I think there is an argument to be made that having a de facto monopoly and engaging in monopolistic (read unreasonable) business practices are not always the same thing. And I don't expect the monopolistic business practices, such as they are to go away any time soon. Although, I'll agree with you that trying to open new markets is not necessarily a monopolistic business practice; and it's also true that even if they deserved it, MS probably will not ever get a fair shake here on/.
I do agree that the last few iterations of commercial varieties of Windows have made massive strides in reliability. Of course, the security is pretty bad as is demonstrated about every few days.
Netscape on Linux, yeah, that's been disappointing since the days of 3.0; but Konqueror and Opera both run very nicely and Opera is downright fast.
OK, that's fair; but don't loadable modules afford us most of the advantages of micro-kernel design while allowing us to retain the benefits of a monolothic kernel?
I'm not sure we won't get modded down as offtopic for debating this here - I'm sure it'll come up again someplace more appropriate; but I think Linux's strengths and continued viability are testament to the idea that monlithic kernels weren't obsolete at the time and they aren't any more so today.
But that issue aside, my point was more that whether you like the monolotihic design or not, forwarding it's strengths through design is something Linus really did do as opposed to incorrectly attributing the open source design to him.
As everyone and their brother have pointed out, OSS cannot be single handedly attributed to Linus; but more to the point, doesn't that make anyone question the merit of this award, when the grantors are so poorly informed? Especially when there are so many other legitimate reasons to give it to Linus, not a one of which is actually mentioned, just to take one example, saving the monolithic kernel from the oblivion to which industry and academia were ready to consign it 8 or so years ago.
You're absolutely right. and in my experience, even after leaving the work where it belongs, responding to the "what do you do?" query with the "I'm a programmer" anser has not once sent a woman screaming in the opposite direction.
Agreed, poor editing. Still it was generally a good and informative interview, characterized by intelligent and informed questions and Seth's gentle self-deprecation and lack of arrogance make him just the right spokesperson for a worthwhile project. I really learned a lot; and if you haven't been by to read the whole thing yet, you're missing it out.
Re:The most plausible explanation
on
New Deep Sea Squid
·
· Score: 2, Funny
Actually, it looks less like the spawn of Cthulhu and more like the anal probe Cartman had in South Park season 2. Keep your cows and little brothers indoors.
In spite of my comments elsewhere about the advantages of self-employment, Spinality's wisdom here is sound. If I'd tried to start my own business fresh out of school, I'd doubtless have mucked about a good bit, possibly gotten myself sued or in trouble with the IRS, gotten discouraged and gone home to die. Seriously though, there's a 99.9% chance you are smarter than I am, so I'm not questioning your ability to make it work; but there is much that is learned in a business environment that will make your attempts at self-employment more successful. Whereever you go, find the person who knows the most and buy them a beer. Take your time and sponge up what you can from the many great minds that are out there.
Yeah, the first poster is right and so are the people he's talking about. Contact an Accountant for the option that suits you best; but that doesn't render the rest of what you hear irrelevant.
The biggest gotcha in self-employment is the lack of employer paid benefits. Before making any decision to opt out of W2 style employment, shop appropriate health plans for yourself and make sure you set aside, first thing, 6-8 months of self pay health insurance premiums, especially if you've got family that depends on you. Most of the other benefits you can live nicely without; but consider what you really want. Many life insurance companies will, if asked, offer special self-employment premiums on incentive style life policies. This is nice because you can essentially use this technique to combine enforced retirement savings and life insurance security, again, thinking of your immediate family.
Once you've factored in health insurance, look at the cash that's left from each scenario and start doing some math. Figure your first year's expenses as a contractor, an S-Corp and a W2 employee, look at the 2001 tax tables, which have been published on the IRS site in their preliminary form and see what you net from each. If money is your only criteria, that's the shortest path to an answer.
I've been through all of the above scenarios and settled on an S-Corp, a few reasons and caveats to follow:
In three years as an S-Corp, I have never had to pay corporate income tax. The breadth of your possible deductions is much greater. And most everything you would suspect, is in fact allowed. I captalize and then depreciate my equipment then deduct software, education and training, an office phone and fax, cell phone, mileage, travel, sub-contractors and whatever else comes up. Everything else flows directly through to me as personal income on which I pay taxes at the income tax rate. There is nothing forced, unnatural or illegal about it. This is what the S-Corp was designed to do. I was audited in my first and third years and thanks to paying an accountant to do the preparation, the IRS left me alone without any questions, penalties or fines.
Make sure, if you go this route, that you file an S Declaration with the IRS before January 7th of the tax year (i.e. 1/7/2001 for 2001 taxes). The IRS will not let you slide on this, most of your corporate expenses will be disqualified and you'll have to file a schedule C with your personal income tax return. Very intrusive, privacy invading rectal exam of a tax form, not pretty. Do not forget.
As an S-Corp, your liability in business matters is limited to the assets of the corporation which is a big plus if you ever get sued for any kind of breach of contract. If you are a regular 1099 contractor, your personal assets will be fair game for the plaintiff.
Most businesses that will want to contract with you will be more inclined to do so if you are incorporated. This clearly relieves them of the problem of paying unemployment taxes on you, providing benefits, etc. Your contracts will also be much easier to write because you can skip all that crap about "So and so is not entitled to and is not an employee of blah blah blah" It's like a whole page of language. And they don't have to 1099 you at the end of the year, or do any special sort of reporting on you.
On a personal note, being self-employed increases your responibility to the job. You can't hang that hat on anyone else, anymore. You can, however, turn down jobs you aren't interested in, choose your own tools, piss away a couple hours a day on/. and download lots of porn without fear of reprisal. I made the move three years ago and never looked back. It's been great for me. Now is a great time to be a contractor too. IT departments that have laid off all sorts of people are turning to contractors in increasing numbers for the necessary services on which they have come to depend, but that they are no longer equipped to handle internally. Depending on your skill set, you can probably ride this wave for another couple years, maybe more. If you've wanted to try it, you should. Good luck!
Last thing - do do do, get an accountant. It's cheaper than you think and priceless all at the same time.
What's most interesting to me about this is that I don't even need to read the rebuttals to know what they contain. There is a real dearth of assertions in the MS white paper that can be scientifically tested and proven. I suppose in the real world, you have to say aomething; but really, it scarcely merits any notice at all, never mind an actual formal response. (Yes, I am aware that imparts some irony to this very post).
Incidentally, is Linux really putting it's best foot forward in relying on RedHat to leap to the defense of Embedded Linux?
I just don't know if another WG is going to change anything. The "business of the web" forges ahead (or sideways, or in reverse) pretty consistently in defiance of any standards or consensus. Sometimes they even try to present their own proprietary technologies as THE standard. Remember in the early days of the MS anti-trust case and Netscape and AOL whining that MS had used their versions of the technologies to assert a control over the net that they were not entitled to. But yours (and my) feelings about MS aside, it was really a joke because both NS and AOL had already spent years subverting the standards to their own purposes. It's going to take a lot more than a dozen, admittedly great, minds hammering out a philosophyover coffeee and cigars.
Back-up folks. Soliciting contributions to fund the work of major contributors to the significant development of a great tool is in no way a sign of failure. It's a time tried model that has brought us a lot of great advances in a multitude of other areas. Here's a great example: A pharmaceutical company gives a research grant to a university professor to conduct a study or work on a treatment for a specific condition that he/she/it may not otherwise be able to dedicate time to. Yeah, I know, there are attendant patent issues and all that; but the idea is still sound. Some life saving drugs that were produced on the same model:
Synthroid
Fosamax
Rezulin
and the inattentive programmers perennial favorite: Ritalin
Count me in when the time comes. Lord knows I've made enough money hacking Perl. I can give a little back.
First of all, it is NOT OK with me, TiVo doing it, or anyone else.
Second of all, MS stuff is NOT 50X better, by any standard. It is not better at all.
Third, there is nothing irrational about an extreme dislike for Microsoft. You can remain blind to the subject as much as you want; but this is about far more than just an inferior product. And most frightening of all is that they quite sincerely don't see anything wrong with their behavior. So it's your responsibility
and mine to object in any way you can. Hey, I have to use MS stuff too from time to time; but I try really hard to keep it to a minimum. It's the least any of us can do.
Claiming to be an alternative to a commercial product in no way obligates them to duplicate every crappy, useless, ill-conceived and under-realized feature stuffed into it's commercial counterparts. The folks writing this letter haven't contradicted themselves at all, they've simply pointed out the compromise involved in using software that has no price tag associated with it.
The common argument for this phenomenon is that Slackware is the Linux user's version of Linux. Low on hand holding for them what doesn't need their hands held. This all seems a bit self-congratulatory to me and I'll not generally use this argument for that reason.
But I've been a faithful Slackware user since Patrick first popped my linux cherry with it lo those many years ago. This is a bit of laziness on my part, I'll admit. I'm completely with all the points made by -razor-; but I have to add an even more basic one. I feel as if with Slackware, I know exactly what's on my boxen. I need that sort of reassurance and control; even if my therapist says it's just an illusion.
Slashdot Mirror
I think there is an argument to be made that having a de facto monopoly and engaging in monopolistic (read unreasonable) business practices are not always the same thing. And I don't expect the monopolistic business practices, such as they are to go away any time soon. Although, I'll agree with you that trying to open new markets is not necessarily a monopolistic business practice; and it's also true that even if they deserved it, MS probably will not ever get a fair shake here on /.
I do agree that the last few iterations of commercial varieties of Windows have made massive strides in reliability. Of course, the security is pretty bad as is demonstrated about every few days.
Netscape on Linux, yeah, that's been disappointing since the days of 3.0; but Konqueror and Opera both run very nicely and Opera is downright fast.
OK, that's fair; but don't loadable modules afford us most of the advantages of micro-kernel design while allowing us to retain the benefits of a monolothic kernel?
I'm not sure we won't get modded down as offtopic for debating this here - I'm sure it'll come up again someplace more appropriate; but I think Linux's strengths and continued viability are testament to the idea that monlithic kernels weren't obsolete at the time and they aren't any more so today.
But that issue aside, my point was more that whether you like the monolotihic design or not, forwarding it's strengths through design is something Linus really did do as opposed to incorrectly attributing the open source design to him.
As everyone and their brother have pointed out, OSS cannot be single handedly attributed to Linus; but more to the point, doesn't that make anyone question the merit of this award, when the grantors are so poorly informed? Especially when there are so many other legitimate reasons to give it to Linus, not a one of which is actually mentioned, just to take one example, saving the monolithic kernel from the oblivion to which industry and academia were ready to consign it 8 or so years ago.
And my wife won't know what I'm looking at.
I spend all my damn money in the boook store anyway. for me, it would be as good as cash.
You're absolutely right. and in my experience, even after leaving the work where it belongs, responding to the "what do you do?" query with the "I'm a programmer" anser has not once sent a woman screaming in the opposite direction.
Agreed, poor editing. Still it was generally a good and informative interview, characterized by intelligent and informed questions and Seth's gentle self-deprecation and lack of arrogance make him just the right spokesperson for a worthwhile project. I really learned a lot; and if you haven't been by to read the whole thing yet, you're missing it out.
Actually, it looks less like the spawn of Cthulhu and more like the anal probe Cartman had in South Park season 2. Keep your cows and little brothers indoors.
In spite of my comments elsewhere about the advantages of self-employment, Spinality's wisdom here is sound. If I'd tried to start my own business fresh out of school, I'd doubtless have mucked about a good bit, possibly gotten myself sued or in trouble with the IRS, gotten discouraged and gone home to die. Seriously though, there's a 99.9% chance you are smarter than I am, so I'm not questioning your ability to make it work; but there is much that is learned in a business environment that will make your attempts at self-employment more successful. Whereever you go, find the person who knows the most and buy them a beer. Take your time and sponge up what you can from the many great minds that are out there.
Yeah, the first poster is right and so are the people he's talking about. Contact an Accountant for the option that suits you best; but that doesn't render the rest of what you hear irrelevant.
/. and download lots of porn without fear of reprisal. I made the move three years ago and never looked back. It's been great for me. Now is a great time to be a contractor too. IT departments that have laid off all sorts of people are turning to contractors in increasing numbers for the necessary services on which they have come to depend, but that they are no longer equipped to handle internally. Depending on your skill set, you can probably ride this wave for another couple years, maybe more. If you've wanted to try it, you should. Good luck!
The biggest gotcha in self-employment is the lack of employer paid benefits. Before making any decision to opt out of W2 style employment, shop appropriate health plans for yourself and make sure you set aside, first thing, 6-8 months of self pay health insurance premiums, especially if you've got family that depends on you. Most of the other benefits you can live nicely without; but consider what you really want. Many life insurance companies will, if asked, offer special self-employment premiums on incentive style life policies. This is nice because you can essentially use this technique to combine enforced retirement savings and life insurance security, again, thinking of your immediate family.
Once you've factored in health insurance, look at the cash that's left from each scenario and start doing some math. Figure your first year's expenses as a contractor, an S-Corp and a W2 employee, look at the 2001 tax tables, which have been published on the IRS site in their preliminary form and see what you net from each. If money is your only criteria, that's the shortest path to an answer.
I've been through all of the above scenarios and settled on an S-Corp, a few reasons and caveats to follow:
In three years as an S-Corp, I have never had to pay corporate income tax. The breadth of your possible deductions is much greater. And most everything you would suspect, is in fact allowed. I captalize and then depreciate my equipment then deduct software, education and training, an office phone and fax, cell phone, mileage, travel, sub-contractors and whatever else comes up. Everything else flows directly through to me as personal income on which I pay taxes at the income tax rate. There is nothing forced, unnatural or illegal about it. This is what the S-Corp was designed to do. I was audited in my first and third years and thanks to paying an accountant to do the preparation, the IRS left me alone without any questions, penalties or fines.
Make sure, if you go this route, that you file an S Declaration with the IRS before January 7th of the tax year (i.e. 1/7/2001 for 2001 taxes). The IRS will not let you slide on this, most of your corporate expenses will be disqualified and you'll have to file a schedule C with your personal income tax return. Very intrusive, privacy invading rectal exam of a tax form, not pretty. Do not forget.
As an S-Corp, your liability in business matters is limited to the assets of the corporation which is a big plus if you ever get sued for any kind of breach of contract. If you are a regular 1099 contractor, your personal assets will be fair game for the plaintiff.
Most businesses that will want to contract with you will be more inclined to do so if you are incorporated. This clearly relieves them of the problem of paying unemployment taxes on you, providing benefits, etc. Your contracts will also be much easier to write because you can skip all that crap about "So and so is not entitled to and is not an employee of blah blah blah" It's like a whole page of language. And they don't have to 1099 you at the end of the year, or do any special sort of reporting on you.
On a personal note, being self-employed increases your responibility to the job. You can't hang that hat on anyone else, anymore. You can, however, turn down jobs you aren't interested in, choose your own tools, piss away a couple hours a day on
Last thing - do do do, get an accountant. It's cheaper than you think and priceless all at the same time.
What's most interesting to me about this is that I don't even need to read the rebuttals to know what they contain. There is a real dearth of assertions in the MS white paper that can be scientifically tested and proven. I suppose in the real world, you have to say aomething; but really, it scarcely merits any notice at all, never mind an actual formal response. (Yes, I am aware that imparts some irony to this very post).
Incidentally, is Linux really putting it's best foot forward in relying on RedHat to leap to the defense of Embedded Linux?
I just don't know if another WG is going to change anything. The "business of the web" forges ahead (or sideways, or in reverse) pretty consistently in defiance of any standards or consensus. Sometimes they even try to present their own proprietary technologies as THE standard. Remember in the early days of the MS anti-trust case and Netscape and AOL whining that MS had used their versions of the technologies to assert a control over the net that they were not entitled to. But yours (and my) feelings about MS aside, it was really a joke because both NS and AOL had already spent years subverting the standards to their own purposes. It's going to take a lot more than a dozen, admittedly great, minds hammering out a philosophyover coffeee and cigars.
I didn't say that he said that he did what she said, oh screw it.
Back-up folks. Soliciting contributions to fund the work of major contributors to the significant development of a great tool is in no way a sign of failure. It's a time tried model that has brought us a lot of great advances in a multitude of other areas. Here's a great example: A pharmaceutical company gives a research grant to a university professor to conduct a study or work on a treatment for a specific condition that he/she/it may not otherwise be able to dedicate time to. Yeah, I know, there are attendant patent issues and all that; but the idea is still sound. Some life saving drugs that were produced on the same model:
Synthroid
Fosamax
Rezulin
and the inattentive programmers perennial favorite: Ritalin
Count me in when the time comes. Lord knows I've made enough money hacking Perl. I can give a little back.
First of all, it is NOT OK with me, TiVo doing it, or anyone else.
Second of all, MS stuff is NOT 50X better, by any standard. It is not better at all.
Third, there is nothing irrational about an extreme dislike for Microsoft. You can remain blind to the subject as much as you want; but this is about far more than just an inferior product. And most frightening of all is that they quite sincerely don't see anything wrong with their behavior. So it's your responsibility
and mine to object in any way you can. Hey, I have to use MS stuff too from time to time; but I try really hard to keep it to a minimum. It's the least any of us can do.
Claiming to be an alternative to a commercial product in no way obligates them to duplicate every crappy, useless, ill-conceived and under-realized feature stuffed into it's commercial counterparts. The folks writing this letter haven't contradicted themselves at all, they've simply pointed out the compromise involved in using software that has no price tag associated with it.
The common argument for this phenomenon is that Slackware is the Linux user's version of Linux. Low on hand holding for them what doesn't need their hands held. This all seems a bit self-congratulatory to me and I'll not generally use this argument for that reason.
But I've been a faithful Slackware user since Patrick first popped my linux cherry with it lo those many years ago. This is a bit of laziness on my part, I'll admit. I'm completely with all the points made by -razor-; but I have to add an even more basic one. I feel as if with Slackware, I know exactly what's on my boxen. I need that sort of reassurance and control; even if my therapist says it's just an illusion.