It looks great. Food that's easy, healthy, and (presumably, I haven't had one yet) tastes good. But it's not gonna supplant ramen noodles -- if you actually look at the pricing, it's $2.59 a pop. You could eat ramen noodles for a week with that much money;-)
So it may become popular with people who have actual jobs, but I don't see it catching on too much with broke college students:-)
Objectively, I agree with a lot of what he's saying. I believe you should be able to copyright software, and that people shouldn't be able to give it away if you don't want them to (on the flip side, I'm a strong supporter of open source/free software. I think people should be allowed to sell their stuff, they just shouldn't expect me to buy it). I think it may have been stupid for them not to give out information about their source code, but it wasn't necessarily immoral.
On the other hand, throughout the whole interview BG comes across as highly defensive and easily upset. He keeps getting into small arguments with the guy, even when he's just being asked simple questions.
But I think the most amusing part is how BG himself is all upset because of how wrong it is to steal other people's software and make money from it. I've lost track of how many times MS has done this;-)
Actually, that's been a bit of a perl in-joke for some time since perl returns the current year as the number of years since 1900 -- in #perl there was talk of having YAPC 19100 next year:-)
What were we expecting, exactly? People writing in saying "The power's out, the phones are out, and I can't connect to the Internet"? One way or another, no one's gonna post comments like that;-)
If you read carefully, it says that the *form* of caffeine is 2.5 times stronger than normal. The actual caffeine content is similar to a cup of coffee -- just like jolt.
If you read carefully, it turns out that the computer that's 62,000 times faster (in theory, as has been pointed out already) is several million dollars. It doesn't give specs for the PC- like computer, it just says that it's "like today's supercomputers". Disappointing. But I suppose it will still be interesting to see if their PC is any good...
You missed something there: the jargon file does not attempt to describe what a hacker should be like, and anyone who modifies their behavior to match up with the jargon file is only kidding themselves. It describes what a lot of hackers are like, based on what ESR has seen himself and heard from others. Acting that way does not make you any more or less a hacker. That stuff is just in there for general amusement, really...
You might not think it's 100% accurate -- of course it isn't. It's giving extreme specifics about large numbers of people, and there's no way it could really be that universal. But it is freqently at least somewhat accurate -- the first time I read it, I was shocked to be reading my own habits, opinions, eating habits, etc. Of course there were differences, some of them significant, but so what? You're taking the whole thing too seriously:-)
There is a hacker culture, too. It may not be as strong or as universal as ESR believes -- that is understandable. Even if it isn't as strong now, there was a time when it was, and the weakening is a natural consequence of the enourmous population explosion. But the things ESR describes as parts of hacker culture are still very real, significant things in some subsets of the culture. Maybe not your part. Big deal:-) Like I said, you're taking it too seriously when it's mostly intended to be amusing (though some of the amusement derives from the partial accuracy).
As for the anti-gift-culture bit. I thought that ESR gave a fairly good analysis of the whole thing, and the gift culture was a good explanation of a lot of effects seen in open source culture. It left out some other significant things, of course, like the "boy, that's-pretty-nifty" syndrome where people write code just because they think it's cool what it can do. Or the "I'm-gonna-solve-this-puzzle-dammit" syndrome, for people who like intellectual challenge. But -- in my opinion -- a lot of it hit the mark. If you're going to disagree, fine, but explain why:-) You just said ESR went too far, which is fairly ambiguous/arbitrary.
I would very much like to see the debate between Apple and the free software community (not just ESR or RMS or Bruce Perens, etc.) before Apple decides. I think many people would start getting disillusioned if all the "important" decisions were debated and resolved before we even heard about them.
You have a good point, but I think you're missing ESR's. It wasn't just that these other people expressed their views in public, but that many people openly attacked Apple's license, as well as ESR and OSI. Rather than responding with "Don't you think that this could be improved by [insert-your-favorite-addition-here]?", they said the whole thing was evil. Of course, I'm not referring to everyone here, as some people were actually behaving rationally.
On the other hand, ESR doesn't seem to be taking the same stance he did at first on the license -- I could be wrong, but this is the first time I've seen him admitting that there could be something wrong with it. Even if this is true, he made a mistake, and it's not an irreversible one. Cut him a little slack:-)
When writing to extremely open-minded people, flame can get results, but no matter who you write to the results are almost always better if you explain your position rationally (some people respond to neither, but that's not the point). Also, bear in mind that when you're the recipient, large amounts of flame can easily drown out the support you may have, and provide a picture that is a lot bleaker than the reality.
So... in conclusion, ESR is not perfect, but he is trying to do the right thing here. Keep that in mind before you get mad at him.
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It looks great. Food that's easy, healthy, and (presumably, I haven't had one yet) tastes good. But it's not gonna supplant ramen noodles -- if you actually look at the pricing, it's $2.59 a pop. You could eat ramen noodles for a week with that much money ;-)
:-)
So it may become popular with people who have actual jobs, but I don't see it catching on too much with broke college students
David
Objectively, I agree with a lot of what he's saying. I believe you should be able to copyright software, and that people shouldn't be able to give it away if you don't want them to (on the flip side, I'm a strong supporter of open source/free software. I think people should be allowed to sell their stuff, they just shouldn't expect me to buy it). I think it may have been stupid for them not to give out information about their source code, but it wasn't necessarily immoral.
;-)
On the other hand, throughout the whole interview BG comes across as highly defensive and easily upset. He keeps getting into small arguments with the guy, even when he's just being asked simple questions.
But I think the most amusing part is how BG himself is all upset because of how wrong it is to steal other people's software and make money from it. I've lost track of how many times MS has done this
David
Actually, that's been a bit of a perl in-joke for some time since perl returns the current year as the number of years since 1900 -- in #perl there was talk of having YAPC 19100 next year :-)
David
What were we expecting, exactly? People writing in saying "The power's out, the phones are out, and I can't connect to the Internet"? One way or another, no one's gonna post comments like that ;-)
David
If you read carefully, it says that the *form* of caffeine is 2.5 times stronger than normal. The actual caffeine content is similar to a cup of coffee -- just like jolt.
If you read carefully, it turns out that the
computer that's 62,000 times faster (in theory,
as has been pointed out already) is several
million dollars. It doesn't give specs for the PC-
like computer, it just says that it's "like today's supercomputers". Disappointing. But I suppose it will still be interesting to see if their PC is any good...
You missed something there: the jargon file does not attempt to describe what a hacker should be like, and anyone who modifies their behavior to match up with the jargon file is only kidding themselves. It describes what a lot of hackers are like, based on what ESR has seen himself and heard from others. Acting that way does not make you any more or less a hacker. That stuff is just in there for general amusement, really...
:-)
:-) Like I said, you're taking it too seriously when it's mostly intended to be amusing (though some of the amusement derives from the partial accuracy).
:-) You just said ESR went too far, which is fairly ambiguous/arbitrary.
You might not think it's 100% accurate -- of course it isn't. It's giving extreme specifics about large numbers of people, and there's no way it could really be that universal. But it is freqently at least somewhat accurate -- the first time I read it, I was shocked to be reading my own habits, opinions, eating habits, etc. Of course there were differences, some of them significant, but so what? You're taking the whole thing too seriously
There is a hacker culture, too. It may not be as strong or as universal as ESR believes -- that is understandable. Even if it isn't as strong now, there was a time when it was, and the weakening is a natural consequence of the enourmous population explosion. But the things ESR describes as parts of hacker culture are still very real, significant things in some subsets of the culture. Maybe not your part. Big deal
As for the anti-gift-culture bit. I thought that ESR gave a fairly good analysis of the whole thing, and the gift culture was a good explanation of a lot of effects seen in open source culture. It left out some other significant things, of course, like the "boy, that's-pretty-nifty" syndrome where people write code just because they think it's cool what it can do. Or the "I'm-gonna-solve-this-puzzle-dammit" syndrome, for people who like intellectual challenge. But -- in my opinion -- a lot of it hit the mark. If you're going to disagree, fine, but explain why
I would very much like to see the debate between Apple and the free software community (not just ESR or RMS or Bruce Perens, etc.) before Apple decides. I think many people would start getting disillusioned if all the "important" decisions were debated and resolved before we even heard about them.
:-)
You have a good point, but I think you're missing ESR's. It wasn't just that these other people expressed their views in public, but that many people openly attacked Apple's license, as well as ESR and OSI. Rather than responding with "Don't you think that this could be improved by [insert-your-favorite-addition-here]?", they said the whole thing was evil. Of course, I'm not referring to everyone here, as some people were actually behaving rationally.
On the other hand, ESR doesn't seem to be taking the same stance he did at first on the license -- I could be wrong, but this is the first time I've seen him admitting that there could be something wrong with it. Even if this is true, he made a mistake, and it's not an irreversible one. Cut him a little slack
When writing to extremely open-minded people, flame can get results, but no matter who you write to the results are almost always better if you explain your position rationally (some people respond to neither, but that's not the point). Also, bear in mind that when you're the recipient, large amounts of flame can easily drown out the support you may have, and provide a picture that is a lot bleaker than the reality.
So... in conclusion, ESR is not perfect, but he is trying to do the right thing here. Keep that in mind before you get mad at him.
David