Jimmy Wales's Open Source Collaboration Tips

destinyland writes "In a new interview Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales acknowledges his debt to Richard Stallman's Free Software Foundation and discusses his new open source search project. He applauds the way Open Source developers work around their ideological differences, acknowledges that he's an Ayn Rand objectivist who's skeptical of the wisdom of crowds, and blames Slashdot for his grandstanding comment that Wikipedia would bury Encyclopedia Brittanica within five years."

Article and title don't match...

[jrockway]

If you're actually looking for open source collaboration tips, take a look at Karl Fogel's (freely-available) book:

http://producingoss.com/html-chunk/index.html [producingoss.com]

OSS idealogical differences... what a crock!

[EmbeddedJanitor]

This paints a picture of most open source projects being run like Wikipedia is, in an "anyone can edit" mode. What crap.

I know of no successful open source software projects run that way. On all the successful open source projects only few are granted write access to cvs/svn and most open source projects are run by one or two very opinionated people who do not accomodate others on a whim. In most cases, people finding a problem submit a patch and onte of the trusted few will apply it. In many cases, the patch will not be applied directly, but will be rewritten to achieve the desired effect better.

Sure people can take all the code and fork the project, but that is very different to having control over the document. You very seldom get wikipeia-style edit wars in OSS code bases because "the boss" does not tolerate it. Abuse the privaledge of write access and you lose it.

To draw a parallels between Wikipedia (which is uncontrolled) and Open Source (which is controlled) just does Open Source a disservice. There's enough anti-Open Source FUD out there and we don't need people thinking that any dummy with a chip on their shoulder can modifyt open source.

Re:

[jrockway]

Did you read the book? His experience is modeled off Subversion (he wrote it). Subversion is pretty successful.

As an aside, we run Catalyst [catalystframework.org] the same way (but with a little bit less bureaucracy, and fewer core contributers).

svn is not "anybody edits"

[EmbeddedJanitor]

svn is an example that supports my statements. svn is successful and it is not "anybody edits". If you wish to contribute to svn, you either have to become a committer or you send in patches which get vetted and applied by the patch manager (read svn's website for details on the process). Joe Sixpack can't just jump in and modify svn code, like you can do with Wikipedia content.

Thus, drawing parallels between Wikipedia content and OS projects is misguided. Perhaps if Wikipedia pages were controlled by "patc

Re:

[ajs]

To draw a parallels between Wikipedia (which is uncontrolled) and Open Source (which is controlled) just does Open Source a disservice.

Well, first off, Wikipedia isn't uncontrolled, and what you are focusing on seems to be a fundamental difference in release cycles rather than development models. In an open source project of sufficient scope to map to Wikipedia, there are typically a core of "admins" who do not write code nearly so much as they make sure the various sub-projects are working together. Wales and the Wikimedia Board do this for Wikipedia et al.

Then you have the various projects that make up the whole product. Look at the Lin

If you don't believe in the wisdom of crowds

[catbutt]

you should throw all your money at the stock market, because if you have any brains whatsoever you can get rich. You should certainly be able to predict better than those stupid crowds whether the stock will go up or down.

Maybe the problem is that wikipedia, as it is currently designed, doesn't tap into that wisdom as effectively as a market does.

Re:

[kfg]

. . .you should throw all your money at the stock market

Dude, that's what the crowd does.

KFG

Re:

[Half-pint HAL]

you should throw all your money at the stock market, because if you have any brains whatsoever you can get rich. You should certainly be able to predict better than those stupid crowds whether the stock will go up or down.

Hmmm.... Am I to take it that you believe that the crowds "predict" the stock market?

That's a fallacy, and is akin to saying that voters predict the outcome of elections. Just as the voters determine the winner of an election, the crowd -- the market -- steer the value of stocks.

HAL.

Re:

[catbutt]

Huh?

Try something simpler, like prediction markets (example: intrade.com). The crowd predicts the chances of whatever happening. For example right now it is predicting that the chance of Obama being the democratic candidate is around 19%. Do you think you can consistantly predict more accurately? If you can, you can make a ton of money.

Stock markets are basically the same thing. Calling it a "fallacy" is ridiculous....its just a way of looking at things, and a valid one.

Stock market vs. betting parlor

[Kadin2048]

The difference between the "prediction market" you're talking about, and the actual stock market, is that in the prediction market, the bettors (for that's what they really are) don't determine the outcome.

If you bet on whether Obama is going to be the next Democratic presidential candidate, your bet doesn't directly influence the outcome (except perhaps in some very indirect, butterfly-effect-like fashion, but we'll ignore that). The two are independent. It's just like betting on a horse race, or a footbal

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[catbutt]

The ultimate long term prediction of the stock market is how much profits the company will make. However, you can also bet on the short term, which is whether the stock will go up or down.

Note that you can play the prediction markets the same way, betting on the price of the shares (selling prior to the date of the election/game etc)

In any case, if it makes it easier to see the point, just talk about prediction markets. You are left with one of two logical conclusions: 1) the crowd is remarkably accura

Re:If you don't believe in the wisdom of crowds

[WolfWithoutAClause]

On that basis predicting the weather should be easy, since molecules in the atmosphere are dumb as rocks, even dumber that dumb people.

And yet... weather forecasting requires supercomputers.

You're confusing dumbness with predictability. They're not the same thing, although dumb people can be predictable sometimes.

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[FallLine]

If you don't believe in the wisdom of crowds you should throw all your money at the stock market, because if you have any brains whatsoever you can get rich. You should certainly be able to predict better than those stupid crowds whether the stock will go up or down.

Maybe the problem is that wikipedia, as it is currently designed, doesn't tap into that wisdom as effectively as a market does.

First, this is a non sequitur. One could be able to significantly out-predict the market, but rationally choose no

skeptical of crowds

[micktaggart]

If you are skeptical of crowds, you should try to use one of them talk pages once...

Yeah, well

[User 956]

[He] blames Slashdot for his grandstanding comment that Wikipedia would bury Encyclopedia Brittanica within five years.

Actually, according to Wikipedia, the number of years in which Wikipedia will bury Encyclopedia Brittanica has tripled in the last six months.

Re:Yeah, well

[Trillan]

+{{fact}} :)

Reality

[Torgo's Pizza]

Jimmy Wales needs to learn that reality has become a commodity.

Re:

[Pinkfud]

Seems like I read that just yesterday on meta.wikimedia.org. Are you the one who made that little mess?

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[subl33t]

I heartily agree, just look at all the shee... people drooling over the iPhone!

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[britneys 9th husband]

You're asking too much -- he still hasn't noticed the recent tripling of the elephant population.

Audio version of the interview

[destinyland]

There's a little bit more detail and context in the audio of the interview [rusiriusradio.com].

No, he does not blame Slashdot.

[Anonymous Coward]

He doesn't blame Slashdot, he blames himself for writing something on Slashdot to rile up the Slashdotters.

Come on, summarizer! This is the guy from Wikipedia, who discusses the importance of distinguishing a channel from its content just a bit higher up in TFA, for crying out loud. Read the damn thing!

Crowds always make good decisions

[andy314159pi]

that he's an Ayn Rand objectivist who's skeptical of the wisdom of crowds

Kill the wise one!

Reply on Ayn:Crowds always make good decisions

[OldHawk777]

My understanding of Ayn Rand is as an existentialist story teller [AKA: writer/philosopher].

Yes, I agree Ayn Rand was an objectivist; However, as an objectivist the story/philosophy must be equally skeptical of the wisdom of self and crowds. As an existentialist, you decide for only yourself (no others). As an objective existentialist, you may decide for only yourself (no others) which (self, crowd, ...) wisdom/philosophy a/o decision [AKA: The Experience and Knowledge (TEK)] is the best.

Ayn Rand the existe

Two more

[Apotsy]

Here's a couple you won't see mentioned:

• Oust your co-founder and start claiming that you are the sole founder. It's okay if your organization's own [wikipedia.org] past [wikipedia.org] press releases [wikipedia.org] contradict what you are now saying. No one will notice!
• Claim that the majority of work is done by a group of people who actually don't really contribute that much [aaronsw.com].

I'm sure there's more.

Claim that anyone who isn't in the groupthink

[Moryath]

is a "troll."

Advocate banning "trolls" whenever possible, especially when they threaten to expose malfeasance on the part of your worst employees.

Call one of your detractors a "disease" in your IRC channels, then deny you said it (even though it was logged) and create an entire "biography" on the person devoted solely to libeling them, in violation of publication laws and your own "standards" for biographical entries.

Suggest in your logged, publicly available email lists for the project that "lone wolves" should start filing dishonest "complaints" with the hosting ISP against a site critical of your behavior.

Take the money donated for "the project" and build a new house with it.

Re:

[nuzak]

How about a few links? If Wikipedia has taught me anything, it's that unsourced information is bullshit.

Re:

[Apotsy]

You needed wikipedia to teach you that?

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[nuzak]

As Foghorn Leghorn would say: Son, you're about as sharp as a bowling ball.

No, I didn't need Wikipedia to teach me that. I think coders are the most gullible people on earth, because they have an automatic assumption that what's put down to text is representative of perfect logical truths. Must explain the Rand thing too.

Re:

[Apotsy]

Son, that's what we call backpedallin'

Re:

[WilliamSChips]

A link may not be a guarantee but stubborn refusal to provide a reference of any kind is suspicious and rightfully so, because the number one cause of that is if you're pulling it out of your ass.

No Sight of the Cite of the site

[The Monster]

A link may not be a guarantee but stubborn refusal to provide a reference of any kind is suspicious and rightfully so, because the number one cause of that is if you're pulling it out of your ass.

In fact, this is true 72.45% of the time according to a recent survey [citation needed].

Do what I do

[cheezfreek]

When in doubt, blame Slashdot. It's fun for the whole family.

I just shrugged...

[Grinin]

but then again, I'm no Atlas

The secret to not being a lame-o Objectivist.

[TheNarrator]

When I was a young lad I was really into Ayn Rand for a long time and read all her books and all the non-fiction stuff. It was fun and interesting. I was a randroid, debated on usenet. blah blah.

Then I realized that there aren't all these super-human man-god objectivists that are being held down by the evil-evader looters. Really the world is a big soup of mediocrity, confusion, uncertainty and incompetence and everybody just tries the best they can. Even people who are genius architects are probably about average as track atheletes or at writing poetry. Thus the need to co-operate with other people who are good at different things and the need for humility, listening to people, etc.

Really Rand is a reflection more generally of Russian thought which is that everything is either perfect and godlike or low, despicable and corrupt. Look at the characters in the Brothers Karamozov for example. The real world is a lot more ambiguous.

Re:

[Capitalist1]

Were you one of those Randroids who didn't actually read her books, perhaps?

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[Fallingcow]

Has to be, since he characterized them as being "fun and interesting".

Just poking good-hearted fun at it, not flaming :)

But seriously, The Fountainhead may be the most overrated novel ever. The worst part of the experience of reading it is when you realize that she's not really going anywhere with this, and that the "lesson" from the first episode (and every. single. subsequent. episode.) is actually the only thing she's trying to say. Possibly a salvageable situation if you throw in some interesting and

Re:

[Watson Ladd]

I read her books, and they turned me into an anarcho-syndacist. Because that's what the society at the end of Atlas Shrugged is.

One project too many?

[pfafrich]

It seems like Wales is on a project creation frenzy, it seems like every month theres yet another project launched from Wales and Beesley. Actually I exaggerate but the previous big announcement http://campaigns.wikia.com/ [wikia.com] seems to be pretty inactive now. I fear the same will happen for the new search engine. Does jimbo have the time to dedicate to making this happen, or is it vapor-ware?

And Rand's article gets polished nicely

[LGagnon]

One thing I've noticed over the years as a Wikipedia contributor is that there's nothing done to stop Rand's wacko cult followers from turning her article into a shrine to her. I once tried to fix this problem, but it turns out that her cult will not allow anything, no matter how well cited, to make her look bad. To this day, I can still point to biases left in the article that they will not allow anyone to correct. And even when there are admins around, her followers are allowed to harass contributors who

gratitude

[doti]

RU: Have you been interested in the open source movement for a long time? Are you a fan of Richard Stallman and the Free Software Foundation?

JW: Oh yeah. We really owe Richard a debt of gratitude for all that.

So do I. [googlepages.com]

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:

[nuzak]

If you're one of those Reality-Denoying Looters who doesn't want to pay for a book, the gist is also in Michael Shermer's essay, The Unlikeliest Cult in History [2think.org]. Shermer's name and reputation might be familiar to folks who travel in Objectivist circles too.

Re:

[stinerman]

Even then, if Jimbo is a follower of Rand, he's done about the exact opposite of her views.

Rand would look at Wikipedia and shudder. Wikipedia is the embodiment of altruism. People helping people for reasons other than to further their own status ... sickening. Jimbo should be out exploiting people, not helping them.

Re:

[haakondahl]

Helping each other for no reason? Is that what I was doing on Wikipedia? I thought that I was engaging in a hobby I enjoy, which is of benefit to me. I thought I was maintaining a system which I find useful, which is of benefit to me. I thought I was testing my own knowledge and plagia^H^H^H^H^Hresearch skill against others who comment in the same areas; all of which benefits me.

We are all free to engage in behavior which we find pleasing. Please don't call yours altruism when in fact, you derive plea

Re:Ayn Rand? The fan dancer?

[WilliamSChips]

Altruism is doing something that benefits other people when you only indirectly benefit from it. That describes 90% of Wikipedia contributions. Personal pleasure doesn't even enter into it, and can't, because unless you're under coercion you are always doing things for some sort of personal pleasure. Actually even if you're under coercion it's usually the pleasure of a lack of pain.

Re:

[StikyPad]

Personal pleasure doesn't even enter into it, and can't, because...you are always doing things for some sort of personal pleasure.

So by "not entering into it," you mean "is the single biggest reason people do anything." Got it.

Re:

[WilliamSChips]

I mean that it doesn't enter into what altruism means because if it does then there is no altruism and the term itself becomes meaningless ergo my definition.

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[Lemmy Caution]

There's a circularity to arguing that deriving pleasure from an altruistic act makes it non-altruistic. If one derives pleasure - even if it is the pleasure of a more comfortable self-image, from the knowledge that one simply has helped another, then it is an altruistic pleasure. Even simply knowing that one's own altruism creates the possibility of another's altruism which may someday benefit you may generate a kind of pleasure. What is important is that the pleasure not derive from another direct source

Re:

[StikyPad]

What is important is that there is no expectation of the benefit created directly by the action for the actor (e.g., I pay for a meal for another that I do not eat[)]

It's difficult to say there's no expectation of reciprocity in most situations, since we know there's a socially implied expectation. If Steve buys you a lunch today, you're socially expected to return the favor when you can, and if you don't, Steve may well be offended, or at least disappointed, neither of which would be possible if there wer

Re:

[Arker]

No, altruism is doing things for others that you do NOT benefit from.

Doing things for others that you benefit from indirectly is called 'enlightened egoisms.'

As opposed to the brute egoism of those who can't see the indirect benefits.

Re:

[WilliamSChips]

Well I say indirectly because IMHO doing altruistic things for other people encourages them to do altruistic things which will eventually benefit everybody including you, in a Prisoner's Dilemma kind of way. That's the evolutionary reason we even have individual altruism at all.

Rationalization

[Anonymous Coward]

> Is that what I was doing on Wikipedia? I thought that I was engaging in a hobby I enjoy, which is of benefit to me.

Weird. Normal people rationalize away their greed and selfishness. I never realized that Rand's followers rationalized altrusim, instead...

I'm not complaining, mind you--I'd much rather you were altrusitic than some greedy asshole--but I confess that the notion of rationalizing it seems odd to me. You usually only rationalize bad things :-)

Re:

[WilliamSChips]

They have to rationalize away the fact that they're *gasp* helping the evil societal leeches who deserve to be beneath us superman industrialists!

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[nagora]

People helping people for reasons other than to further their own status

This must be some alien, non-clique ridden, Wikipedia that I've never seen.

TWW

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[Pluvius]

Wikipedia is the embodiment of altruism. People helping people for reasons other than to further their own status ... sickening.

Have you actually been to Wikipedia lately?

At any rate, I agree that Rand would hate Wikipedia, but only because of its "everyone has a say" open-source traits. Though of course Wikipedia is now making some people "more equal than others."

Rob

Re:

[IL-CSIXTY4]

Rand would look at Wikipedia and shudder. Wikipedia is the embodiment of altruism.

I don't think there are people making sacrifices in their own lives to write Wikipedia entries, nor are there people holding guns to the other group making them write Wikipedia entries.

Rand would have loved Wikipedia, IMHO. It's the embodiment of *selfishness*, as she saw the meaning of the word:

1. People write Wikipedia entries voluntarily
2. They're building a storehouse of knowledge to make factual information available t

Re:

[nuzak]

> They're building a storehouse of knowledge to make factual information available to everyone

Why would Rand care about something done for this nebulous "everyone", especially when no one pays for it?

Re:

[IL-CSIXTY4]

Why would Rand care about something done for this nebulous "everyone", especially when no one pays for it?

Good point :)

Let's try phrasing it this way:

People with knowledge are creating a resource by which any individual who seeks knowledge may find it, and people are donating the fruits of their labors (money) to the WikiMedia Foundation because they value the dissemination of knowledge to those who value and crave it.

Wow...sounds wordy enough to be from the pages of Atlas Shrugged.

Re:

[nuzak]

Yep, with enough turgid prose, you can justify pretty much anything, including outright charity and altruism.

Of course Rand also believed that anyone who liked Strauss as opposed to Rachmaninov was also "denying reality" and directed exactly the same vitriol that way. Same went for painters, actors, and so on. Really goofy boid, that Rand dame.

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[owlnation]

Wikipedia is the embodiment of altruism. People helping people for reasons other than to further their own status ... sickening. Jimbo should be out exploiting people, not helping them.

I think the word "altruism" doesn't mean what you think it means. I've seen plenty of people on Wikipedia attacking others to further their own status - some editors attack too, not just "vandals". Wikipedia is an exercise in vanity as much as it is even approaching altruism. As to Jimbo exploiting people... certainly not ob

Re:

[stinerman]

The goal of the Wikimedia foundation is to develop and maintain open content, wiki-based projects and to provide the full contents of those projects to the public free of charge.

That sounds pretty "selfless". Now some of the individuals who make up Wikipedia might be assholes, but I don't really do much work there, so I don't know. I contribute because I want to make things better for others. I want everyone to have access to correct information, not because I get a hard-on for having more edits than som

Re:

[EricTheGreen]

Even then, if Jimbo is a follower of Rand, he's done about the exact opposite of her views.

Rand would look at Wikipedia and shudder. Wikipedia is the embodiment of altruism. People helping people for reasons other than to further their own status ... sickening.

Rubbish. As well to say that Rand (or any Objectivist, for that matter) would disapprove of someone volunteering to help out on the local library council. Or promoting an effort to build a new library, for that matter.

Rather, the "exact oppposite"

Re:

[LGagnon]

You'd be surprised, but neuroscience is disproving Rand's pseudophilosophy:
http://www.boingboing.net/2007/01/23/neuroscience_ of_altr.html [boingboing.net]

Re:

[haakondahl]

You sound like you were beaten up by an Objectivist in college.

"Really, whenever someone professes such hostility toward an old dead woman who wrote turgid novels, I can only assume that it is out of indolence, a mere reading of Walker's book, and a lack of any real training in Objectivism, etc..."

Lighten up. Or you'll get Piekoff on your case.

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[Knuckles]

Well, I am hostile to Rand because I read Atlas Shrugged.

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[julesh]

Why doesn't Jimbo just say he's an individualist, why bring up Rand at all?

Because a lot more people know about Rand and what she wrote than actually understand the implication of the term Objectivist. It's the easiest way of explaining it to most people.

Re:Ayn Rand? The fan dancer?

[CaffeineAddict2001]

You might be an Ayn Rand objectivist if:

You're a brilliant innovator. Really. You'd show us... but we're not worthy of benefiting from your genius.

You replaced your subscription of Penthouse with the Wall Street Journal and read it for the same purpose.

Whenever you visit a national park you lament all the sky scrapers that should have been built there instead.

You day dream about escaping to Galt's Gulch, even though the male\female ratio is something like 10:1. Hey, it worked for the Smurfs.

It takes you 20 minutes to explain to people the concept of "A thing is itself" and wonder why people think you are condescending.

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[Life2Short]

Funniest thing I've read on Slashdot in the last 6 years. Thank you.

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[kfg]

. . .a mere reading of her two fat novels. . .

Is enough to fry your brain into a mass of undifferentiated goo.

KFG

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[radtea]

What does Ayn Rand have to do with philosophy? Indeed. Whenever someone professes admiration for Ayn Rand, I can only assume that it is out of ignorance, a mere reading of her two fat novels without any training in real philosophy

There are a small number of people (a few dozen worldwide, maybe) who don't fall into that category, and Jimmy is one of them. Although his background is primarily in economics and I wouldn't accuse him of being a deep philosophical thinker, in the mid-90's he organized and ran th

Only collectivism creates individual freedom

[spun]

Collectivism allows the individual to persue his goals. Without the support of others, people are very limited in what they can do. Without collectivism, we would each be at the mercy of the strong and amoral, as well as nature. There's an old African proverb that peaks to the reciprocal nature of individual freedom and social responsibility: Only free individuals can make a strong tribe. Only a strong tribe can make free individuals.

Collectivism can be dangerous too

[FallLine]

Collectivism allows the individual to persue his goals. Without the support of others, people are very limited in what they can do. Without collectivism, we would each be at the mercy of the strong and amoral, as well as nature. There's an old African proverb that peaks to the reciprocal nature of individual freedom and social responsibility: Only free individuals can make a strong tribe. Only a strong tribe can make free individuals.

Individualism allows the group to pursue its goals. Without the hard w

Re:

[spun]

Survival is the most basic freedom of all. If I do not have access to the means of survival because I do not own property, I am at the mercy of property holders. I may technically have all the freedom in the world, but I would have to give it all away to survive. Redistributing assets would then amount to protecting basic freedoms.

All natural resources were originally shared by any who could use them. What gives a person the right to steal from us all for his own personal gain? Before a person works land, t

Re:

[nuzak]

> Here's a clue: communism has never even been tried.

I'm no philosopher, but perhaps there's something inherently wrong with a sociopolitical theory that, despite hundreds of earnest and large-scale attempts across the many years and places, hasn't been judged to have risen to the level of even having been tried, let alone accomplished.

Or maybe the "true XYZ has never been done" rationalization is just a variant on the No True Scotsman fallacy.

Re:

[birdboy2000]

It's not a no true scotsman fallacy, its an acknowledgment of Lenin's serious deviations from what Marx actually wrote, what with a dictatorship, "vanguard party" (Read: New elite) and all, and the fact that Leninism, not Marxism, was the driving force behind the other communist revolutions worldwide.

Re:

[Lemmy Caution]

Marx wrote very little about what might follow capitalism. For him, the political control of the means of production by the proletariat was the first and last condition. There was very little to deviate from: Lenin believed he was, really, creating a communist society: he may have been authoritarian, anti-democratic, arrogant and violent, but he wasn't cynical. (Stalin, on the other hand, was all that and cynical.)

It is always easier to praise the book-writers than the people who do the dirty work of histor

Re:

[nuzak]

> adore Nietzsche and Schopenhauer and repudiate the fascists (Adolph H. was fonder of the latter than the former, surprisingly.)

Elizabeth Nietzsche was an ardent Nazi (no, Hitler did not invent them) and presented her brother's works personally to Hitler, who expressed an admiration for them. Presumably she cut out the parts where he praised the Jews for being "the strongest purest race in Europe", plus his numerous excoriations and vilifications of the Nazis. One imagines that if Hitler had actually

Re:

[Lemmy Caution]

To be more exact, Nietzsche repudiated racialists and hyper-nationalists. There were not Nazis as such until well after his death. At the same time, his writing was at times ambiguous: selective reading can turn him into a number of things. It could be argued that he still relied on ethno-characterological profiles that were compatible with Nazism.

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[PCM2]

So ownership of real property is theft, and society has a right to distribute property so that all men have the ability to support themselves without selling themselves into slavery.

How, pray tell, does one sell oneself into slavery? Where I was raised, we just called that work.

Individualists feel the weak are their rightful prey, and resent anything that allows their prey to escape. That is the true reason they oppose collective action: they want to take advantage of people one by one.

Wow. You are

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[spun]

If one has to accept the deal offered, no matter how bad, because otherwise one would starve, that is slavery. And you have no argument, so must resort to ad-hominem.

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[FallLine]

Survival is the most basic freedom of all.

Virtually everyone in the western world is doing much better than merely surviving. In point of fact, they're living much longer than at any other point in history. Survival has never been guaranteed, but thanks to the ingenuity and hard work of a great many individuals the overwhelming majority of us live quite comfortably.

All natural resources were originally shared by any who could use them.

Nonsense. People have been fighting over resources as long as ma

Re:

[tehcyder]

There's an old saying that goes something like: First they came for the X, I remained silent, I was not X. Then they came from Y, I remained silent, I was not a Y.... When they came for me, there was no one left to speak out.

As this is hardly an obscure reference on slashdot (it comes up almost as often as "give a man a fish and he is fed for a day...") would it really be that much effort to quote it accurately?

Oh, and the original by Pastor Martin Niemöller is about the need for collective politica

Re:

[FallLine]

As this is hardly an obscure reference on slashdot (it comes up almost as often as "give a man a fish and he is fed for a day...") would it really be that much effort to quote it accurately?

There is no "one" definitive original quote that anyone can point to and actually prove [ucsb.edu]. The point it conveys is the same regardless.

Oh, and the original by Pastor Martin Niemöller is about the need for collective political action, and the need not to be inward-looking and selfish, so it's not exactly a defence

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

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[nuzak]

If you love science, reasoning, don't hate yourself, like trading the things that you create for things of value created by others, and generally find that your own happiness is important to you, it's likely that you'll love Ayn Rand's writings.

I love all those things up til you get to Ayn Rand. She's a poor writer, a hateful polemicist, and a shoddy philosopher. I don't find it the least bit inconsistent that her vile bilge is inconsistent with my own philosophies, even if they overlap halfway.

If you can

Objectivism: comic-book reality

[WilliamSChips]

If it weren't for people who help other people, I probably would be in a much worse place than I am in right now. Several of my teachers have said that I am the smartest person they have ever known, and I'm not even making this up. But I have Asperger's Syndrome and it has lead to me being almost entirely emotionally inept. Things like this are the standard for smart people--one switch on, one switch off. Supporters of individual fanaticism like the majority of the Objectivist movement is predicated on

Re:

[bogie]

Not sure if you are joking, but he's referring to Ayn Rand of the Atlas Shrugged variety. Whenever I hear anyone mentioning Rand it seems to be in the vein of laissez-faire capitalism and an "every man for himself" philosophy. Usually I end up not liking that person very much, but that's just me.

Re:

[kfg]

Yes, it's a joke. For the necessary background I refer you to; Wikipedia:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sally_Rand [wikipedia.org]

Usually I end up not liking that person very much. . .

We might get along.

KFG

Re:

[udderly]

Atlas Shrugged is a melodramatic joke of a book with such a childish storyline that I'm surprised that anyone takes her "philosophy" seriously. As other posters have indicated, her "serious" philosophical work is regarded with derision by most in the field. Her so-called ethical system had been demolished by others more rigorous and of greater intellect (Kant, Hume, Hobbes, Kierkegaard) before she was even born.

Like you, I have to admit to a experiential distaste for her adherents. I have found that th

Re:

[Pxtl]

Suicidal graduate English assignment:

Compare and Contrast the Turner Diaries and Atlas Shrugged.

If you can complete this project without your brain melting, you get a free straight-jacket. /not that I'm saying that Atlas Shrugged is anywhere near on the level of monstrosity as The Turner Diaries - I'm just picking out two books that tend to make people wince at the very thought of their existence.

Re:

[drinkypoo]

I assume you're talking about cinelerra or something. Negligence is when your build instructions don't work. Thank you, and have a nice day.

Re:

[morgan_greywolf]

Really? They don't work?

Have you been successful in getting it to work? Because I was about to try that app as soon as I had the chance...

Re:

[drinkypoo]

Have you been successful in getting it to work? Because I was about to try that app as soon as I had the chance...

Well, they didn't work for me anyway, on Ubuntu. I did go around installing things. Finally I found a repo that would let me install it; if I were booted into Linux right now I'd look it up and tell you what it was. Suffice to say that you can find binary packages and this is definitely the method I'd suggest for trying out cinelerra. I noodled around with the build for quite a while and fina

Re:

[petermgreen]

Negligence is when your build instructions don't work.
so you expect people to test thier build on every version of every linux distro or even every unix-like system out there?

that is one of the downsides of a system like linux, all the distros are different so you can't gaurantee that what works on one will work on all of them.

Re:

[bjourne]

I take it you have not graduated from Slashdot Trolling 101 yet?

Re:If you don't have the time, don't do it

[morgan_greywolf]

I

f you don't have the time and the resources to fully support what you put on the internet, don't do it, or plan on a huge legal bill. You will be sued for negligence. You will lose your job. You're obligated to support what you put on the internet, whether or not the GPL says "no warranty".

Obligated by whom? If Linus and his band of merry kernel hackers got together and said "Ok, we've all had enough of Linux. Time to move on!", except to fulfill 3rd-party contractural obligations (i.e., Linus works for OSDL, Alan Cox for Red Hat, etc.), what would prevent them from doing so? Nothing!

You use software that you didn't pay for, in terms of support you deserve exactly what you paid for. If the authors happen to be kind enough to return your e-mails instead of snickering 'RTFM', that great, but a FOSS author is under no obligation to support anything. If he wants his project to succeed, he will have to support what he's written for at least some time, but nobody's gonna put his feet to the coals for dropping support for a project he no longer has time for.

Re:

[Anonymous Coward]

"If you don't have the time and the resources to fully support what you put on the internet, don't do it, or plan on a huge legal bill."

Based on what legal theory?

"You will be sued for negligence."

What did I "neglect" to do?

"You're obligated to support what you put on the internet, whether or not the GPL says "no warranty"."

Bullshit. I'm not 'obliged' (that's the word you are searching for) to provide anything for free) to do anything unless you pay me. That is called a 'contract'. You provide me something

Re:

[PCM2]

No it isn't. Encyclopaedia Britannica Inc. is an American company headquartered in Chicago. "Encyclopaedia Britannica" is that company's trademark. Typesetting the "ae" as a ligature is optional.

Just like /.

[The Monster]

Anyone who can write a spoken language can contribute to Wikipedia.

...As well as an awful lot of people who can't. In certain genres, the grammar is horrendous, the spelling abysmal, and the less said about the punctuation, the better.

As someone who tries to do something about it, I often don't bother, because some articles are that badly written.