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Comment by marcus_holmes | Hacker News Reader

Because a closed-source company is open about being a for-profit commercial entity that is trying to make a dollar first and foremost.

Docker is "revolutionising infrastructure" or something. It doesn't have "make heaps of money" as it's primary goal. Partly this is because open source. There's an expectation that open source is also "for the greater good".

The cardinal sin of our times is hypocrisy. Being a money-worshiping greedy capitalist bastard is fine, as long as you're open that that's what you are. Pretending to be altruistic while actually being greedy will generate all the hate.

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But it's not one or the other. It's perfectly legitimate to start a company with the goal of improving the world, while also needing to make some profit so you can continue to be a functioning company. No greed or bastards involved.

What does being open source and being altruistic have to do with each other? Personally, I think they enabled the login, so that new users would be able to use docker cloud, after installing docker, without needing to create an account. But still, being open source, allows you to verify security, be transparent about the product design/intentions, possibly extend or customize for your needs, etc. There is a lot of value there, that shouldn’t warrant so much hate.

Force users to create an account, then advertise it as "now you don't need to create an account anymore"

Yeah...

I agree. There's nothing intrinsic to Open Source that means "for the greater good". And Open Source is beneficial even when done by greedy corporate bastards. There's even an argument that by crowdsourcing pull requests for free, an Open Source company is actively being greedy and capitalist.

However, the kind of mindset that enjoys being a greedy capitalist bastard finds it very very hard to accept the Open Source philosophy - it's all fear-based, "do unto others before they do unto you" and so "if they can rip my code off, they will", because that's what they'd do. I've experienced way too many hard conversations about open-sourcing code with this type of person.

So there tends to be a correlation between Open Source software and a co-operative mindset that would find this type of coercive marketing bullshit to be evil and reject it. This correlation becomes an expectation.

> What does being open source and being altruistic have to do with each other?

The "open" in "open source" is about encouraging cooperation and collaboration. And not using lock-in or patents or walled gardens to obstruct competition.

If the altruistic aspect is still not obvious: many projects encourage a gift economy by accepting donations.

Astroturfing is really not compatible with what you called "be transparent about the product design/intentions"

I would only ask someone being so harsh, what they have personally contributed as a project directly or indirectly (supporting an existing project) before being as harsh or judge mental as this, especially toward a product like docker, that probably revolutionalized an industry. To clarify, I mean popularized an entire paradigm of running software, not necessarily the first.

> What does open source and being altruistic have to do with each other?

Would you spend time out of your day to contribute to software that requires your users to sign up for someone else’s spam list?

I think contributors are going to compile it from source, to contribute ?

Yes, absolutely. Would you like the cure to cancer if it meant you had to give your email address? One thing has nothing to do with the other.

You may not feel this way, but think of downloading docker, as a non developer. You are probably following some tutorial, and really have no idea what you are actually doing. What if a container you are downloading is dangerous, or becomes dangerous. What if the version of the platform you have eventually becomes risky, due to a hack/0day? You are basically downloading an entire OS/execution environment, that makes it seamless to run an entire environment, while doing nothing. How would the company send an email/warn you etc, of some basic info that could really help you, or make your experience better? This isn’t som H&M mailing list to take your money. This is real, marketing aside, maybe they actually care?

None of that is related, proven by the simple fact that Docker and other open-source for-profit companies exist and have already contributed significantly to the industry.

This was a bad marketing-driven move, but that's all it is.

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