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It was a different time when software was seen as something that was built together and everyone was interested in learning the best from one another.

No, it was really not. His tale is from mid-2000s, not from mid-1980s.

In mid 2000s these companies were already operating in the billions and their engineers were already well compensated, and it was known.

Hell, "Cracking the Coding Interview" came out in 2008. Getting a job at those companies at the time was already something coveted because of how well they paid.

> In mid 2000s these companies were already operating in the billions and their engineers were already well compensated, and it was known.

Perhaps in the USA, but in many other countries this does for sure not hold.

He wants to evangelize, spread, and support FreeBSD adoption; this free labor helps in this.

This... they really owe him something, IMHO. Hell, discounted service so he can make a better margin on Tarsnap sounds good to me!

I do have a few "free" AWS accounts! But they're for FreeBSD stuff (development, publishing official images, and FreeBSD infrastructure which Amazon hosts) -- I would never use them for my business.

I'm sure I could get away with it and nobody at Amazon would even notice, but it's the principle of the thing.