[bevekspldnw]

As somebody who pulled down an open source project I find this trope of FOSS losing its way for greed utterly disingenuous.

People need to put food on the table, period. I’ve had people take my work and make more money from it than I have, with no attribution or credit.

Then I pulled it down and got a lot of people asking why it’s no longer free, when I tell them I can sell them a license they don’t even reply.

I care more about my family than your FOSS ideals. End of story.

[nurple]

The point is to benefit humanity, not make money. With that said, sure this ideology seems impossible to realize change in the current money-obsessed world, but the thing is that these ideologies are simply incompatible. Yes, I'd say that you are also unfortunately money-obsessed, your whole post is centered on it; I don't blame you though, I also have to focus a majority of my life on money to raise my children, but it doesn't have to be like that.

We won't make change until enough people are willing to sacrifice to make it, and most people just aren't willing to bear that load when going with the existing system, while broken, alleviates that pain while unfortunately also acting as a network multiplier to not just perpetuate, but also strengthen, the status quo.

Make no mistake, the existing system is built with features made explicitly to limit your freedom. You simply can't live without selling your labor. If you look at a lot of people trying to start their own businesses (FLOSS or not), they're trying to use the system to earn their freedom in a system where true self-determination and financial independence are synonymous.

That's all the FLOSS ideology is, buying our common self determination through leveraging the power of computing. And looking at how much money it's generated, you can't say that was an impossible dream, but we're losing the war.

[bevekspldnw]

Cool, I’ll send you my land lords banking info so you can pay my rent, the info for my kids childcare, and where to contribute to my retirement account.

Also, for what it’s worth, I’ve forgone millions of dollars in compensation over the years to work on socially beneficial projects, and literally just left $250k on the table last year alone. But yeah, wanting to support my family makes me greedy.

[nurple]

I said money-obsessed, not greedy, not really the same thing, but it is something that's becoming more and more pervasive. Case in point, your whole response was focused purely on money.

I actually find it pretty interesting that there's so much hostility towards my posts when I attempt to start a discussion on alternatives to our present and decaying society. Like, it is a lack of imagination? A resignation to reality? Belief that this is the best we can do?

Personally, I /can/ envision a future without landlords, banking info, and retirement accounts, where we direct the immense productivity of our people away from one that necessitates a focus on money. I guess I'll just need to work on my pitch.

[bevekspldnw]

I’ve been working in digital rights and advocacy for years. High rhetoric isn’t how you change things, it’s long-term commitment to meaningful action that must be sustained or it will falter.

My annoyance is that I’ve had this discussion a hundred times and unless you are in the trenches trying to make change while supporting your family I’m not really interested in musings on what a better world looks like, I’m busy trying to support myself doing the work to make it happen.

And per my comment above, I’ve given up a TON of money, but I still deserve to have money in my pocket.

[nurple]

Now that's something I can work with. I don't intentionally spout high rhetoric as a way to chastise or belittle, though I admit I do let frustration leak into my words. I honestly am looking for how I and more people can be a part of a change, I do _want_ productive discussions.

This week has been an interesting one for me, my perspective has shifted quite drastically. Honestly I was bitter, I found that I was unintentionally on a mission to inflate perceived injustices to create bad people in my mind, ostensibly for the purpose of making myself look "good" in comparison. I let that need leak into my interpersonal interactions in an attempt to push that juxtaposition into other people's minds.

I'm not in the trenches like you because I spent a decade focusing on bootstrapping a company because I wanted money, and I selfishly wanted to just ignore everything that bothered me and focus on what I loved doing. In the end it ruined most of what I actually value, and that changed me in ways I hadn't realized; in the end I burned myself and bridges as those things began to crumble.

I will say that I've thought a lot about our conversation this week as I've been trying to find a path to somewhere better, as I do struggle a lot with what you're saying as I have kids of my own, some adult, who are seriously struggling because of the screwed up money obsessed world we find ourselves in.

A pretty big part of the torment I was laying on myself was because I didn't feel like I deserved the monetary success I had worked so hard to find, I felt like liquidating my value as my co-founder had was tantamount to becoming one of those people I so fervently despised. I've instead been trying to prove to myself that I could do it again on my own, with the expected result.

I decided to call our investor this week and negotiated a buyout of my equity. Now I guess I just need to figure out how I can turn that into some good in the world. I'm incredibly grateful at this point actually, I've experienced having nothing, I've experience true hopelessness, and I've experienced how much even a small gesture by someone who cares can drastically change one's circumstances and frame of mind.

If there's anything you could share with me about your experience in advocacy, I would be humbly thankful.

I apologize for how I treated you.

[lelanthran]

> The point is to benefit humanity, not make money.

Maybe, but the priority is to put food on the table. You can't benefit humanity if you're dead.

[bevekspldnw]

Never underestimate the willingness of people to have others suffer for their ideals.

[sanderjd]

Yep, free software originated among academics employed by institutions who paid them for things things other than their creation of software. And good on them!

But there just aren't enough professors, grad students, or young people with plenty of extra time on their hands, to build all this stuff for free.

[bevekspldnw]

Also, that code tends to be proof of concept, full of bugs, and never audited or used in production.

Academic peer review doesn’t include code review.

[marcos100]

Do you share a part of you charge with the people that contributed? If not, what you're doing is the same as what others did when they took your work and profited from it.

You've all agreed what can and can't be done with your code based on the license you used.

If you want to make money with software, it's proprietary or dual-licensed (A)GPL with CLA. Anything else you'll bait and switch on people.

[aydyn]

Have you made meaningfully more money from it after taking it down?

[bevekspldnw]

Yes.

[globular-toast]

How did stopping them use it feed your family?

[mfru]

Well, apparently it stopped people who made profit specifically by using their project without giving back and that might have alleviated the OPs frustration, which is fair enough.

[bevekspldnw]

Because I’m in the same market now and they are my competitors so I can’t monetize my work at cost if somebody else is taking my labor for free and undercutting me on price.

These aren’t hard concepts.