5 ms·

I'm still baffled as to why people treat Github like a public library despite being owned by what was at one time the greatest enemy of free and open source sof

by jrm4 4y ago

I'm still baffled as to why people treat Github like a public library despite being owned by what was at one time the greatest enemy of free and open source software in existence. Not saying they haven't changed their tune somewhat, but a library owned by Barnes and Noble is going to have very different incentives than an actual library. Made all the more silly by the fact that it's Git. You could just host it yourself for five bucks a month and that's probably overpaying.

TAForObvReasons 4y ago
GitHub built goodwill over the years. There were many controversies, but there were also many die-hard fans. That didn't evaporate overnight. Microsoft bought GitHub (and minted 3 billionaires in the process) specifically to acquire that goodwill and monetize it.
- aliqot 4y ago
  > acquire that goodwill and monetize it Embrace Extend <-- here Extinguish
  - fluoridation 4y ago
    That's not what EEE refers to. "Embrace" does not mean "buy".
    - jrm4 4y ago
      It can, I think. The EEE concept is useful enough to go slightly outside its original intended use.
      - fluoridation 4y ago
        So the idea here is 1. Acquire company for tens of billions. 2. Intentionally ruin own investment. 3. ??? 4. PROFIT! ?
        jrm4 4y ago
        There are a lot of less-than-optimal possible outcomes between "create the best possible free open source library" and "utterly ruin."
        robertlagrant 4y ago
        Well. 1. Acquire company for $7.5bn in stock, so fortunes are joined rather than cash paid 2. Still charge money for it 3. Create an AI product out of the open source bit of it, justifying the price tag, as well as build links to Microsoft dev tools to entice OSS back into the Microsoft ecosystem 4. Maybe profit, but almost certainly not loss
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    Uh, what's the extend that has happened since microsoft bought github? Do you mean copilot? I would not classify that as extending anything. It's just a thing they made. "Monetizing goodwill" is not an extend.
    - turtleyacht 4y ago
      > Microsoft <heart> Open Source
    - jrm4 4y ago
      Of course that's "extending." It's a very clever attack on open source generally.
      - Dylan16807 4y ago
        But it's not open source specific. Not in creation and definitely not in use. And the idea of the extend of EEE applying to all of open source at once, the way you could apply to a product or a standard or a protocol, doesn't really make sense.
        jrm4 4y ago
        You're thinking way too narrowly. EEE doesn't require a specific plan -- if you look at the history of Microsoft engaging in EEE, you can see it's been much more experimental than you're suggesting. It's basically Microsoft saying "Here is a thing that looks like it might in some way eventually be a threat to our business model and/or we can make some money off of it -- let's get our hooks in now and see what happens, we have the money to do it."
        Dylan16807 4y ago
        But again, copilot does not get their hooks into open source any more than it gets their hooks into code in general. And they're not doing EEE against "code". EEE doesn't need a specific plan but it does need some kind of target standard. Getting into an emerging market, without specific kinds of integration or malfeasance, is just competition.
- jacooper 4y ago
  Its not good will, its features and comfort. Github has the UI that almost every developer is used to, easy to use CI/CD, great issue and Pull request handling. And more importantly, everything is free. Even Ignoring the value and the features, Employers don't ask for your git link, they ask for your GitHub account. And since most projects are on GitHub having all of your projects there tooz makes it easier to see all of your commits, making your profile look more active. That's without mentioning the ease of discovery and issue reporting since everyone has an account.
  - jrm4 4y ago
    Agreed. And I think the road to technology hell is paved with convenience and "free."
npteljes 4y ago
That's because there's no feedback loop of what you're saying, in the active lives of the people interfacing with GitHub. Consider an example of ingesting poison. If the poison tastes bad, I'll be sure to spit it out immediately, either by involuntary disgust, or because I associate with that negative feeling of being poisoned, something I don't want, so I react. But what if the poison tastes good? And what if it not only tastes good, it actually rewards me for ingesting it, in some way? People tell me it's poison, it might not say so on the label, and many are also ingesting it. Is it even believable that it's poison, given that I don't experience the negatives at all?
- dijit 4y ago
  your analogy is spot on and aligns with humanity very well. Drugs, alcohol and sugar all fit this description very neatly.
- b3morales 4y ago
  To take the analogy further, it also (arguably) wasn't poisonous for many years. The poison would have been added in June of 2018.
skybrian 4y ago
It's been a bit over four years since the acquisition and Microsoft hasn't screwed it up yet. It's good to have a backup plan, but it's convenient to keep using it for now.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
deltarholamda 4y ago
>Made all the more silly by the fact that it's Git. You could just host it yourself for five bucks a month Ah, but GitHub isn't selling git hosting. It's a social network that also does git. That's the cake that Microsoft bought, not the UI and API frosting.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- culi 4y ago
  Hmmm I wonder if there is any work on federated github alternatives. Seems like a much more consequential network effect to tackle than social media tbh
  - lygaret 4y ago
    check out https://forgefed.org/ https://forgefed.org/ > ForgeFed is an upcoming federation protocol for enabling interoperability between version control services. It’s built as an extension to the ActivityPub protocol, allowing users of any ForgeFed-compliant service to interact with the repositories hosted on other instances.
wand3r 4y ago
Eh, I have no love for Github but this is huge bikeshedding. This can apply to so many pieces of a software project that at some point you just aren't even working on a project. Every tool has tradeoffs and based on use github and gitlab are the kind of tradeoffs developers are willing to make
- jrm4 4y ago
  I'd disagree. I think it's a "Black Swan" esque problem. Software developers shouldn't use Github for their bread and butter, in the same way that I argue real businesses should pay for email and not use Gmail. Sure, it might work fine forever, but when it doesn't, you're really screwed and you could have avoided that in a relatively simple way. Reminds me of seatbelts and fire extinguishers.
Too 4y ago
And Dropbox can also be hosted yourself with a oneliner rsync-script… The value GitHub provides is far from unique in anyway, but let’s not pretend it’s trivial. Especially for an open source project already struggling to get contributors to their main code base, even more so for any ops work.
thealchemistdev 4y ago
I saw this a few months ago. local> ssh user@example.com user@example> git init --bare $DIR user@example> exit local> git clone user@example.com:$DIR I've seen VPS services for as low as $4 a month. I'm with you in camp baffled.
- tick_tock_tick 4y ago
  And dropbox is just rsync with a bit of cute UI basically worthless. These comments are peak examples of how disconnected some hackernews users are from real life.
  - Dylan16807 4y ago
    That's not a fair comparison. The argument is more like a version of dropbox that's only used by programmers and owned by a company programmers should hate. And the rsync is capable of doing full multi-directional sync. In that scenario the hypothetical dropbox loses a ton of value.
  - jrm4 4y ago
    Nah. I'll still charge that it's laziness if this is your job. I get that this kind of practice is common, but I still find it lazy. I compare it to using gmail as your professional email. It's a bad idea; even if it never bites you, because the cost is so little and the harm is so great if it ever screws up. Except I can see why average joe user might not think about it, and I don't think developers have that excuse. You should know and understand that tech is risky enough. Same reason there was no excuse for the kik zero padding debacle. The fact that a LOT of people did a lazy dumb thing doesn't make it not dumb or lazy.
- ollien 4y ago
  Heh - a former employer of mine used something similar to this to sync code between laptops and development VMs :) We had a script that made a temporary commit, and pushed to a git repository in the way you describe, then reverted that commit.
- shepherdjerred 4y ago
imran-iq 4y ago
> I'm still baffled as to why people treat Github like a public library Because too many open source projects rely on it. Projects like crates.io force you to have a github account to use it. Most (neo)vim plugin managers give preferential treatment to github over other forges.
spandrew 4y ago
I'd like to know more about how MSFT qualifies for the moniker "they're the greatest enemy of free and open source software". From my understanding they've invested in many open web resources previously (like jQuery).
- cyral 4y ago
  And they opened sourced .NET
- jrm4 4y ago
  I did say "at one time," not necessarily now. But if you've been watching, literally the only reason they don't hate it now is because they lost the open source v. proprietary battle.
jotato 4y ago
This made me wonder. Is there a not-for-profit SCM host that does act like a library?
hot_gril 4y ago
I refuse to believe that Microsoft is any different from before (not just wrt to foss but general attitude). Doesn't matter if there's a new CEO. Look at what they did to Minecraft logins. Or this.

by jrm4 4y ago

TAForObvReasons 4y ago

GitHub built goodwill over the years. There were many controversies, but there were also many die-hard fans. That didn't evaporate overnight. Microsoft bought GitHub (and minted 3 billionaires in the process) specifically to acquire that goodwill and monetize it.

aliqot 4y ago
> acquire that goodwill and monetize it Embrace Extend <-- here Extinguish
- fluoridation 4y ago
  That's not what EEE refers to. "Embrace" does not mean "buy".
  - jrm4 4y ago
    It can, I think. The EEE concept is useful enough to go slightly outside its original intended use.
    - fluoridation 4y ago
      So the idea here is 1. Acquire company for tens of billions. 2. Intentionally ruin own investment. 3. ??? 4. PROFIT! ?
      - jrm4 4y ago
        There are a lot of less-than-optimal possible outcomes between "create the best possible free open source library" and "utterly ruin."
      - robertlagrant 4y ago
        Well. 1. Acquire company for $7.5bn in stock, so fortunes are joined rather than cash paid 2. Still charge money for it 3. Create an AI product out of the open source bit of it, justifying the price tag, as well as build links to Microsoft dev tools to entice OSS back into the Microsoft ecosystem 4. Maybe profit, but almost certainly not loss
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  Uh, what's the extend that has happened since microsoft bought github? Do you mean copilot? I would not classify that as extending anything. It's just a thing they made. "Monetizing goodwill" is not an extend.
  - turtleyacht 4y ago
    > Microsoft <heart> Open Source
  - jrm4 4y ago
    Of course that's "extending." It's a very clever attack on open source generally.
    - Dylan16807 4y ago
      But it's not open source specific. Not in creation and definitely not in use. And the idea of the extend of EEE applying to all of open source at once, the way you could apply to a product or a standard or a protocol, doesn't really make sense.
      - jrm4 4y ago
        You're thinking way too narrowly. EEE doesn't require a specific plan -- if you look at the history of Microsoft engaging in EEE, you can see it's been much more experimental than you're suggesting. It's basically Microsoft saying "Here is a thing that looks like it might in some way eventually be a threat to our business model and/or we can make some money off of it -- let's get our hooks in now and see what happens, we have the money to do it."
        Dylan16807 4y ago
        But again, copilot does not get their hooks into open source any more than it gets their hooks into code in general. And they're not doing EEE against "code". EEE doesn't need a specific plan but it does need some kind of target standard. Getting into an emerging market, without specific kinds of integration or malfeasance, is just competition.
jacooper 4y ago
Its not good will, its features and comfort. Github has the UI that almost every developer is used to, easy to use CI/CD, great issue and Pull request handling. And more importantly, everything is free. Even Ignoring the value and the features, Employers don't ask for your git link, they ask for your GitHub account. And since most projects are on GitHub having all of your projects there tooz makes it easier to see all of your commits, making your profile look more active. That's without mentioning the ease of discovery and issue reporting since everyone has an account.
- jrm4 4y ago
  Agreed. And I think the road to technology hell is paved with convenience and "free."

npteljes 4y ago

That's because there's no feedback loop of what you're saying, in the active lives of the people interfacing with GitHub. Consider an example of ingesting poison. If the poison tastes bad, I'll be sure to spit it out immediately, either by involuntary disgust, or because I associate with that negative feeling of being poisoned, something I don't want, so I react. But what if the poison tastes good? And what if it not only tastes good, it actually rewards me for ingesting it, in some way? People tell me it's poison, it might not say so on the label, and many are also ingesting it. Is it even believable that it's poison, given that I don't experience the negatives at all?

dijit 4y ago
your analogy is spot on and aligns with humanity very well. Drugs, alcohol and sugar all fit this description very neatly.
b3morales 4y ago
To take the analogy further, it also (arguably) wasn't poisonous for many years. The poison would have been added in June of 2018.

skybrian 4y ago

It's been a bit over four years since the acquisition and Microsoft hasn't screwed it up yet. It's good to have a backup plan, but it's convenient to keep using it for now.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

deltarholamda 4y ago

>Made all the more silly by the fact that it's Git. You could just host it yourself for five bucks a month Ah, but GitHub isn't selling git hosting. It's a social network that also does git. That's the cake that Microsoft bought, not the UI and API frosting.

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
culi 4y ago
Hmmm I wonder if there is any work on federated github alternatives. Seems like a much more consequential network effect to tackle than social media tbh
- lygaret 4y ago
  check out https://forgefed.org/ https://forgefed.org/ > ForgeFed is an upcoming federation protocol for enabling interoperability between version control services. It’s built as an extension to the ActivityPub protocol, allowing users of any ForgeFed-compliant service to interact with the repositories hosted on other instances.

wand3r 4y ago

Eh, I have no love for Github but this is huge bikeshedding. This can apply to so many pieces of a software project that at some point you just aren't even working on a project. Every tool has tradeoffs and based on use github and gitlab are the kind of tradeoffs developers are willing to make

jrm4 4y ago
I'd disagree. I think it's a "Black Swan" esque problem. Software developers shouldn't use Github for their bread and butter, in the same way that I argue real businesses should pay for email and not use Gmail. Sure, it might work fine forever, but when it doesn't, you're really screwed and you could have avoided that in a relatively simple way. Reminds me of seatbelts and fire extinguishers.

Too 4y ago

And Dropbox can also be hosted yourself with a oneliner rsync-script… The value GitHub provides is far from unique in anyway, but let’s not pretend it’s trivial. Especially for an open source project already struggling to get contributors to their main code base, even more so for any ops work.

thealchemistdev 4y ago

I saw this a few months ago. local> ssh user@example.com user@example> git init --bare $DIR user@example> exit local> git clone user@example.com:$DIR I've seen VPS services for as low as $4 a month. I'm with you in camp baffled.

tick_tock_tick 4y ago
And dropbox is just rsync with a bit of cute UI basically worthless. These comments are peak examples of how disconnected some hackernews users are from real life.
- Dylan16807 4y ago
  That's not a fair comparison. The argument is more like a version of dropbox that's only used by programmers and owned by a company programmers should hate. And the rsync is capable of doing full multi-directional sync. In that scenario the hypothetical dropbox loses a ton of value.
- jrm4 4y ago
  Nah. I'll still charge that it's laziness if this is your job. I get that this kind of practice is common, but I still find it lazy. I compare it to using gmail as your professional email. It's a bad idea; even if it never bites you, because the cost is so little and the harm is so great if it ever screws up. Except I can see why average joe user might not think about it, and I don't think developers have that excuse. You should know and understand that tech is risky enough. Same reason there was no excuse for the kik zero padding debacle. The fact that a LOT of people did a lazy dumb thing doesn't make it not dumb or lazy.
ollien 4y ago
Heh - a former employer of mine used something similar to this to sync code between laptops and development VMs :) We had a script that made a temporary commit, and pushed to a git repository in the way you describe, then reverted that commit.
shepherdjerred 4y ago

imran-iq 4y ago

> I'm still baffled as to why people treat Github like a public library Because too many open source projects rely on it. Projects like crates.io force you to have a github account to use it. Most (neo)vim plugin managers give preferential treatment to github over other forges.

spandrew 4y ago

I'd like to know more about how MSFT qualifies for the moniker "they're the greatest enemy of free and open source software". From my understanding they've invested in many open web resources previously (like jQuery).

cyral 4y ago
And they opened sourced .NET
jrm4 4y ago
I did say "at one time," not necessarily now. But if you've been watching, literally the only reason they don't hate it now is because they lost the open source v. proprietary battle.

jotato 4y ago

This made me wonder. Is there a not-for-profit SCM host that does act like a library?

hot_gril 4y ago

I refuse to believe that Microsoft is any different from before (not just wrt to foss but general attitude). Doesn't matter if there's a new CEO. Look at what they did to Minecraft logins. Or this.