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As a programmer I find this offensive, we work all day trying to make software good (enough). As I see it the problem is with users, they think they should get

by bartwe 15y ago

As a programmer I find this offensive, we work all day trying to make software good (enough). As I see it the problem is with users, they think they should get programs, like firefox, for free. Most programs you use on a daily basis are now larger than anything a single person can build in a lifetime, and it should be free ? No business constraints and lack of money is what is keeping software down. Nobody is paying anyone to 'reinvent the wheel' to be better.

deleted 15y ago
[deleted]
jodrellblank 15y ago
Most programs you use on a daily basis are now larger than anything a single person can build in a lifetime And that's my fault, is it? I asked for a web browser with a pile of code so it can run on platforms I don't use? That supports user-unfriendly features I can't override, and which has its own configuration style so I can change the default display size of Tamil fonts? Don't blame the users because software is huge, it's huge because developers made protocols complicated and wanted to offer one program to a lot of people to save themselves effort. they think they should get programs, like firefox, for free Remind me which happened first: Developers offer free web browsers, or users expect free web browsers? I think the former. No business constraints and lack of money is what is keeping software down. Nobody is paying anyone to 'reinvent the wheel' to be better. And we all know what a commercial web browser would look like - $300 per user, government mandated for mediacal use, Netscape 4 with knobs on, still crashy. Good software is good, crummy software is crummy, and that seems largely independent of whether it is commercial or not, to my anecdotal eyes.