
What I learned building a career driven by “everything should be free” (2013) - caseysoftware
https://medium.com/@1marc/what-i-learned-from-building-a-career-driven-by-an-everything-should-be-free-idealism-be97720fedee#.zd34p29w0
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mei0Iesh
A blog, datepicker, and meetup events are trivial to me. They're like the
freebies you'd expect in a party favor bag. It sounds more like he doesn't
want to work hard, just hang out and talk, make a few small things, and
somehow expects that to translate to survival.

It's a common fallacy shared by hippies: "let's all get together, feel good
from drugs, sex, and music, make a few bead necklaces and paintings, and we'll
live happily ever after as a peaceful family."

It's ironic he's continuing to do the same he's warning against by blogging
about it on Medium.com.

Here's the secret about those "free" ideological communities... it's only free
in terms of dollar bills; really their currency is love.

They want to be loved, and accepted. To hang out with fellow kind who stroke
and groom them. They don't want to go out and hunt or fight. They're like the
weak, infants of the tribe.

That's why someone like Stallman pushes so hard for the "free" thing, because
in a highly competitive economy, he just isn't equipped to function. He can
produce a few things, but all the other stuff necessary to thrive in the harsh
outer world just isn't there. It's either find a way to get some love somehow,
in a less competitive "free"verse, or be a loser in misery.

This guy might have more potential if he's managed to reproduce and have a
spouse. Or there might be some critical flaw there that's blocking his ability
to work at Google, and he's stuck without much opportunity.

Unfortunately, some people are sucked into that "free" religion when they
didn't need to be. It's a disservice to society, but an advantage for the guys
who can convince people to join their hippie circle. Stallman is a selfish
greedy top 1%er like people accused Bill Gates of being; the only difference
is, he's a lot more tricky in his deception.

~~~
grabanski
> A blog, datepicker, and meetup events are trivial to me. They're like the
> freebies you'd expect in a party favor bag. It sounds more like he doesn't
> want to work hard, just hang out and talk, make a few small things, and
> somehow expects that to translate to survival.

You're grossly underestimating the work that was put into open source, writing
and running events. I worked 60-80+ hours per week throughout my entire
twenties. 20-25 was largely given to coding open source, speaking and running
events...all for free.

> This guy might have more potential if he's managed to reproduce and have a
> spouse. Or there might be some critical flaw there that's blocking his
> ability to work at Google, and he's stuck without much opportunity.

You're missing the point here. I've had an abundance of opportunities, but
decided against working at these large tech companies. I'm from the Midwest
was insistent on doing everything the hard way...consulting and giving as much
of the time I could to open source, blogging and speaking for free.

Ultimately this article was just meant to be a brain dump of some things I
wrestled with along the way. Right now I run a company which sells education,
so I've changed my tune in that free is not always doing better for humanity.
Arguably I'm making even more of an impact now and also being paid for it...

------
rebootthesystem
> it turns out being relied upon for mission critical software for multi
> million dollar companies has it’s own pressure

I thought that was really very funny "revelation" this fellow had.

Welcome to the real world.

~~~
grabanski
Right but the point I was aluding to was there's a difference in pressure from
being just a developer on a team like I was to being catapulted to "the guy"
who's supposed to lead delivering mission critical software bug free when
millions of dollars on the line. It was a simple comment saying being given
more prestige will lead to even greater expectations of you...

~~~
rebootthesystem
Believe me, I get it. I've been in the position of principal engineer
responsible for multi-million dollar projects multiple times. It's always
interesting to see someone go through revelations when stepping into new
shoes. We've all done it. In my case multiple times. Interesting how quickly
one's perspective can change with the advantage of a new frame of reference.

------
dpc_pw
I have a solution for you: Copy Fair licensing - give OpenSource to
OpenSource, charge businesses that make money. We're also working on a
collaborative CopyFair ownership:
[https://github.com/CopyFairCorp/copyfair](https://github.com/CopyFairCorp/copyfair)

------
VOYD
"Built a blog to 100,000+ unique visitors per month", but yet posted on
medium.com.

~~~
grabanski
I killed my blog and stopped writing around 2008 and it peaked at near a few
million page views in 2010. See:
[http://marcgrabanski.com/grab/3c8cd1.png](http://marcgrabanski.com/grab/3c8cd1.png)
\-- this is just web traffic. Not email subscribers or RSS readers.

Thanks for stopping by to question my authenticity!

~~~
grabanski
Oops...missed 30 days...
[http://marcgrabanski.com/grab/40fa28.png](http://marcgrabanski.com/grab/40fa28.png)

