4 ms·

You don't miss being able to make a living from writing your own software?

kstrauser 1y ago
That part sounds pretty wonderful, but it also means you were paying through the teeth for everyone else’s software, too. There are still plenty of small shops making a nice software living today. I don’t have the nerve to do it myself, though.
khazhoux 1y ago
No one ever talks about how OSS literally devalued software, which resulted in the best hackers being forced to take corporate jobs.
- PaulRobinson 1y ago
  If you listen to RMS’ talks, arguably this is a feature, not a bug. Most people pick up on the idea of freedom as in liberty with OSS: that you should be able to amend software at will. Strangely there are limits in his mind (at one talk I attended he insisted he didn’t care about being able to amend the software in his microwave, so didn’t care if it was Free or not). However when asked about how programmers should make a living, his economic argument is that we should be paid for our hours, not for our software. In his telling, the right economic model is not the author who writes something once and is paid forever by everyone who wants to consume that “art”, but more like the trading crafter who makes and sells things on an on-going basis. In support of that model, the “devaluation” of software, has meant we have a planet running on it that would not have been possible if every library and application on ever machine had cost $100-$500 each. The advances in scientific and medical research powered by that software driven World would not have been achieved yet, but neither would the damage caused by social media and adtech. I’m not sure which side of the fence I sit on. I’ve had a good career being paid to write software because of its growing influence in the World, which likely would have stalled if OSS didn’t exist. But sure, I like the idea of spending a year writing something and living the rest of my life off the proceeds, like most people would.
  - vidarh 1y ago
    Note that the vast majority of authors also don't write something once and is paid forever sufficiently to life of it. The average full-time author in the UK would've made more at McDonalds, and usually only earn that much because they continue to churn out works. Like with software, this is in large part because everyone can write, and so there is a glut of content, and while a lot of it is poorly written tripe, there's a glut of quality content in almost every niche that is good enough that outstrips the demand, and so only the tiniest proportion of authors earns well. Like with software, a lot of people also do it because they want to, rather than for the money, which further drives down the prices. I've published two novels. They've sold substantially better than average but nowhere near bestseller level. And yet, despite selling substantially better than average, they're the lowest paid work I've done in more than two decades. I'm a fast writer - the second novel took me 3 weeks. It's still never going to pay for itself. That's okay. If I wanted to earn a living from writing, I'd look to write articles or columns for magazines and newspapers, or doing copywriting, paid by the word, rather than writing novels.
- pjmlp 1y ago
  The return to 90's style licenses kind of makes the point of everyone realizing someone has to put into the money, capitalism doesn't work with pull requests to upstream.
  - anthk 1y ago
    Libre licenses boosted computing like no else. The 90's was mostly about turds in golden cases.
    - musicale 1y ago
      90% of everything is crap (Sturgeon's law), but as I understand both commercial and free software advanced quite a bit in the 1990s: Visual BASIC, HyperCard 2.0, Java, JavaScript, Linux, MacOS System 7-9, TrueType, Windows 95, Windows NT, Photoshop, Microsoft Office, Encarta, Lotus Notes 2.0, MPEG, QuickTime, video editing (Video Toaster etc.), Pro Tools, MP3 encoders/players and WinAmp, Acrobat and PDF software, WWW, Apache, NCSA Mosaic, Netscape Navigator, FrontPage (and other html editors), ICQ and Instant Messenger, video conferencing (CU-SeeMe), various IDEs (Eclipse), etc. Not to mention incredible developments in PC, console and arcade games...
      - anthk 1y ago
        Ehhh... I disagree. Java -> Bloated compared to Icon/TCL VB -> OKish, but TCL/Tk and a bit of C did wonders under Unix. NT -> Good, advanced 95 -> Mediocre against Amiga/Mac. MSO -> Polished turd and uberused, giving disasters such as the renaming on Genomics and tons of papers now being void. MPEG -> Good, bound to TV and multimedia standards. QT -> Propietary crap, but QT3D was and it's still interesting. Lqtplay from libquicktime plays them well. MP3 -> Opus and OGG preferred here Acrobat/PDF -> PostScript and DJVU Netscape/FrontPage -> Damn crazy bloat with opaque formats on tons of stuff not bound to proper terminology. Even using Emacs editing HTML pages seems easier. Composer looked easier than FP, for sure. Videoconf -> Yes, h323 and friends. IDE's -> A lot of them were better under DOS or very bloated under Windows, such as Eclipse, Netbeans... PC/Console -> Yep, 3DFX/Glide and free Unixen, but consoles went downhill, the PC was set ahead since the Unreal engine.

That part sounds pretty wonderful, but it also means you were paying through the teeth for everyone else’s software, too. There are still plenty of small shops making a nice software living today. I don’t have the nerve to do it myself, though.

khazhoux 1y ago

No one ever talks about how OSS literally devalued software, which resulted in the best hackers being forced to take corporate jobs.

PaulRobinson 1y ago
If you listen to RMS’ talks, arguably this is a feature, not a bug. Most people pick up on the idea of freedom as in liberty with OSS: that you should be able to amend software at will. Strangely there are limits in his mind (at one talk I attended he insisted he didn’t care about being able to amend the software in his microwave, so didn’t care if it was Free or not). However when asked about how programmers should make a living, his economic argument is that we should be paid for our hours, not for our software. In his telling, the right economic model is not the author who writes something once and is paid forever by everyone who wants to consume that “art”, but more like the trading crafter who makes and sells things on an on-going basis. In support of that model, the “devaluation” of software, has meant we have a planet running on it that would not have been possible if every library and application on ever machine had cost $100-$500 each. The advances in scientific and medical research powered by that software driven World would not have been achieved yet, but neither would the damage caused by social media and adtech. I’m not sure which side of the fence I sit on. I’ve had a good career being paid to write software because of its growing influence in the World, which likely would have stalled if OSS didn’t exist. But sure, I like the idea of spending a year writing something and living the rest of my life off the proceeds, like most people would.
- vidarh 1y ago
  Note that the vast majority of authors also don't write something once and is paid forever sufficiently to life of it. The average full-time author in the UK would've made more at McDonalds, and usually only earn that much because they continue to churn out works. Like with software, this is in large part because everyone can write, and so there is a glut of content, and while a lot of it is poorly written tripe, there's a glut of quality content in almost every niche that is good enough that outstrips the demand, and so only the tiniest proportion of authors earns well. Like with software, a lot of people also do it because they want to, rather than for the money, which further drives down the prices. I've published two novels. They've sold substantially better than average but nowhere near bestseller level. And yet, despite selling substantially better than average, they're the lowest paid work I've done in more than two decades. I'm a fast writer - the second novel took me 3 weeks. It's still never going to pay for itself. That's okay. If I wanted to earn a living from writing, I'd look to write articles or columns for magazines and newspapers, or doing copywriting, paid by the word, rather than writing novels.
pjmlp 1y ago
The return to 90's style licenses kind of makes the point of everyone realizing someone has to put into the money, capitalism doesn't work with pull requests to upstream.
- anthk 1y ago
  Libre licenses boosted computing like no else. The 90's was mostly about turds in golden cases.
  - musicale 1y ago
    90% of everything is crap (Sturgeon's law), but as I understand both commercial and free software advanced quite a bit in the 1990s: Visual BASIC, HyperCard 2.0, Java, JavaScript, Linux, MacOS System 7-9, TrueType, Windows 95, Windows NT, Photoshop, Microsoft Office, Encarta, Lotus Notes 2.0, MPEG, QuickTime, video editing (Video Toaster etc.), Pro Tools, MP3 encoders/players and WinAmp, Acrobat and PDF software, WWW, Apache, NCSA Mosaic, Netscape Navigator, FrontPage (and other html editors), ICQ and Instant Messenger, video conferencing (CU-SeeMe), various IDEs (Eclipse), etc. Not to mention incredible developments in PC, console and arcade games...
    - anthk 1y ago
      Ehhh... I disagree. Java -> Bloated compared to Icon/TCL VB -> OKish, but TCL/Tk and a bit of C did wonders under Unix. NT -> Good, advanced 95 -> Mediocre against Amiga/Mac. MSO -> Polished turd and uberused, giving disasters such as the renaming on Genomics and tons of papers now being void. MPEG -> Good, bound to TV and multimedia standards. QT -> Propietary crap, but QT3D was and it's still interesting. Lqtplay from libquicktime plays them well. MP3 -> Opus and OGG preferred here Acrobat/PDF -> PostScript and DJVU Netscape/FrontPage -> Damn crazy bloat with opaque formats on tons of stuff not bound to proper terminology. Even using Emacs editing HTML pages seems easier. Composer looked easier than FP, for sure. Videoconf -> Yes, h323 and friends. IDE's -> A lot of them were better under DOS or very bloated under Windows, such as Eclipse, Netbeans... PC/Console -> Yep, 3DFX/Glide and free Unixen, but consoles went downhill, the PC was set ahead since the Unreal engine.