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from the sign-me-up-for-the-next-hermit-convention dept.
The nation's nerds woke up in a utopia this morning, one where everyone stays inside, sporting events are being canceled, and all social interaction is forbidden.
All types of nerds, from social introverts to hardcore PC gamers, welcomed the dawn of this new era, privately from their own homes.
"I have been waiting my whole life for this moment," said Ned Pendleton, 32 -- via text message, of course -- as he fired up League of Legends on his beefy gaming PC. "They told me to take up a sport and that the kids playing basketball and stuff were gonna be way more successful than us nerds who played Counter-Strike at LAN parties every weekend."
Always look on the bright side of life.
[Certainly an element of gallows humor, but it does offer a different perspective from the incessant drumbeat of gloom and doom surrounding the current SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. What "positives" have you seen? --martyb]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2020, @10:56PM (46 children)
Job market gonna be great after 10% of the boomers die.
(Score: 4, Touché) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:04PM (40 children)
Boomers are retired, so it's not opening up any jobs and is killing off the jobs of the healthcare workers that were attending to their medical stuff.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:15PM (4 children)
Fewer boomers means less social security expenditure, so still a win-win.
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:53AM (2 children)
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Sunday March 15 2020, @09:52PM (1 child)
Nah - the money will go to their kids, who will spend up big!
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Tuesday March 17 2020, @11:07PM
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:59AM
Yay, more money to throw at the MIC!
What, did you think reduced expenditure meant your taxes would go down?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:45PM (16 children)
Huh? Boomers aren't all retired yet. Yeah, they're all at least in their 50s (I think that generation is supposed to start around 1962, so about 57 years old now?), but there's still plenty of working people in their late 50s and 60s. Remember, you can't draw Social Security until 65 at the very earliest I think, and you get the best benefits if you wait until 72. So there's lots of boomers still working. Trump, for instance, is definitely a Boomer and he's certainly not retired.
However, the way this disease works, it's by far hardest on older people, so Boomers will be hardest hit. Of course, they're also largely guilty of giving us a society with such a disastrously horrible healthcare system, so it does seem like just desserts.... And if it kills a lot of them off, it'll certainly have a big effect on politics in this country for a long time.
(Score: 5, Informative) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:56PM (5 children)
Try 1945. Named so for the explosive birth rate after the end of WWII.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by Grishnakh on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:43AM (4 children)
That's when the Boomer generation started. I'm talking about when it ended, which was in the 60s somewhere.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:41AM (3 children)
You did say "I think that generation is supposed to start around 1962, so about 57 years old now?". It was not obvious that you were counting backwards from 1962.
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:21AM (2 children)
I understood him to mean the youngest age that qualified as a boomer. We all accept that a 70 year old is a "boomer", but what's the youngest? And that target got moved over the years. It originally meant people born 1945-1955.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:37AM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDKWTehsomk [youtube.com]
(Score: 0, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @05:53PM
Well TMB can't think critically, once he has a thought that is THE only valid opinion around. To him anyway, the rest of us sigh and move on, arguing with him is like talking to the seat back on a short yellow bus.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:42AM (5 children)
Earliest eligibility age is 62.
But, if you run the numbers, you then have to live until you are about 83 years old before the "better benefit" of waiting until 72 returns more total cash than starting at 62.
Yes, the size of each check is larger, but starting at 62 you get ten years worth of smaller checks before you get that first age 72 check, and those slightly larger age 72 checks have to make up for those ten years worth of accumulated smaller check amounts.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:33AM (4 children)
I can't think like that. My take home pay is considerably larger than SS + 401k would be if I were to retire right now. So, I keep working, which mean that both SS and 401 keep growing. If/when I retire, I'll get more money.
Retirement is for old, worn out people who can't work. In fact, I think that's what congress was talking about when they created social security. They never really considered that people would just get lazy, and use social security to lie about doing nothing.
My wife is talking about retirement, but hasn't decided when she's going to do so. I haven't even given it serious thought. I'll just keep on working until one of a couple things happens.
1. the job dries up and blows away
2. I'm sick or hurt and can't work
3. I'm sick or hurt and working becomes more of a hassle than I can deal with (which is not precisely the same thing as #2)
4. Maybe I reach 75 or 80 years old, which will shock hell out of me - I didn't expect to reach 30!
5. I just drop dead
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @08:08PM (1 child)
I pick no. 5. How soon can you do it?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @08:12PM
You only get a vote if you pray to the magic fairy in the sky. Or, one of the fairies who have been elected to public office in recent years.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 16 2020, @11:54AM (1 child)
Point 4: Me either
wtf happened...
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 16 2020, @12:49PM
The good died young, dude, and we're stuck here.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:34AM
You can retire as early as age 62. You get the best benefits if you wait until age 70. You actually start to lose money if you wait until after age 70, because you get no more credits after the month you turn age 70.
(Score: 5, Informative) by mcgrew on Sunday March 15 2020, @10:40AM (1 child)
Ignorance is NOT bliss, kid.
Remember, you can't draw Social Security until 65 at the very earliest
62, 65 for full benefits. I turned 62 and retired in 2014.
Boomers will be hardest hit. Of course, they're also largely guilty of giving us a society with such a disastrously horrible healthcare system
Wrong again.We boomers inherited that abysmal system. Oh, and you can thank us for cleaning up the toxic environmental mess the "Greatest Generation" left us, too. Like I told another dumb kid on Facebook, all the problems you inherited we boomers inherited and have been trying to fix all our lives.
So have a little respect for your elders, you snotnosed kid.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 3, Informative) by Runaway1956 on Monday March 16 2020, @01:02PM
My wife is sixteen months older than I am. We've both been getting statements from SS for years now. Her statement does not look like my statement. She can retire at 63 (too late now) or she can retire at 65 for "full benefits".
I can retire at 63 for "early retirement", or 65, or wait until 72 for "full benefits".
That stuff is all being grandfathered into a new plan. Apparently, the goal is less to reduce benefits, than to A: make you work longer for those benefits, and B: maybe reduce the number of people who survive to draw those benefits.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @08:49PM
Neither Nixon or Ted Kennedy [wikipedia.org] were boomers.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:58AM (17 children)
I think we're missing the point, this would be the Trump plan to fix Medicare: just make sure nobody lives past 65 and the whole thing is solvent again!
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:41AM (8 children)
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @10:27AM (7 children)
It most definitely was part of the plan. The life expectancy was considerably shorter back then. You can't run a successful Ponzi Scheme if everyone is able to get their money back eventually.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:36PM (6 children)
Hey kids: I bet you didn't know your were born to fill in the bottom of a pyramid scheme!
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:32PM (5 children)
Having said that, I first learned about the Social Security/Medicare problem in the late 1980s from a discarded book, with a photo of colored matchsticks displayed in some of US flag-colored pattern (US outline or flag, I don't recall) caught in the act of burning away. The book exaggerated the situation somewhat, but was still a remarkable bit of prognostication. 30 years later, here we are going through the start of the problems that book detailed.
I also find it remarkable how some of the more vocal defenders here will take the brunt of the fallout from these pyramid schemes' failures. It's like it's karma.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:16PM (4 children)
Like Malthus, anybody can do the math and see the looming problem - predicting the date that the market stampedes off the cliff irretrievably is the trick.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:50PM (3 children)
It's not the market that will stampede here. My guess is someone with a perfect haircut, white teeth, and a truckload of empty promises will do the job all under the guise of protecting those programs - printing money to cover obligations they can't dodge, killing elderly patients through neglect to lower demand, taxing more, and of course, forcing as many people as they can off that cliff for that greater good.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:09PM (2 children)
The system is global, some countries have limited impact, but the major players in the major markets have more impact on the success and failure of government programs than anything the lawmakers can do. The biggest player of all is consumer sentiment - if too many consumers all pucker up and start hoarding toilet paper, there's no stopping the inevitable messy results - and consumer sentiment affects far more than toiletries.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:30PM (1 child)
That's pretty flimsy even for toilet paper. The messy results are negated by private parties making more toilet paper and consumers eventually running out of places to put all that toilet paper. Consumer sentiment doesn't have anything to do with programs like Social Security or Medicare which are demand controlled - you get what you get. OTOH, if you're saying that there are unintended consequences from "major players" due to monkeying around with these huge programs? Well, me too!
(Score: 3, Interesting) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:44PM
But, does this happen before the shit hits the fan? Not for the majority of consumers who seem likely to run out before restocking happens. In slightly more serious areas: acquaintances of ours work in the prison system, they use face masks year round for protection against various things various inmates are infected with - guess who just ran 100% out of facemasks this morning?
Various forms of consumer sentiment determine the majority of the federal tax income stream. Did Clinton "balance the budget"? That brief, apparently accidental, budget balancing was mostly a result of how the economy was running - including an opening of investor wallets on an unprecedented scale, in combination with a lack of Republican trashing of the federal budget for a few years. It's all tied together.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 16 2020, @03:23PM (7 children)
Two problems:
1. Allowing people to live past 30 may not be a sustainable use of planetary resources.
2. People aged 65 don't make good runners.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday March 16 2020, @04:06PM (6 children)
Have you watched Logan, recently? It's classically corny.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 16 2020, @07:00PM (5 children)
Actually, yes. I watched it sometime last year. I watched a couple times. I only got to see it once in my teenage years, and maybe again in college. So I definitely wanted a refresh. I've also learned that things that formed an impression in one's youth are worth re-watching or for books re-reading in one's older years. Sometimes a different perspective that comes with age.
As for corny, yes. But so is a lot of sci fi from the 60s and 70s. Nevermind martian bugs from the 50's.
A thought about Logan's run. If someone can no longer be part of the society after age 30, what would be wrong if they want to live but go outside the domed city and try to make a life on their own. But they wouldn't be "on their own" for long, as others would join them. But it would be a society of "old" people in their 30's and older. If those "old" people could continue to procreate, then I wonder just how soon their population would overwhelm the "utopian" city of domes? And if they procreate, they're not all going to be over 30 anymore. Within less than twenty more years you're going to have more births from younger fitter people. Maybe the city's founders realized and feared this.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday March 16 2020, @07:38PM (4 children)
If I were a city founder, I might be inclined to reduce the number of people who might piss in my water supply - among other things. Modern day New York City is incredibly dependent on natural resources from nearby rural New York - especially drinking water.
Back then, "never trust anyone over 30" was still a saying you'd hear once in a while - my father had a bit of a crisis as his 30th birthday approached.
As for corny, if you want to make Logan's Run look high tech, watch "Journey to the Center of the Earth" (original, of course) again...
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 17 2020, @01:49PM (3 children)
If you really want that type of bad Sci Fi, watch The Core. I almost didn't make it through that movie. Some movies just make it impossible to suspend disbelief.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday March 17 2020, @02:54PM (2 children)
The Core led me to rewatch Journey... they're both slightly farther out on the request for suspension of disbelief than Buckaroo Banzai and his trips through solid matter.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Tuesday March 17 2020, @03:30PM (1 child)
(groan) I remember when my wife made me watch Buckaroo Banzai.
Then there came a time when Geordi on ST:TNG mentioned "oscillation over thruster" in some bit of "treknobabble".
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Tuesday March 17 2020, @07:47PM
Buckaroo Banzai is the fore-runner/basis of so much: the Back to the Future flux capacitor, obviously... Ready Player One calls it out directly, I forget all the references but there are literally dozens.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:58AM
Communism FTW [youtube.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:21AM (1 child)
China lie. Boomers die.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Monday March 16 2020, @03:24PM
Trump drop big boomers on China for telling fake news!
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:25PM
If you're Indian.
(Score: 2) by ikanreed on Sunday March 15 2020, @10:01PM
Oh I thought the post title refered to the writers of the Babylon Bee
(Score: 2) by legont on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:02PM (5 children)
Perhaps the bug will do what Trump failed to?
"Wealth is the relentless enemy of understanding" - John Kenneth Galbraith.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:05AM (4 children)
Perhaps the bug will do what Pelosi failed to?
(Score: 3, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:25AM (3 children)
It already has. Have you been to WalMart lately? Plenty of empty shelves just like in socialist utopia.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @08:39AM (2 children)
Socialist utopia: you've got the money but can't but anything with it.
Capitalist utopia: you can get a portable fusion reactor in your local mart, but you've got no money.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @10:29AM
TMB utopia: Meh, the important shit's paid for. Ima go fishing.
Livin the dream, bitches!
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 3, Touché) by maxwell demon on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:48PM
Well, then I opt for socialist utopia in the first half of the day, and capitalist utopia in the second half. In the first half I get the money, in the second half I can spend it. :-)
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:05PM (14 children)
The Roomie and I've already got plans to self-quarantine out at the river with some fishing poles for a couple weeks if we catch it.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:12AM (2 children)
^ Just TMB coming out in favor of his roomies pole! [youtube.com]
(Score: 5, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:01AM (1 child)
Pffft, as if. He barely knows which end to hold and which to swing around. I do all the pole work round these parts.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @08:10PM
And how are his fishing skills?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:01AM (9 children)
Just don't piss in the river, not only is it rude, it also spreads disease.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:06AM (8 children)
Turn in your Man Card, Joe. Some things are just more important than public health and every red-blooded, American man knows whizzing in the river when you're fishing is one of them.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:06AM (2 children)
You'd better stock up on Busch Light next time you go to the grocery store.
(Score: 5, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday March 15 2020, @10:31AM (1 child)
Nah, I'm going with a bunch of Corona. That way I don't have to bother getting tested and can still say I came down with a case of Corona.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by stretch611 on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:53PM
Don't forget...
Corona goes best with a Lime [wikipedia.org].
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:43AM (2 children)
The best piss, is underway on a large ship, doing 20 to 30 knots, and kicking up a huge rooster tail of foam behind. Walk out onto the fantail, unzip, and let it fly. I suppose that if I were a Paul Bunyan sized man, I could tint the wake yellow. ;^)
Before anyone asks, no, that is NOT approved naval procedure. If an officer saw you doing that, he'd write you up, and the CO would take some of your money, your rank, and he'd have you chipping paint for a couple of weeks. So, don't get caught pissing off the fantail!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:36PM (1 child)
Be careful not to get it caught in the propellers or tangled in the towed array.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:51PM
No worries. When I dropped it in the cold water, it shriveled up almost instantly, safely out of reach of the screws.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:33PM (1 child)
At least piss on the back side of the bank, most of your hepatitis will die off in the soil before it gets to the river.
One hepatitis infected fisherman can contaminate a whole bay full of shellfish.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by acid andy on Sunday March 15 2020, @05:19PM
It would be shellfish. Very, very shellfish. (Sorry!)
If a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday March 16 2020, @04:32AM
Most of the expected batch of looney conspiracy theories I've heard about this blame China, because... well, if it had to make sense it wouldn't be a conspiracy theory. However, we now know who's really behind the conspiracy: Nrrrrds!
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:16PM (4 children)
Yeah, I know, no true nerd has the social skills necessary to attract a mate with which to produce offspring. But, there are test tubes, sperm banks, artificial insemination, and such like devices and methods. Whether offspring are wanted is another question, which I will overlook for the nonce.
It totally sucks to have been looking forward to the end of Spring Break and the little ones going back to school, freeing us from the responsibility of watching over them all day long, only to have school cancelled and Spring Break extended another week, or two!
(Score: 2) by krishnoid on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:47PM
I think you just wrote the elevator pitch for "Cyrano: 2020".
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @07:33AM (2 children)
Computer Science in the late 1990s was 40 dudes per chick. I got her! All the guys were too afraid to sit next to her, but I got to the computer lab when the only seat available was next to her. I couldn't resist the computer. I had no choice. She talked to me. It was meant to be.
So I impregnated her. Then I did it again. Finally, she dropped out of school to be my housewife. Now we have 12 kids. I play evolution to win.
(Score: 2) by bzipitidoo on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:57PM
Dodecadad!
(Score: 2) by driverless on Monday March 16 2020, @05:11AM
Dude, that "chick" was a dude in a utilikilt.
(Score: 5, Funny) by PinkyGigglebrain on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:18PM (1 child)
All those years of practicing self isolation are finally paying off :)
"Beware those who would deny you Knowledge, For in their hearts they dream themselves your Master."
(Score: 4, Funny) by TheGratefulNet on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:12AM
so, they tell us we're supposed to practice social distancing.
I'm a geek in tech. I don't need to practice that, I've perfected it.
"It is now safe to switch off your computer."
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:35PM (11 children)
Good news, nerds! Coding is indoor work. Your betters the tech billionaires need some code to copy into their very lucrative apps.
Get on GitHub and make brilliant commits. Open source everything so billionaires can make money off your hard work. You won't get paid a penny, but remember, GitHub is where you showcase your rockstar skills so you can land that six figure salary someday. Someday is never.
Now that nobody leaves the house because of coronavirus, you nerds have no excuse not to code all day and all night. Get to work! Don't make the tech billionaires declare a Summer of Code event to motivate you to work for free.
Tech industry business plan:
1. Tell naive idiot coders that coding for free is a lucrative career.
2. Steal open source code.
3. Billions in profit!
If you're dumb enough to learn to code, you will die poor.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:52PM (6 children)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:08AM (5 children)
What! Not $200,000?! Have you considered that you truly suck at coding?
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:52AM (4 children)
(Score: 4, Troll) by Runaway1956 on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:47AM (3 children)
sarcasm Are you SERIOUS? I thought all Americans wanted to live in Gay Bay, where you can drop trow, and defecate on the sidewalk! /sarcasm
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @05:58PM (2 children)
I'd rather deal with the occasional turd than having a sentient one walking sround town plotting genocide.
They're coming for you runaway! Better start up a meth habit so you can stay awake all night, cause that's when they come for you! Club to the head, black bag the fatty, toss in the trunk of a cadillac (need the space and power to haull off whales) and enroll you in fat nazi rehab camp.
Worse than death for you maggots, education wooooOooOooOoooo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @06:09PM (1 child)
Just like China in the middle of the last century? Fekkin' commies are known for that kind of thing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 16 2020, @04:19PM
Comparing conservatives to chinese communist revolutionaries? Seems about right, they both devolved into fascist rule.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @03:48AM (2 children)
There's two types of "open source guy".
The first used the GPL, and companies have to follow the terms and keep the code open. Companies often don't go after GPL3 code because of the requirements that devices sold that use it have to allow the user to be able to modify the affected portions on the device. Companies have to go through hoops and you can still profit off of their work. There's a lot of software with millions and millions of dollars of commercial funding poured into them, but you can freely take advantage of that without issue.
Sometimes, commercial source licenses are sold so the author can profit directly off of corporate interest.
The second used the BSD or MIT or some hilariously permissive license, and now his code is embedded in someone else's product making a company millions, and they get absolutely dick-all from it. The target hardware is shut tight, no code is released, no money comes your way. They can take, and take, and give absolutely nothing back.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:34PM
A person I worked on a recent startup with was a senior Googler who was in charge of some decent sized projects at the company. He also held a upper managerial position at Amazon, got to recount some interesting stories about meetings with Bezos. He was a pretty mediocre coder. That kind of surprised me but not really all that much. His code was at least passable, but his networking and schmoozing game was 10/10 - and what really matters when advancing that corporate ladder?
Ah, the point? We started getting into licensing discussions for the product. He and his decades of FAANG experience had no clue that code that did not have a license could not simply be copied and used as you see fit. For those who don't know, code that does not have a license is by default copyrighted and owned by the creator - copying it is illegal. I have 0 doubt that not only has plenty of unlicensed code made it into these companies private projects, but also likely code that was GPL'd. Clearly at these companies legal rights usage was not a high priority training topic.
We tend to imagine the companies would never take this risk because the risk:reward sucks. That's maybe true from a company perspective. I say maybe because they'd get any claim knocked down to a pittance in court, if somehow it could be proven. But beyond this, companies are made up of individuals - now a days hundreds of thousands of individuals. There's an *extremely* non-zero percent of these folks borrowing liberally from code that shouldn't. Thinking your rights are protected when you put your code out in the wild is just naive. There's some coder slightly obfuscating your code and claiming it as his own out there. You get nothing, he gets accolades. Isn't open source awesome?
I actually respect the BSD/MIT/NoLicense types more because of this. They at least understand the sacrifice you make when putting code out there.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by TheRaven on Sunday March 15 2020, @05:11PM
That's an interesting perspective. I've worked on both sorts of projects. BSD / MIT licensed code that I've written has ended up in a bunch of places, but it's also made me money when companies want to hire a contractor to work on it and look for people already familiar with the code. In some cases, they've paid me to write from-scratch replacements for GPL'd programs to permissively license, because it's cheaper than paying the lawyers to deal with the GPL (if they get some third-party contributors to the permissively licensed alternative, that's free code, if they don't then it's no loss to them). In contrast, I've seen companies take GPL'd code that I've written and assigned copyright for to the FSF and use it in violation of the license, but the FSF hasn't bothered to take them to court because they didn't think they could win and it's expensive. I've also seen companies take GPL'd code and not contribute back because they didn't want to publicly admit that they were using it internally (even though they were fully in compliance with the license), just in case they opened themselves up to liability.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by acid andy on Sunday March 15 2020, @11:33AM
Wow, did Salty Spice just get a +5?
"My advice to any young man or boy is to stay at home and not be a
ramblercoder, as it won't buy you anything." -- James Emmit McCauleyIf a cat has kittens, does a rat have rittens, a bat bittens and a mat mittens?
(Score: 5, Interesting) by krishnoid on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:45PM
Telepresence companies -- zoom, webex, etc., now have the largest pool of free, involuntary beta testers ever to draw on. Maybe that'll shake out the industrial-grade products and/or bring the cream to the top. Also, since the problem isn't with socializing -- it's with physical presence -- they'll also have a chance to alpha-test any telesocializing (vs telework) offerings/20% projects they may have had in incubation.
One big thing I'm hoping for, though, is that the carriers and ISPs now have a chance to answer for all the subsidies they've been collecting to build out their capacity, and maybe even explain how they were spending them on Jimmy Choo's as the national/global population starts to strain their existing capacity on a minute-by-minute basis. Make yourself an oversized Reeses-branded mug [vice.com] of your favorite hot beverage and watch the legislators-vs-FCC-vs-carriers-vs-unwashed-masses gladiator match start.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:46PM (3 children)
Don't worry about it and let the boomers croak. Such an elegant approach.
(Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:30AM (2 children)
SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:33AM (1 child)
I don't need to hide because I still live in my parents basement, you insensitive clod!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:21AM
Started in the basement, now we're here
Started in the basement, now my whole fam fuckin' here
(Score: 3, Funny) by SomeGuy on Saturday March 14 2020, @11:50PM
In Phase II, everyone who gets to stay home is fired and replaced with cheap offshore Indian labor.
Phase III... well, you know... profit!
And next year during flu season, this virus comes back and wipes out all the people who stayed inside. WIN WIN!
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @12:24AM
I live in the Seattle area. Afternoon commute time for me on Christmas eve was an astonishingly low 26 minutes. Twice this week I've come within 2 minutes of that achievement.
I won't be celebrating that when I'm sick, of course, but for now.... Woohoo!
(Score: 2) by mrpg on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:08AM (5 children)
I work at a hotel (with tourists of course). I am going to die.
(Score: 5, Funny) by takyon on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:09AM
Correction: You are going to be fired, and then die.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @01:43AM (1 child)
What tourists? You will probably be on short shifts, or lay off, pretty soon. And very likely come out alive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @02:01AM
Then die slowly of starvation. But don't worry - the stock market will remain high come hell or high water https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2020-03-12/not-qe-not-anymore-fed-injects-15trillion-markets-coronavirus-stimulus-goes-global [zerohedge.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 15 2020, @04:45PM (1 child)
Imagine your hotel was a country. And you were voluntarily inviting everybody to come party, get out in the streets, and touch each other on the face. Welcome to Thailand!
Songkran - the water festival that draws in stupidly large amounts of tourists is officially still on in many locations. The government has banned tourists from some locations like China and Hong Kong. Notably absent however is every single country with "rich" foreigners who can come splash around their monies. Well except Italy, they finally and reluctantly got around to banning Italians. The official policy for people from elsewhere in Europe is that they're supposed to be under observation and engage in "self monitoring". LoL.
1 month from now, expect the entire country of Thailand to be an ultra hot spot for corona. They're going in for a short term profit that will result in longer term economic devastation. If nothing else, it'll keep life interesting.
---
Corona is so interesting. I'm unsure if it's something that in 6 months I'll be looking back as something maybe slightly more relevant than the swine flu, or if it's something that in 6 months will have caused a radical reshaping of our entire world. I have to say that the odds are on the former, but that's only because betting on the status quo is always the safe bet. Increasingly it's looking like we might be headed towards the latter.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday March 16 2020, @12:20AM
Relevance of corona/covid-19 is already way beyond that of swine flu, if only because of the big market drops. Swine flu [wikipedia.org] apparently reached 10-20% of the global population, which may be a good indicator of how far this one is going to spread.
Tech conferences and conventions as we know them may never recover (good opportunity for VR), there will be a big shift to online streaming, people may be isolating themselves and prepping more from now on, etc. I'm guessing the People's Republic of China will remain intact, but I'm not sure about the Islamic Republic of Iran.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]