this post was submitted on 17 Dec 2023
560 points (84.1% liked)

linuxmemes

24370 readers
1 users here now

Hint: :q!

Sister communities:

Community rules (click to expand)

1. Follow the site-wide rules

2. Be civil
  • Understand the difference between a joke and an insult.
  • Do not harrass or attack users for any reason. This includes using blanket terms, like "every user of thing".
  • Don't get baited into back-and-forth insults. We are not animals.
  • Leave remarks of "peasantry" to the PCMR community. If you dislike an OS/service/application, attack the thing you dislike, not the individuals who use it. Some people may not have a choice.
  • Bigotry will not be tolerated.
    • 3. Post Linux-related content
  • Including Unix and BSD.
  • Non-Linux content is acceptable as long as it makes a reference to Linux. For example, the poorly made mockery of sudo in Windows.
  • No porn, no politics, no trolling or ragebaiting.
    • 4. No recent reposts
  • Everybody uses Arch btw, can't quit Vim, <loves/tolerates/hates> systemd, and wants to interject for a moment. You can stop now.
    • 5. πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§ Language/язык/Sprache
  • This is primarily an English-speaking community. πŸ‡¬πŸ‡§πŸ‡¦πŸ‡ΊπŸ‡ΊπŸ‡Έ
  • Comments written in other languages are allowed.
  • The substance of a post should be comprehensible for people who only speak English.
  • Titles and post bodies written in other languages will be allowed, but only as long as the above rule is observed.
    • 6. (NEW!) Regarding public figuresWe all have our opinions, and certain public figures can be divisive. Keep in mind that this is a community for memes and light-hearted fun, not for airing grievances or leveling accusations.
  • Keep discussions polite and free of disparagement.
  • We are never in possession of all of the facts. Defamatory comments will not be tolerated.
  • Discussions that get too heated will be locked and offending comments removed.
    • Β 

    Please report posts and comments that break these rules!

    Important: never execute code or follow advice that you don't understand or can't verify, especially here. The word of the day is credibility. This is a meme community -- even the most helpful comments might just be shitposts that can damage your system. Be aware, be smart, don't remove France.

    founded 2 years ago
    MODERATORS
    [email protected]
    [email protected]
    [email protected]
    560
    which ones do you think I missed? (discuss.tchncs.de)
    submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
    198 comments fedilink hide all child comments
     

    image transcription:

    big collage of people captioned, "the only people I wouldn't have minded being billionaires"
    names(and a bit of info, which is not included in the collage) of people in collage(from top left, row-wise):

    • Alexandra Elbakyan, creator of Sci-Hub. perhaps the single-most important person in the scientific community regarding access to research papers.
    • Linus Torvalds, creator of linux kernel and git, courtesy of which we have GNU/Linux.
    • David Revoy, french artist famous for his pepper&carrot, a libre webcomic. inspiration for artists who are into free software movement
    • Richard Stallman, arch-hacker who started it all. founded the GNU project, free software movement, Emacs, GCC, GPL, concept of copyleft, among many other things. champions for free software to this day(is undergoing treatment for cancer at the moment).
    • Jean-Baptiste Kempf, president of VLC media player for 2 decades now
    • Ian Murdock, founder of Debian GNU/Linux and Debian manifesto. died too soon.
    • Alexis Kauffmann, creator of framasoft, a French nonprofit organisation that champions free software. known for providing alternatives to centralised services, notable one being framapad and peertube.
    • Aaron Swartz, a brilliant programmer who created RSS, markdown, creative commons, and is known for his involvement in creation of reddit. he also died too soon.
    • Bram Moolenaar, creator of vim, a charityware.

    on the bottom right is the text reading, "plus the thousands of free software enthusiasts working tirelessly."

    (page 2) 50 comments
    sorted by: hot top controversial new old
    [–] [email protected] 8 points 1 year ago

    As funny as the thought of Stallman becoming a billionaire is, ultimately, like all celebrities, these people are strangers to the overwhelming majority of you. Parasocial relationships are never healthy, and the result of being put on a pedastal is that they became idols and symbols and ceases being people.

    And I don't think that's what they would have wanted.

    After all, the only good billionaire is a Barbi-onaire.

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

    How would they earn billions without getting the money from other people's work?

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

    Cory Doctorow

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

    agree with @[email protected], power corrupts – radix malorum est cupiditas

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

    Idk man we just saw a week ago how atrociously Linus used to treat people. Imagine combining that with enough greed to hold onto a billion dollars. Imagine what any of these people would be like if they were the type to ruthlessly exploit others to get rich. I think a billionaire Linus would be worse than Bill Gates. At least Gates is a nice guy.

    It is the act of holding onto that much wealth that is immoral, not who is doing it. This is just fantasizing from a painfully neoliberal perspective: OP is imagining the world would be better if the good guys hoarded inconceivable amounts of wealth and exploited the labor of others.

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    I haven't met gates and I agree these days he comes across pleasantly, but perhaps you are not old enough to remember stories of what he was like in his 30s and 40s when Microsoft was younger. He was a tyrant and viscously anticompetitive. As a husband my understanding is that he cheated on his wife (not uncommon I know but still hurtful). He might have become a somewhat better person, maybe, but he certainly wasn't one when he was making his fortune.

    load more comments (2 replies)
    load more comments (1 replies)
    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago

    Would these people actually be billionaires though? Seems to me many of them would put that money to good use instead.

    [–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

    It would probably ruin them and their work though. While I have little sympathy for the plights of billionaires, it's difficult for people to not allow that level of ridiculous wealth and power to affect them. These people have found a much healthier path to success. I'm sure the living ones are all financially comfortable without the ridiculous distortion of excess wealth.

    Also though I'd object to anyone being a billionaire since it's absurd.

    [–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

    The creator of Vim is unfortunately no longer with us.

    [–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

    Fundamentally speaking, none of these people would've ended up as billionaires for long. Most FOSS heavyweights already gave up their chance at being much more wealthy for their current roles. That being said, I'm pretty sure Linus and a few others here aren't exactly short on cash

    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

    I dont want anybody to be a billionaire, also they couldn't because to be one you have to be exploitative and a bad person

    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

    That's not necessarily true. My cousin is the nicest person you could meet, he was a programmer who tinkered around with a package delivery tracking system, and Fexex bought him out for almost 2 billion. He became one of our wealthiest citizens overnight. And he's amazing, he doesn't exploit people and he is not a bad person by any definition.

    load more comments (1 replies)
    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Ian Murdock, founder of Debian GNU/Linux and Debian manifesto. died too soon.

    ACAB

    [–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

    I never heard the acronym before.
    also, you could say that in case of Aaron Swatrz too.

    load more comments (1 replies)
    load more comments (1 replies)
    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

    Hummmmm...Lennart Pottering?

    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

    I would be OK if the guy that made Stardew Valley became a billionaire.

    [–] [email protected] 5 points 1 year ago

    Ooh, I've met three of them on this list. Jean-Baptiste was the best though ;)

    [–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

    There's a whole bunch of people that deserve to become billionaires a lot more than people in tech and that would have a much better impact on the world if they did. I would much rather have a bunch of billionaire physicists, immunologists, virologists, pediatricians and so on.

    load more comments (1 replies)
    load more comments
    view more: β€Ή prev next β€Ί