

Why Doesn't Anyone Give a Crap About Freedom Zero? (a new Mac is a "giant hardware dongle") - toffer
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001044.html

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nickb
Zed Shaw already exposed Jeff's hypocrisy:

<http://www.zedshaw.com/conferences/cusec2008.html>

Finally I watched Jeff Atwood of Coding Horror fame talk about what a lot of
other people have said and why you should blog. I completely agreed with
everything Jeff said, except for a tiny bit of hypocrisy he didn't fess up to
until asked.

See, Jeff's talk was obviously changed up to compliment mine. He basically
said what I said, that if you want to do software go work for a software
company. Don't go work for a company that doesn't do software to make money.
They won't respect you.

That's true.

He also talked about how blogging is something all programmers should do.
Being able to write and influence people is important since that's how you get
your ideas across. Nobody reads code but they do read English.

Also true.

However, then someone asked Jeff what he does, and he said he works for a .NET
consultancy doing software for other people.

Sorry Jeff, that's not a software company. A software company actually sells
software to people. People buy the actual software from you and if they don't
your company fails. Jeff basically works for a consultancy that builds
software for other people to sell. While he's probably the money maker, I'm
betting that he's really not on the same level as his peers at a company like
Microsoft.

~~~
Tichy
sounds to me like his original comment meant jobs where software development
is not the money maker (for example a bank or whatever). A software consulting
firm is still making money with software, that is, the developers are it's
main asset.

------
pennig
One major point Jeff failed to mention is that the so-called dongle can also
run his precious Windows and with a little effort, Linux (and really, what is
Linux without a little effort?)

Sure, you'll need a Mac if you want to run the Mac OS (legitimately). But to
call it a dongle is a bit of a stretch in my opinion.

Of course, the entirety of this comment is pretty much divergent from the
author's main point. So, feel free to disregard the above.

As for Freedom Zero, there are few places you'll be able to achieve that
comfortably. But that's not what Apple is about, and plenty of people are
happy with that, myself included.

~~~
BrandonM
_Sure, you'll need a Mac if you want to run the Mac OS (legitimately). But to
call it a dongle is a bit of a stretch in my opinion._

I have to reply because a lot of people seem to be making this mistake. You
precisely described a dongle in that paragraph. A dongle is a piece of
hardware which is necessary if you would like to run the software. It doesn't
necessarily mean the dongle is worthless, it just means that you can't run the
software without it, which is what you said.

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chaostheory
Today I find it a little ironic for any guy (including coding horror's
blogger) who's running on Windows (or OS X) by choice to be bitching about
freedom 0.

There are already plenty of viable alternatives if that's what you want. I
don't see the point in further complaints. This isn't the 80's or 90's.

------
bayareaguy
Is it just me or did anyone else read this article this way:

 _Why would cross-platform developers use an operating system that only runs
on on Macs? That does not make sense! But more important, you have to ask
yourself: What does this have to do with being productive? Nothing. Ladies and
gentlemen, it has nothing to do with being productive! It does not make sense!
Look at me. I'm a blogger ranting about being productive, and I'm talkin'
about Freedom Zero! Does that make sense? Ladies and gentlemen, I am not
making any sense!_

Apologies to South Park.

~~~
nickb
Kudos! <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chewbacca_defense>

------
sspencer
I guess if you want to, you can think of it that way. I had OpenBSD on my old
PowerBook for a while; I never really felt constrained by the platform. It's
only "just a dongle" if you let it be just a dongle.

~~~
binarykeats
The point isn't that you can't run other OSes on Mac hardware. The point is
you can run OS X only on Mac hardware.

This argument has been going on forever, of course. But that doesn't mean it
doesn't make sense. It would be nice if you could run OS X on any old cheap
hardware you chose, rather than the overpriced machines made by one company.
That's the normal state of affairs for virtually every other OS people care
about.

------
parenthesis
His argument works much better against Macs in the pre-OS X days. But OS X is
a Unix (UNIX 03 certified, as of 10.5 on Intel). So if one uses OS X mostly as
such, then one isn't locked in: if you get fed up, or were Apple to pull the
plug or go under, then one could switch to some other Unix. Try the parallel
case if (har har) Microsoft went under.

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axod
Likening it to a hardware dongle is seriously flawed. I don't get this recent
spate of Apple bashing. If you don't like them, don't buy them.

Personally, I'm getting my MacBook Air thanks.

~~~
nkohari
Really? The Air? It's the slowest Mac on the market. I just don't understand
why you'd choose the Air over a regular MacBook.

~~~
raganwald
Marketing exec to Steve Jobs: "9 out of 10 people will choose a MacBook Pro
instead of a MacBook Air"

Steve Jobs: "Then build Nine MacBook Pros for every one MacBook Air."

------
run4yourlives
> Why Doesn't Anyone Give a Crap About Freedom Zero?

No no no, that's not how it works - Tell me, why _should_ anyone give a crap
about freedom zero?

------
sanj
"People buy consoles like the Xbox 360 and Wii because they work with a
minimum of fuss"

Shouldn't these be called out as dongles as well?

Why aren't they?

