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The article says it’s only open to enterprise customers. Computing freedom you have to pay a ton for is not really freedom. It’s really not even close to the co

The article says it’s only open to enterprise customers. Computing freedom you have to pay a ton for is not really freedom. It’s really not even close to the control of IRC.

geofft 8y ago
Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? Is it not worth Kerberos being free software because the only real users of Kerberos are enterprises? Computing freedom for anyone is computing freedom, and contributes to a norm of user control instead of service provider control. This step is a very small step, and it only affects a few users. But it's still a step in the right direction. (Something self-hosted like IRC is a much better step, and I'm glad there are free software/on-prem direct Slack competitors now, too. That's also a step in the right direction!)
- SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
  >Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? The non-strawman scenario would be if Linux only ran on expensive mainframes.
- femiagbabiaka 8y ago
  Both of the technologies you named as examples are free and open. Anyone can inspect them and deploy them on their own. Slack isn’t like that unfortunately. This is a move to add another feature that will attract enterprise customers, I would doubt that even Slack themselves would proclaim this as a move towards greater software freedom.
  - pmart123 8y ago
    I agree that this move is articulating enterprise customer demands rather than demonstrating greater software freedom. I don’t view this as unfortunate though. Slack is a productivity and collaboration product versus a utility like a low level database or encryption method. As such, many users and businesses want to pay for support, added features, hosting/availability/backups. It is better to have someone having to pay Slack a lot for power features than have a bunch of targeted ads in Slack. The buck stops somewhere.
  - Zancarius 8y ago
    > Anyone can inspect them and deploy them on their own That's what I don't get from reading this thread. Like you said, Kerberos does have its uses outside enterprise deployments, and if you want authenticated/encrypted NFS for whatever reason it's really one of your only options.
- darkpuma 8y ago
  > Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? Honest question: what is it worth to me? I don't but into this "any linux usage is a win" mentality. Linux being used on tivos is worthless to me (https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary-tyrants.en.html https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary-tyrants.en.html), and it's hard to see why Linux running on hardware I will never have the opportunity to own should be worth anything to me either. Am I expected to cheer for the linux team no matter the circumstance?
  - yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
    Still benefits you; more users to bolster the ecosystem (contributing to shared code), and code that later turns out to be useful (many-cpu systems were expensive supercomputers... right up until they started landing on desks).
ses1984 8y ago
It's pretty clear many customers don't want control, they want features, and irc lacks those.
- femiagbabiaka 8y ago
  Not true, Slack is actually pretty far behind on terms of features. It is true that people like the better looking, easier to use technology however.
  - artursapek 8y ago
    More features isn't always better. I already find Slack very overwhelming.
  - quacker 8y ago
    IRC doesn't even have the only feature I care about: the native ability to see messages sent while I was logged out. And no, I don't want to run my own bouncer, and I don't want people running their own insecure bouncers across my company. Yes, I could use something like IRCCloud but that requires another account and I'm tied to their client unless I pay[1] https://www.irccloud.com/faq#faq-bnc https://www.irccloud.com/faq#faq-bnc
    - LinuxBender 8y ago
      There are a few web clients that use redis to allow you to see history. I will be the first to admit, those clients don't scale as well as IRC itself does. [1] [2] And of course, someone would have to manage that infrastructure. It isn't for everyone. Another option would be to rent a really cheap VM and run a tmux or screen session with weechat [3] or epic [4], but command line isn't for everyone either. [1] - https://github.com/thelounge/thelounge https://github.com/thelounge/thelounge [2] - https://github.com/Nordaaker/convos https://github.com/Nordaaker/convos [3] - https://weechat.org/ https://weechat.org/ [4] - http://www.epicsol.org/#getting_epic http://www.epicsol.org/#getting_epic
      - 8y ago
SeanDav 8y ago
2 Options as I see it: Either don't use Slack or try to gather consensus and change things
- femiagbabiaka 8y ago
  Using Slack isn’t really a choice for most people, but I agree, coming up with alternatives is important.
  - stickfigure 8y ago
    Using Slack is a choice for someone in your organization, even if you aren't that person. You probably also don't get unilateral control over your working hours, pay, and office.
manigandham 8y ago
It’s still their product. You have the freedom to not pay for it and use whatever alternative you want or build your own.
- reciprocity 8y ago
  It should be noted that once the Network effect [0] takes place, it becomes less about freedom to build your own software and more about the cost (including - maybe especially - intangible) and viability of doing so. If the problem is "this user is unsatisfied with this product', the solution is not necessarily to tell them to build their own [1]. We, as people, are allowed to criticize (hopefully constructively) products that have flaws in them even while using said software. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma
  - da_chicken 8y ago
    I'm not so sure the network effect is significant here. Slack is designed as a space for team communication, so it seems like a situation where the network effect is at it's least powerful. After all, teams are about the smallest size imaginable. Any alternative is also going to be on the Internet, be it another product, IRC, or a mailing list. The only inertia you have to overcome is the inertia to create an account. Second of all, the value of peers on a team network is not equal. The team leadership and top contributors are the most valuable members of the network. If they decide to jump ship to another product, your choice is to either follow suit or essentially exclude yourself from the team. Would you seriously not work someplace or not contribute to a product because it meant you couldn't use Slack and had to use Hangouts or IRC? I'll agree that Slack's product is better and -- baring complaints common to many Electron apps -- relatively without fault, but requiring it seems a bit excessive.
gwright 8y ago
One of the tensions between federated services (DNS, SMTP, HTTP, etc.) and non-federated services (Twitter, Slack, Facebook messenger, Signal, etc.) is that quite a bit of control (perhaps all) is delegated to the single operator in the non-federated model. I don't think you are going to get "computing freedom" via a non-federated service regardless of how you define "computing freedom". Autonomy and independence aren't part of the equation in that context.

The article says it’s only open to enterprise customers. Computing freedom you have to pay a ton for is not really freedom. It’s really not even close to the control of IRC.

geofft 8y ago

Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? Is it not worth Kerberos being free software because the only real users of Kerberos are enterprises? Computing freedom for anyone is computing freedom, and contributes to a norm of user control instead of service provider control. This step is a very small step, and it only affects a few users. But it's still a step in the right direction. (Something self-hosted like IRC is a much better step, and I'm glad there are free software/on-prem direct Slack competitors now, too. That's also a step in the right direction!)

SlowRobotAhead 8y ago
>Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? The non-strawman scenario would be if Linux only ran on expensive mainframes.
femiagbabiaka 8y ago
Both of the technologies you named as examples are free and open. Anyone can inspect them and deploy them on their own. Slack isn’t like that unfortunately. This is a move to add another feature that will attract enterprise customers, I would doubt that even Slack themselves would proclaim this as a move towards greater software freedom.
- pmart123 8y ago
  I agree that this move is articulating enterprise customer demands rather than demonstrating greater software freedom. I don’t view this as unfortunate though. Slack is a productivity and collaboration product versus a utility like a low level database or encryption method. As such, many users and businesses want to pay for support, added features, hosting/availability/backups. It is better to have someone having to pay Slack a lot for power features than have a bunch of targeted ads in Slack. The buck stops somewhere.
- Zancarius 8y ago
  > Anyone can inspect them and deploy them on their own That's what I don't get from reading this thread. Like you said, Kerberos does have its uses outside enterprise deployments, and if you want authenticated/encrypted NFS for whatever reason it's really one of your only options.
darkpuma 8y ago
> Is it not worth Linux running on mainframes because mainframes are expensive? Honest question: what is it worth to me? I don't but into this "any linux usage is a win" mentality. Linux being used on tivos is worthless to me (https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary-tyrants.en.html https://www.gnu.org/proprietary/proprietary-tyrants.en.html), and it's hard to see why Linux running on hardware I will never have the opportunity to own should be worth anything to me either. Am I expected to cheer for the linux team no matter the circumstance?
- yjftsjthsd-h 8y ago
  Still benefits you; more users to bolster the ecosystem (contributing to shared code), and code that later turns out to be useful (many-cpu systems were expensive supercomputers... right up until they started landing on desks).

ses1984 8y ago

It's pretty clear many customers don't want control, they want features, and irc lacks those.

femiagbabiaka 8y ago
Not true, Slack is actually pretty far behind on terms of features. It is true that people like the better looking, easier to use technology however.
- artursapek 8y ago
  More features isn't always better. I already find Slack very overwhelming.
- quacker 8y ago
  IRC doesn't even have the only feature I care about: the native ability to see messages sent while I was logged out. And no, I don't want to run my own bouncer, and I don't want people running their own insecure bouncers across my company. Yes, I could use something like IRCCloud but that requires another account and I'm tied to their client unless I pay[1] https://www.irccloud.com/faq#faq-bnc https://www.irccloud.com/faq#faq-bnc
  - LinuxBender 8y ago
    There are a few web clients that use redis to allow you to see history. I will be the first to admit, those clients don't scale as well as IRC itself does. [1] [2] And of course, someone would have to manage that infrastructure. It isn't for everyone. Another option would be to rent a really cheap VM and run a tmux or screen session with weechat [3] or epic [4], but command line isn't for everyone either. [1] - https://github.com/thelounge/thelounge https://github.com/thelounge/thelounge [2] - https://github.com/Nordaaker/convos https://github.com/Nordaaker/convos [3] - https://weechat.org/ https://weechat.org/ [4] - http://www.epicsol.org/#getting_epic http://www.epicsol.org/#getting_epic
    - 8y ago

SeanDav 8y ago

2 Options as I see it: Either don't use Slack or try to gather consensus and change things

femiagbabiaka 8y ago
Using Slack isn’t really a choice for most people, but I agree, coming up with alternatives is important.
- stickfigure 8y ago
  Using Slack is a choice for someone in your organization, even if you aren't that person. You probably also don't get unilateral control over your working hours, pay, and office.

manigandham 8y ago

It’s still their product. You have the freedom to not pay for it and use whatever alternative you want or build your own.

reciprocity 8y ago
It should be noted that once the Network effect [0] takes place, it becomes less about freedom to build your own software and more about the cost (including - maybe especially - intangible) and viability of doing so. If the problem is "this user is unsatisfied with this product', the solution is not necessarily to tell them to build their own [1]. We, as people, are allowed to criticize (hopefully constructively) products that have flaws in them even while using said software. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_effect [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma
- da_chicken 8y ago
  I'm not so sure the network effect is significant here. Slack is designed as a space for team communication, so it seems like a situation where the network effect is at it's least powerful. After all, teams are about the smallest size imaginable. Any alternative is also going to be on the Internet, be it another product, IRC, or a mailing list. The only inertia you have to overcome is the inertia to create an account. Second of all, the value of peers on a team network is not equal. The team leadership and top contributors are the most valuable members of the network. If they decide to jump ship to another product, your choice is to either follow suit or essentially exclude yourself from the team. Would you seriously not work someplace or not contribute to a product because it meant you couldn't use Slack and had to use Hangouts or IRC? I'll agree that Slack's product is better and -- baring complaints common to many Electron apps -- relatively without fault, but requiring it seems a bit excessive.

gwright 8y ago

One of the tensions between federated services (DNS, SMTP, HTTP, etc.) and non-federated services (Twitter, Slack, Facebook messenger, Signal, etc.) is that quite a bit of control (perhaps all) is delegated to the single operator in the non-federated model. I don't think you are going to get "computing freedom" via a non-federated service regardless of how you define "computing freedom". Autonomy and independence aren't part of the equation in that context.