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Comment by hokkos | Hacker News Reader

What kind of trolling is that ?

>I think we should use GPL v3 instead.

In all seriousness, I'm not sure they could switch it to GPLv3. I think that Apple's firmware signing might run afoul of the anti-tivoization clause and prevent them from shipping Swift on Macs. IANAL

Apple seems to think so, which is why all their GNU tools are frozen at their GPLv2 versions.

Apache2 is compatible with GNU GPLv3, though.

Compatible doesn't mean equivalent. GPLv2, AGPL, and LGPL are all compatible with GPLv3, but they don't have the same terms.

GPLv2+ (GPLv2 with the optional "or any later version" language) is compatible with GPLv3, but GPLv2 is not otherwise compatible with GPLv3 (e.g., Linux is under GPLv2, and not GPLv3 compatible.)

That issue changed my view of GitHub, and related things. I'd seen a few animated gifs in other threads this past week, but it didn't really sink in until this.

I used to hold scientists and programmers to a different standard than most normal people, because it seemed like a certain level of advanced understanding was necessary to build anything functional in those fields. But I've since realized that special ability does not carry over into all areas of life.

It feels like seeing a ghost. I'm embarrassed to be registered with GitHub, and also to be human.

Whenever I pictured the kind of person who posted reaction gifs to a thread, I imagined some 14 year old kid trying to be cool.

Now, seeing this on github, I can only spend a few minutes clicking on the gif-poster's names and taking a glance at their code to see if they are actually mentally retarded or 14, and leave mystified and horrified.

I'll take people who post reaction gifs over people who use "retarded" as an insult.

> I used to hold scientists and programmers to a different standard than most normal people, because it seemed like a certain level of advanced understanding was necessary to build anything functional in those fields.

This is a dangerous and wrong idea.

I think you need to reevaluate the standards to which you hold people you know nothing about. GitHub is a free platform that anyone can post on, regardless of academic pedigree. Further, having specialized knowledge and being a troll are not mutually exclusive qualities. The humor of early hacker culture may have been more witty but it was nonetheless a means for programmers to take themselves less seriously [1].

> It feels like seeing a ghost. I'm embarrassed to be registered with GitHub, and also to be human.

Maybe that's a sign you should get over yourself.

[1] http://www.catb.org/jargon/html/

This is a serious question: what about enjoying memes, and humor in general, indicates a lack of "special ability"?

I won't disagree that the stuff people have posted in that issue isn't funny. But honestly, I'd rather see that kind of thing than live in a world where people feel the need to treat everything (or even all technical things) seriously. There's enough darkness in the world without imposing more on ourselves.

FLOSS gotta FLOSS. I'd be surprised if they didn't open a pull request to change the license.

I actually read this PR as trolling against GPL folks, in the vein of making fun of their license of choice. Seeing that people have also thought differently, it would perhaps be better not to blame a group at all.

Github is weird.

Yeah, and memes are tiring, but lots of people clearly enjoy them.

I really enjoy Github as a technology platform. As a social network, not so much.

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