bad news - a large enough collection of resource extraction industries have already denuded vast areas.. combine with poisonous petrochemical products over time and industrial lighting and roads.. we are in a fast-paced extinction event.. "we" means a lot of economies..
It is "successful" in the short term to be greedy. Many companies today are successful.
The first and only time I met Richard Stallman was at a small private talk in Palo Alto at MacAurthur Park. About 20 people at most I would say. His rigor and attentiveness to detail stood out brightly, even amongst a room full of PhDs and others. I was startled by the talk at the time and I have to say that those ideas have never left me since then. The content of his careful polemic have only grown in weight and relevancy today, whatever your own views are.
It is an honor and achievement of a society that Richard Stallman may speak and say what he chooses to say, in 2025.
Thank you! I agree - it’s an honor to host RMS for a talk! We will be posting video recordings of the event online afterward, so please keep an eye out if you’re interested in hearing what he has to say in 2025.
> It is an honor and achievement of a society that Richard Stallman may speak and say what he chooses to say, in 2025.
Georgia Tech, as a public institution, takes the First Amendment very seriously (see: https://provost.gatech.edu/academic-freedom-and-freedom-expr...). Our student organization has worked hard with the College of Computing and other members of the administration to ensure that all of RMS's requests have been met.
first response from me "let me mention how the real business world actually works" .. let's add a more nuanced slice to that however
Since desktop computers became popular, there have been thousands of small to mid-size companies that could benefit from software systems.. A thousand thousand "consultants" marched off to their nearest accountant, retailer, small manufacturer or attorney office, to show off the new desktop software and claim ability to make new, custom solutions.
We know now, this did not work out for a lot of small to mid-size business and/or consultants. Few could build a custom database application that is "good enough" .. not for lack of trying.. but pace of platforms, competitive features, stupid attention getting features.. all of that, outpaced small consultants .. the result is giant consolidation of basic Office software, not thousands of small systems custom built for small companies.
What now, in 2025? "junior" devs do what? design and build? no. Cookie-cutter procedures at AWS lock-in services far, far outpace small and interesting designs of software.. Automation of AWS actions is going to be very much in demand.. is that a "junior dev" ? or what?
This is a niche insight and not claiming to be the whole story.. but.. ps- insert your own story with "phones" instead of desktop software for another angle
One thing I'd point out is that there are only so many ways to write a document or build a spreadsheet. There are a ton of business processes that are custom enough to that org that they have to decide to go custom, change their process, or deal with the inefficiency of not having a technical solution that accomplishes the goal easily.
Lotus Notes is an example of that custom software niche that took off and spawned a successful consulting ecosystem around it too.
certainly no -- not "all software" of anything. Where is the word "enterprise" in the post you have replied to ? "enterprise" means the very largest companies and institutions..
I did not write "all software" or "enterprise software" but you are surprised I said that... hmmm
Coding on an Osbourne Executive.. portable yes, but the screen was so small, the external monitor was essential. Pick green or orange monitor phospher (very different looking). Big floppy disks and CP/M, Wordstar and .. Visi-Calc? Basic language.. authors workstation and could dial in with a modem to a BBS.
bad news - a large enough collection of resource extraction industries have already denuded vast areas.. combine with poisonous petrochemical products over time and industrial lighting and roads.. we are in a fast-paced extinction event.. "we" means a lot of economies..
It is "successful" in the short term to be greedy. Many companies today are successful.
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