So, I really love open source. To the extent that I often men | Not boring, and a bit of a condescending prick

So, I really love open source.

To the extent that I often mention, in private conversations, that my ideal “engineer” life is to be paid for working in a 100% open fashion, so that my business hours could be screencast.

And that I’d need to do nothing to configure a new laptop or desktop but to copy a bunch of dotfiles and have its public key populated on the repos I work with.

As of now (2021) this, technically, is attainable. But the question already is in the air: what if my open source work benefits the wrong people?

My answer to this concern remains the same: “none of my problem”.

Because if that’s what you are worried about, why don’t you focus your energy on making our world more united and more positive-sum? As opposed to contributing to its divisiveness by erecting even more barriers, such as constraining what general-purpose technologies should be open source by the reasoning that goes along the lines of “intellectual property”, “corporate secrets”, and “national security”.

Technology, after all, is that high tide that lifts all boats. And, when it comes to software, the cost of making it possible for everyone to contribute to it is literally zero. In fact, this cost is negative — as controlling access to the code is by itself a nontrivial task that’s quite an expense for the entity that “owns” this code.

And we, each and every human being, undoubtedly benefit from better maps, better messengers, and better wealth preservation and transfer solutions that are near-instant, know no borders, and are mathematically guaranteed to do their job well.

~ ~ ~

And it occurred to me just today that such a point of view may well be cancel-worthy in some not too distant future.

Which is a very sad thought. Because it means I myself do not believe 100% that my dear humankind is interested in playing more and more positive-sum games moving forward.

Seriously, the Golden Age of technology may already be past us. To the degree that I feel the urge to publish this post today, while it is still safe to hold such a point of view publicly.