5 ms·

It seems like you haven’t quite got the concept of capitalism and how humans and markets actually work. If you give away your work for $0 then the value of your

It seems like you haven’t quite got the concept of capitalism and how humans and markets actually work. If you give away your work for $0 then the value of your work is $0. Yes a tiny minority may want to pay more than that to make themselves feel morally superior or to virtue signal their goodness. But most won’t. Accept it and act accordingly: make companies pay to use your work and sue the companies that fail to comply with the licence conditions. It isn’t rocket science.

selfhoster11 5y ago
> If you give away your work for $0 then the value of your work is $0. I should've been paying my mother market rates. After all, she and my father have been running at a loss for this whole "family" enterprise. IMO, open source is (or should be seen as) more of a "friends and family doing favours for each other" kind of human activity. Some people do it for the sheer joy of it, share without expectation of more than a "thank you" (at max), and calling their work valueless is just crass marketism.
- mbrodersen 5y ago
  You are not getting my point. I am reacting to the OSS maintainers that get upset when the intrinsic value of their work doesn't automatically convert to market value ($ in their pockets). My point is to stop blaming the world and instead put a market value on their work for corporations.
  - dang 5y ago
    Can you please stop posting in the flamewar style to HN? You've been it a lot in these threads. I'm afraid it's repetitive and it lowers the quality of the discussion. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - wpietri 5y ago
      Thanks. My apologies for taking the bait.
    - mbrodersen 5y ago
      I am surprised you would see my comments as engaging in a flamewar dang. If you look at my comment history it should be clear that I in general don’t do that. Perhaps also take into consideration the many upvotes my comments have received. However I acknowledge that I might have been a bit more snarky in my comments than was strictly necessary to get my point across.
wpietri 5y ago
This is a classic mistake of people worship at the church of Econ 101: confusing price with value. Our system depends entirely upon things that are priced at $0 but are valued much higher. If you actually spend your life only doing things you are paid in cash for, I truly pity you. And in fact I can help you out by reminding you that you aren't getting paid for posting here, so you are morally obligated to stop doing it.
- mbrodersen 5y ago
  No you are not getting my point. OSS code often has a high intrinsic value (it is useful) and $0 market value (you pay $0 for it). The problem is that OSS maintainers often mistake the two. They seems to think that the world should automatically give the work they do a high $0 market value because of its intrinsic value. But that is not how it works. > If you actually spend your life only doing things you are paid in cash ... > And in fact I can help you out by reminding you ... Hahaha I love it when people get all passive aggressive :) It should be obvious to you that the fact that I am writing this, without getting paid for it, show that I don't spend my life only doing things I am paid for. You might want to look into the Econ idea of Utility Value. It has nothing to do with $.

selfhoster11 5y ago

> If you give away your work for $0 then the value of your work is $0. I should've been paying my mother market rates. After all, she and my father have been running at a loss for this whole "family" enterprise. IMO, open source is (or should be seen as) more of a "friends and family doing favours for each other" kind of human activity. Some people do it for the sheer joy of it, share without expectation of more than a "thank you" (at max), and calling their work valueless is just crass marketism.

mbrodersen 5y ago
You are not getting my point. I am reacting to the OSS maintainers that get upset when the intrinsic value of their work doesn't automatically convert to market value ($ in their pockets). My point is to stop blaming the world and instead put a market value on their work for corporations.
- dang 5y ago
  Can you please stop posting in the flamewar style to HN? You've been it a lot in these threads. I'm afraid it's repetitive and it lowers the quality of the discussion. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - wpietri 5y ago
    Thanks. My apologies for taking the bait.
  - mbrodersen 5y ago
    I am surprised you would see my comments as engaging in a flamewar dang. If you look at my comment history it should be clear that I in general don’t do that. Perhaps also take into consideration the many upvotes my comments have received. However I acknowledge that I might have been a bit more snarky in my comments than was strictly necessary to get my point across.

wpietri 5y ago

This is a classic mistake of people worship at the church of Econ 101: confusing price with value. Our system depends entirely upon things that are priced at $0 but are valued much higher. If you actually spend your life only doing things you are paid in cash for, I truly pity you. And in fact I can help you out by reminding you that you aren't getting paid for posting here, so you are morally obligated to stop doing it.

mbrodersen 5y ago
No you are not getting my point. OSS code often has a high intrinsic value (it is useful) and $0 market value (you pay $0 for it). The problem is that OSS maintainers often mistake the two. They seems to think that the world should automatically give the work they do a high $0 market value because of its intrinsic value. But that is not how it works. > If you actually spend your life only doing things you are paid in cash ... > And in fact I can help you out by reminding you ... Hahaha I love it when people get all passive aggressive :) It should be obvious to you that the fact that I am writing this, without getting paid for it, show that I don't spend my life only doing things I am paid for. You might want to look into the Econ idea of Utility Value. It has nothing to do with $.