder than the MBA's in school. You can out think them on any problem worth thinking about. But yet they will enjoy life to it's fullest while you work so hard to take away your only chance of make a paycheck that you enjoy. I applaud open source....have contributed to it. But it is not the end all be all. OSS really servers one purpose in my mind. It keeps pushing the industry forward and for that I am thankful. Yes Open Office will eventually replace all the real functionality of Office. But during that time microsoft is steady innovating the next grand idea. Sure they will probably eventually lose the Office war. Woopy Ding. By the time Linux becomes the OS of choice MS will be moving past what you know as an OS. Shit people. People are not communists by nature....I DID NOT SAY OSS was Communist. I said the idea that all people should be equal and have equal access is one of the ideals of communism. I for one don't want to be equal to the MBA's I went to school with. I am smarter, more motivated, and I plan on doing something that interests me for the rest of my life. Developing software. You would be wise to see OSS for what it is. You would be wiser to continue to contribute when you can. But the wisest of you will realize that the world has never really been changed by idealists and you are not likely to be the idealist group that succeeds. Even if you do succeeded you will only have succeeded in removing the one career path that most of you introverts are capable of truly excelling at. BTW I did post as a different user...I see no reason to check my real user id and see that swath of flame that you will probably spew. Good luck to you all. I hope you grow up and face the world for what it is.
Sorry to see this moderated as "Troll" when it's so exactly right! A lot of free software is great, but the people who are interested in it tend to sabotage adoption. And I don't mean people like Richard Stallman, who really believe in things and work for what they believe in. I don't mean people who can logically describe the advantages of using free software, either. Instead, I mean people who just like feeling superior and lack a sense of the dignity of others around them. These people range from the famous (Eric Raymond, e.g.) down to the masses of low-self-esteem high school kids looking for something to identify with.
A company that I know well recently (several years back) fired the top system administrator for basically being so obnoxiously religious and derisive about software that everyone got sick of hearing from her. We just couldn't get any work done for the time spent listening to her Microsoft jokes and puns. Unfortunately, she wasn't alone and I'm sure this isn't the only time something like this has happened.