Russia's New Official Holiday — Programmer's Day

Glyn Moody writes "Russia's president, Dmitry Medvedev, has decreed a new holiday for his country: Programmer's Day. Appropriately enough, it will be celebrated on the 256th day of the year: September 13th (September 12th for a leap year). Do programmers deserve their own holiday ahead of other professions? Should the rest of the world follow suit?"

Comments

Re:At least...

[Boronx]

By calling it "national service" day, rather than "terrorists kicked our ass and now we have to act like idiots" day, we take the day back in some small way.

Re:In honor of Programmer's Day

[Hurricane78]

Well, it's not all black and white here. The idea was to eliminate worker extortion. A concept you might know from not being able to quit when the working condition / pay ration becomes unbearable.
Their attempt obviously failed. But the spirit was undoubtedly a good one. (As it usually is.)

Their main faults were to think that "everyone is equal", while some still were "more equal" than others. Thereby again creating the old hierarchy, or "boss paradise".
(Originally, those "more equal" were just there to manage the transition, and then dissolve. Which for reasons of basic human behavior never happened.)
We must accept, that humans first think of themselves. Even when we give, we do so, because it feels good to us, and because we follow our goals. If your goal is to make someone else big, and that makes you happy, you still do it for yourself. So this does not mean it is bad. And as for being egoistic, being the opposite of altruistic sacrifice, I can just quote someone I do not like very much, but who is right:
“It stands to reason that where there's sacrifice, there’s someone collecting sacrificial offerings. Where there’s service, there's someone being served. The man who speaks to you of sacrifice, speaks of slaves and masters. And intends to be the master.” — Ayn Rand

So my solution (yes, I thought about this quite a bit) is very simple: In such a new "company", everyone can work for multiple people and let multiple people work for him. So it's not a hierarchy anymore, but a free graph. Which means that not only a boss can prefer one of his employees, but an employee can prefer one of his bosses. Or in proper non-biased terms: A service provider and a money provider, or two service providers, (two money providers would be strange, but thinkable), have equal freedoms. If one of your "bosses" offers a crappy deal, you can say no, and take a better one. Just as he can take a better one than you. You don't have to have any long-term contracts (although you can). You can simply work on a project basis.
This would not have been possible, two decades ago. But with computers being ubiquitous, the whole contract-, "self-employment"- and tax management, can be automated. Even as a service.
I'd try that. Even if just to see the flaws, and fix them.

Re:Yes.

[igny]

There are teachers', doctors' mathematicians' days in Russia. I am not sure about other but perhaps they exist too. A relevant story.

A Russian grandpa is asked how often he drinks vodka. He replies "Not very often, only when it is a holiday or after a sauna. For example what holiday is it today?" It appeared that no one could recall any holiday today. The grandpa ponders "Hmm sounds like a good day to go to a sauna"