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Linus and Guido a) do not control anyone's paycheck b) cannot control who decides they're interested in working on Linux and Python. The benevolent dictatorshi
by geofft 7y ago
Linus and Guido a) do not control anyone's paycheck b) cannot control who decides they're interested in working on Linux and Python.
The benevolent dictatorship model works great when people can vote with their feet (or their keyboards, as the case may be) whether they support the dictator in the first place. The contributors to Linux and Python have more influence over the projects than the dictators do - they continually decide whether to endorse the dictator's vision. A dictatorship of a company is much more like an actual dictatorship of a country, where you control people's lives and decide who gets to join and leave. It's more efficient, yes - but it is both less just and less incentivized to point that ruthless efficiency in the right direction.
By all means, run technical projects at work like Linux and Python are run - but give people the freedom to vote no confidence in these projects without endangering their housing and their health insurance.
- technotony 7y agoYou don't get to decide who leaves. If people don't like a companies dictator then they are free to go join another company. It's this competition in the free market for labor that helps prevent the abuses of tyranny.
- xiler 7y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_Litigation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-Tech_Employee_Antitrust_L... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony
- lexs 7y agoThat is a terribly naive perspective on the "free market for labor"
- pathseeker 7y agoNot in software.
- sbarre 7y agoIf by "software" you mean the tiny bubble that is silicon valley (and aspirants). The majority of developers out there hold down "real" jobs like everyone else at giant faceless corporations where they have no say and no power.
- geofft 7y agoThere are some H-1B holders and green card applicants I'd like you to meet. Also some pregnant people, people who look like they could get pregnant, people with significant medical expenditures, .... Yes, obviously, the control that an employer has over these people is much less than the control a governmental dictator would have - but it's much, much more than the control Guido or Linus have over anyone.