Python finally offloads some batteries [LWN.net]

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 16, 2022 23:52 UTC (Wed) by pebolle (guest, #35204)
In reply to: Python finally offloads some batteries by NYKevin
Parent article: Python finally offloads some batteries

"ungrateful leeches on the goodwill and hard work of others" is not rather melodramatic, it is nauseating. Free software does not and should not include an obligation to contribute back. It's perfectly fine to only use free software. That's one of its tenets.

Moreover it is also perfectly fine to criticize a project as a mere user. "You made me rewrite my program!" isn't invalidated by "You should have contributed money, patches or bug reports!". That's basically a truism.

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Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 17, 2022 0:06 UTC (Thu) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (3 responses)

It's perfectly fine to only use free software. That's one of its tenets.

Yes, but the whole point of free software is also to give users what they need (from the programming and legal POV) to scratch their own itches; the original developers are under no obligation whatsoever to scratch their users' itches for them for free, indefinitely.

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 17, 2022 0:21 UTC (Thu) by pebolle (guest, #35204) [Link] (2 responses)

That's all correct.

But it doesn't justify name-calling users that do not contribute back. Neither does it mean that one shouldn't be able to criticize a free software project without having contributed back.

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 17, 2022 0:45 UTC (Thu) by anselm (subscriber, #2796) [Link] (1 responses)

I agree about the name-calling, but when it comes to “criticising a free software project”, there are obvious differences between criticism that is constructive, which should be welcome from anybody, and “criticism” that is basically vociferous complaints by non-contributing users that they're not getting their itches scratched for free, which developers should be free to disregard at will.

(If users can't scratch their own itches, the least they can do, instead of complaining, is learn how to write and submit meaningful and constructive bug reports. If nothing else, this would turn them into contributing users who are actually helping the project.)

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 17, 2022 7:37 UTC (Thu) by Wol (subscriber, #4433) [Link]

The other thing they can do - if they are businesses - is to sponsor a developer to scratch their itches for them.

I've just been watching this scenario play out on a kernel mailing list - some users have no clue ... it's tricky, that one came over somewhat as a culture clash ...

Cheers,
Wol

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 25, 2022 7:13 UTC (Fri) by oldtomas (guest, #72579) [Link] (3 responses)

If the name describes the situation adequately ("leech", in this case a metaphor), I don't have issues with it.

That's what names have been made for, after all.

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 28, 2022 13:23 UTC (Mon) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link] (2 responses)

> If the name describes the situation adequately ("leech", in this case a metaphor), I don't have issues with it

A leech is a parasite that latches on to an unwilling host and drains the life out of it to sustain itself. Some metaphor. In fact, the word is specifically used as a particularly emotive term of derision and hatred; it implies that the speaker *utterly despises* the person they're talking about.

Basically, it's a more specific way of describing somebody as a "worthless fucking cunt", or similar. On the offensiveness scale, it's high enough that I can only really think of one word that's higher but that I might occasionally use in close company when senselessly enraged; everything higher than *that* I wouldn't even *think*, let alone say.

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 28, 2022 21:21 UTC (Mon) by pebolle (guest, #35204) [Link]

> it implies that the speaker *utterly despises* the person they're talking about.

Exactly. And the infuriating part, for me, is that this metaphor is used for people and organizations doing what I thought was the right thing: using Free Software.

Python finally offloads some batteries

Posted Mar 29, 2022 10:11 UTC (Tue) by kleptog (subscriber, #1183) [Link]

Maybe it's a cultural thing? A leech (in my experience) doesn't tend to harm the host, and they go away by themselves. They are at most temporarily irritating.

However, I just looked it up in the dictionary and it has definitions involving the words "exploit" and "extort" which are much more negative. If that's the meaning you're using then I can see the statement being interpreted very differently.