Let’s continue with the barbecue analogy. I come to your barbecue and you drop my steak on the ground and then just put it on my plate covered in dirt and tell me “it’s a free steak, if you don’t like dirt on it, then leave!”
See how it works? You don’t want a community, you just want an adoring fanbase for your passion project!
Yeah but that’s the thing. You don’t have to eat the steak. This isn’t just a 5 person bbq, there’s tens of thousands of people here that want to have my steak, and I’m the only person cooking in the whole town that isn’t burning the whole thing black . There’s plenty of food, sorry there’s some dirt on that one, but I’m not going to derail the whole event for you. Enjoy the barbecue. You don’t like it? Leave. But I don’t care about a little dirt on my steak because I still seared it the way I’m proud of and clearly it’s better than most of the other steaks around or you and everyone else wouldn’t be here.
I’m here to cook steaks because having a barbecue is what I like doing. If I feel like the dirt is a problem, I’ll fix it, but I’m trying to make the best steaks possible and to me that means focusing on the cooking, not the dirt that got on yours.
Don’t like it? Leave. Wanna bitch at me until I stop cooking? Fine by me. I’ll go inside and cook my steaks there.
Out of tens of thousands of people actually visiting, only 1% are actually taking the time to say anything about the dirty steaks. Everyone else is just quietly leaving after seeing the chef shout down a guy for complaining about the dirt, and then throwing his bbq tongs at them!
That’s not quite right because we’re all getting the exact same thing. I’m giving you a free steak and you’re complaining about the cut of meat. Everyone is getting the same cut, and I bought the steak that I’m giving away so I get to pick what I buy. If you don’t like it you’re more than welcome to bring your own steak and I’ll get it on the grill, or pay me to get you what you want, or hope that I remember to grab one for you the next time. You’re not entitled to a free steak though.
Even backing up and looking at your interpretation as you presented it: you’re complaining that your free steak got ruined and asking for a new one. You might not always get a new gift just because the one given to you went wrong.
Sorry you didn’t get a free steak. Do you want me to take one from someone else?
You don’t want a community, you just want an adoring fanbase for your passion project!
Here’s the thing though: so what if I do? If “I” get what I want, then you get something you like for free. At worst, you get nothing for the grand total of no cost.
You might be forced to go pay for some commercial software, where it’ll cost more and you’ll probably also not get your feature on demand.
Well with software the steak analogy breaks down. You’re making one steak and an unlimited number of people get to eat copies of that steak. They’re all perfect copies of a nicely cooked steak, but they all have dirt on them. And for some reason you think it’s more important to fiddle around with the charcoal instead of offering steaks without dirt.
Yes. Because every person who deals with the software has the same opinion about functionality.
Dirty food is objective. Variety isn’t. “Menu is confusing” is subjective, hence some people don’t feel motivated to change what they don’t see as broken.
I honestly can’t fathom arguing this hard to defend flagrant entitlement. You keep glossing over how your demands of fair treatment and community are directed towards someone offering to share with you without any request for reciprocity.
Usually the maintainers are people who got involved because they actually have ability and were able to change something they wanted to be different. Their opinions matter more because they actually bring something to the community.
You’re not entitled to someone’s nights and weekends just because they shared with you. Trying to phrase it as elementary school manners doesn’t make it magically true that now they owe you.
“You invited me to dinner. If you didn’t want my critique of your cooking and home decor you should have never invited me”. Same entitled energy.
They are also the only steaks in the world and the person is making those steaks for free. You can get the dirt off the steak if it’s the only steak in the world.
It’s free dirt steak or overcooked chicken or one of those delivery meal kits where you have to cook everything yourself.
But the whole point about the dirt steak is that simply not dropping it in the dirt would be so much less effort than all the arguing that has already gone on in this thread. Everyone arguing against me is trying to justify feeding people dirt because “passion project > building something really nice, clean, and polished that users love”, which is why so much of open source on the desktop remains a niche hobby for 3 decades and counting.
These people are making the steaks for themselves and are generous to offer the scraps to the community. If you go around demanding free steaks all the time, I ask why don’t you start cooking steaks too?
You speak as if it’s only generosity that motivates people to contribute to open source. That power, recognition, career advancement, or even salary (which may not be publicly acknowledged) are not factors.
You can say the same about moderators on forums or hobby wikis. I think a lot of them are motivated by the sense of ownership and power they have over others within a particular area of interest.
Let’s continue with the barbecue analogy. I come to your barbecue and you drop my steak on the ground and then just put it on my plate covered in dirt and tell me “it’s a free steak, if you don’t like dirt on it, then leave!”
See how it works? You don’t want a community, you just want an adoring fanbase for your passion project!
Yeah but that’s the thing. You don’t have to eat the steak. This isn’t just a 5 person bbq, there’s tens of thousands of people here that want to have my steak, and I’m the only person cooking in the whole town that isn’t burning the whole thing black . There’s plenty of food, sorry there’s some dirt on that one, but I’m not going to derail the whole event for you. Enjoy the barbecue. You don’t like it? Leave. But I don’t care about a little dirt on my steak because I still seared it the way I’m proud of and clearly it’s better than most of the other steaks around or you and everyone else wouldn’t be here.
I’m here to cook steaks because having a barbecue is what I like doing. If I feel like the dirt is a problem, I’ll fix it, but I’m trying to make the best steaks possible and to me that means focusing on the cooking, not the dirt that got on yours.
Don’t like it? Leave. Wanna bitch at me until I stop cooking? Fine by me. I’ll go inside and cook my steaks there.
Out of tens of thousands of people actually visiting, only 1% are actually taking the time to say anything about the dirty steaks. Everyone else is just quietly leaving after seeing the chef shout down a guy for complaining about the dirt, and then throwing his bbq tongs at them!
That’s not quite right because we’re all getting the exact same thing. I’m giving you a free steak and you’re complaining about the cut of meat. Everyone is getting the same cut, and I bought the steak that I’m giving away so I get to pick what I buy. If you don’t like it you’re more than welcome to bring your own steak and I’ll get it on the grill, or pay me to get you what you want, or hope that I remember to grab one for you the next time. You’re not entitled to a free steak though.
Even backing up and looking at your interpretation as you presented it: you’re complaining that your free steak got ruined and asking for a new one. You might not always get a new gift just because the one given to you went wrong.
Sorry you didn’t get a free steak. Do you want me to take one from someone else?
Here’s the thing though: so what if I do? If “I” get what I want, then you get something you like for free. At worst, you get nothing for the grand total of no cost.
You might be forced to go pay for some commercial software, where it’ll cost more and you’ll probably also not get your feature on demand.
Well with software the steak analogy breaks down. You’re making one steak and an unlimited number of people get to eat copies of that steak. They’re all perfect copies of a nicely cooked steak, but they all have dirt on them. And for some reason you think it’s more important to fiddle around with the charcoal instead of offering steaks without dirt.
Yes. Because every person who deals with the software has the same opinion about functionality.
Dirty food is objective. Variety isn’t. “Menu is confusing” is subjective, hence some people don’t feel motivated to change what they don’t see as broken.
I honestly can’t fathom arguing this hard to defend flagrant entitlement. You keep glossing over how your demands of fair treatment and community are directed towards someone offering to share with you without any request for reciprocity.
Usually the maintainers are people who got involved because they actually have ability and were able to change something they wanted to be different. Their opinions matter more because they actually bring something to the community.
You’re not entitled to someone’s nights and weekends just because they shared with you. Trying to phrase it as elementary school manners doesn’t make it magically true that now they owe you.
“You invited me to dinner. If you didn’t want my critique of your cooking and home decor you should have never invited me”. Same entitled energy.
They are also the only steaks in the world and the person is making those steaks for free. You can get the dirt off the steak if it’s the only steak in the world.
They aren’t though. Hardly any open source projects are completely unique types of software with no alternatives.
If that’s the case, why are you going to get free dirt steak when you can go get free not dirt steak? Yes this is still the metaphor.
It’s free dirt steak or overcooked chicken or one of those delivery meal kits where you have to cook everything yourself.
But the whole point about the dirt steak is that simply not dropping it in the dirt would be so much less effort than all the arguing that has already gone on in this thread. Everyone arguing against me is trying to justify feeding people dirt because “passion project > building something really nice, clean, and polished that users love”, which is why so much of open source on the desktop remains a niche hobby for 3 decades and counting.
These people are making the steaks for themselves and are generous to offer the scraps to the community. If you go around demanding free steaks all the time, I ask why don’t you start cooking steaks too?
You speak as if it’s only generosity that motivates people to contribute to open source. That power, recognition, career advancement, or even salary (which may not be publicly acknowledged) are not factors.
You can say the same about moderators on forums or hobby wikis. I think a lot of them are motivated by the sense of ownership and power they have over others within a particular area of interest.