
Everyone complaining about MS buying GitHub needs to offer a better solution - velmu
https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2018/06/everyone-complaining-about-microsoft-buying-github-needs-to-offer-a-better-solution/#click=http://maansiirtofirma.fi
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maym86
Generally I have always hated the argument that anyone opposed to anything
needs to have a better solution before their opinion is valid and will be
taken into account.

Sometimes it's clear how a particular solution is negative but beyond that we
don't have the breath or depth of knowledge to suggest the alternative or it
is not our job to spend the time to come up with one. Yet we may have enough
experience in a particular aspect of it to know about a significant downside
of the choice.

It always just seems like a way of dismissing valid criticism by someone who
supports the choice and not addressing the criticism.

Edit: grammar & spelling

~~~
silverlake
There often isn’t a good solution, only a bunch of “bad” solutions. Pointing
out that they are bad is useless to everyone. GitHub wanted to be a successful
independent company. That failed. What is the next least bad solution before
bankruptcy?

~~~
slowmovintarget
> Pointing out that they are bad is useless to everyone.

This is false.

Some people may not have given the matter consideration. When they don't they
may accept the bad solution as normal, and "normal" often rightly or wrongly
leads people to jump to the conclusion that the solution is proper. I've many
times had to argue against something where the argument in favor was "we've
always done it that way."

Pointing out that a solution is bad records challenges that can be met and
satisfied in producing a new solution. But if no one notices, or those who do
never say anything, then people will tend to assume it is normal and therefore
proper.

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coldtea
> _Everyone complaining about MS buying GitHub needs to offer a better
> solution_

MS _not_ buying GitHub?

~~~
RestlessMind
And that's better for GitHub how?

~~~
coldtea
Who said the answer had to take into account GitHub's wellbeing?

The complaints against MS buying it are not because are not made with the
consideration that the deal is bad for GitHub itself.

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awat
I personally think it’s fair to be catiously optimisitic at best. I for one
don’t have the solution but I don’t feel like all the sudden I need to trust
Microsoft.

That being said I like the direction they are going in but I’m sure people
liked the direction they were going in before thier change of heart towards
open source too.

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seba_dos1
GitHub was a bad solution for FLOSS projects already, it just became so much
clearer now.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
I always thought people posting content on Tumblr/Medium/WordPress were making
a mistake, that they were getting very little in return for their work. It's
starting to become clear that hosting your project on someone else's servers
has many of the same issues.

~~~
timmytokyo
GitHub provides a central, well-known "hub" for code collaboration. Due to its
success and popularity, it has achieved a network effect that is really
difficult to replicate. (Google wasn't able to do it.) If GitHub were to go
away or deterioriate in some way, something else would inevitably take its
place.

Putting your project on github is the best way to ensure that you have the
largest possible number of eyes on it. And if something better comes along,
you can always copy your repo there. I don't see what you lose by hosting on
github.

~~~
dingaling
> the best way to ensure that you have the largest possible number of eyes on
> it

Potentially. Or it means that your work becomes diluted and lost in the ocean.
The Instagram problem: many eyes but they're focused on a few targets. Most
'normal' posters will have only a handful of followers and a few 'likes'.

If you have a specialised codebase, say something to do with astrophotography,
putting it on Github isn't really going to launch it into the mainstream with
thousands of contributors who just stumbled upon it. People who need it will
find it by other channels regardless of where it is hosted.

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prisionif
> standards compliance that won the browser war, not Microsoft's extensions

OMG, what about the whole antitrust case of the USA against Microsoft in the
2000ies?

I can't read any other paragraph written by "journalists" like those.

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dredmorbius
"You can't complain until you provide something better" is one of the oldest
bullshit arguments in the book.

If I go to a doctor with an ailment, or the Agora with a public grievance, the
notion of admitting and communicating that there's a problem is an essential
step. Identifying etiologies, goals, and solutions ("getting there from here")
are also necessary, but independent steps that need not be initiated or
accomplished by the same people.

Sorry, but I'm tired of this very tired trope.

A key problem is that infrastructure, information, and information exchanges
play poorly with markets and market-oriented institutions: for-profit
corporations.

If markets are your problem, marketing-it-harder -- selling the company to a
larger and more abusive monopolist -- will probably mean you'll be having a
bad day.

~~~
amarkov
GitHub, Inc. is a for-profit organization too, as are its biggest competitors.
If you're concerned about the interaction between profit and code hosting,
that doesn't have much to do with this acquisition.

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ggregoire
I’m still not sure why people are complaining.

MS is the biggest contributor on GitHub, and VSCode/TypeScript are exemplary
pieces of open source projects.

Maybe we should wait and see before bashing MS and migrating everything on
another centralized for-profit platform?

~~~
dvfjsdhgfv
> I’m still not sure why people are complaining.

Of course you know why as the arguments of both sides were presented here ad
nauseam, you just aren't convinced by them. In short, people who witnessed
faul play by Microsoft that lasted for many years and their attitude towards
users as presented in Windows 10 aren't convinced they should be the owner of
GitHub.

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berbec
> it was ultimately Netscape's failure to respond to Internet Explorer 4, 5,
> and 6's speed, relative stability, and superior (though still poor)
> standards compliance that won the browser war

The monoploist practice of bundling the browser with the OS isn't to blame at
all?!

~~~
prisionif
exactly, the USA had a case of antitrust against Microsoft for doing that. The
whole world is aware of that except that "journalist".

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wpdev_63
People need to realize that google could have bought it. Think about it.

~~~
x0x0
Why would google buy it beyond charity?

~~~
amarkov
Google tried to do code hosting before, so they must see some value in it.

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mythrwy
Aah, Peter Bright (the resident MS promoter) and arstechnica.

I still have bad memories of those two from time when Windows 8 was released.
Immediately before the release, arstechnica instituted down-voting. Then, upon
release there were a flurry of articles (Mostly from Bright) talking about how
great Windows 8 was, what a game changer etc. etc. In the comments anyone
questioning the validity of that view was downvoted out of site.

------
lebrad
Of course critics of GitHub's acquisition have indeed offered a better
solution in the form of Microsoft not buying GitHub.

Beyond that though, the article encourages and exemplifies the most blatant
form of armchair CEO-ing.

The tech press has gleaned clicks from their fawning yet resigned corporate
strategy fantasies for so long that now their headlines straight up demand
that mentality from their readers.

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jlarocco
A better solution would have been to drive more users to paid accounts.

Microsoft buying them doesn't even solve the problem that they're not
financially viable right now. Unless cutting HR and other support roles is
enough to bump them to profitability, but I doubt it.

At this point it's too late, though, because this sale is a direct consequence
of them taking VC funding a few years back. How was a website for hosting
source code ever going to satisfy venture capitalists looking for a big pay
out?

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Grue3
GitHub could've built a service that is actually profitable. I know, a radical
concept. But, they had _a lot_ of time to think of something to go IPO with.

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draw_down
They really don’t.

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sambull
Letting it shut down

