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I can’t help feeling like we engineers are shooting ourselves in the foot with the open source culture: Most challenging and interesting work is turning into un

I can’t help feeling like we engineers are shooting ourselves in the foot with the open source culture: Most challenging and interesting work is turning into unpaid (open source) hobby projects. Professional software engineering is more and more about cobbling together various open source software, fiddling with configuration files and other menial tasks. Also, where is my “open source lawyer” or “open source doctor” whose work I can download from GitHub for free and file my issues / complaints with there? I guess this benefits the mediocre software engineer (who can now accomplish things by cobbling together open source that they would never be able to accomplish from scratch), and perhaps it’s also a plus for the top 0.001% who are good hustlers too and can make a career out of touring around conferences as some kind of nerd celebrities. But for the skilled and professional engineer (say top 5-25%) I’m starting to feel it’s a trap. (Open source is great for basic infrastructure though, like operating systems, compilers, interpreters, frameworks like TensorFlow or PyTorch, etc. I’m definitely not against it in general.)

titoCA321 4y ago
Many law firms and lawyers offer pro-bono services to those that qualify. There are even lawyers and law firms that contribute to open-source organizations on legal matters regarding lawsuits and licensing. Many court motions and filings are accessible to the public if you visit the courthouse and there are organizations that make case proceedings publicly available on their public websites. There are also medical clinics that offer medical services across the United States to those that qualify. Many medical studies and patents are publicly accessible on the web. There are organizations that offer compensation and health-care for those willing to volunteer for medical studies, questionnaires or clinal trials. Additional lawyers and doctors offer “free” work that grow their business. Why do you think some lawyers offer free consolations. Why do some dental offices offer free cleanings or free consultations and exams when patients are looking for braces? When folks equate “free” and “opensource” and mention “doctors” or “lawyers”, they imagine the lawyer working on their probate and wills for free or representing them on traffic accidents for “free” and in reality, that’s never going to happen.

titoCA321 4y ago

Many law firms and lawyers offer pro-bono services to those that qualify. There are even lawyers and law firms that contribute to open-source organizations on legal matters regarding lawsuits and licensing. Many court motions and filings are accessible to the public if you visit the courthouse and there are organizations that make case proceedings publicly available on their public websites. There are also medical clinics that offer medical services across the United States to those that qualify. Many medical studies and patents are publicly accessible on the web. There are organizations that offer compensation and health-care for those willing to volunteer for medical studies, questionnaires or clinal trials. Additional lawyers and doctors offer “free” work that grow their business. Why do you think some lawyers offer free consolations. Why do some dental offices offer free cleanings or free consultations and exams when patients are looking for braces? When folks equate “free” and “opensource” and mention “doctors” or “lawyers”, they imagine the lawyer working on their probate and wills for free or representing them on traffic accidents for “free” and in reality, that’s never going to happen.