Subj : Re: do serious programmers have a life?
To   : comp.programming
From : gswork
Date : Fri Sep 30 2005 09:02 am


Mabden wrote:
> "Gerry Quinn" <gerryq@DELETETHISindigo.ie> wrote in message
> news:MPG.1da476634de21fb98a623@news.indigo.ie...
> > In article <%8c_e.856$rl1.41@newssvr27.news.prodigy.net>,
> > mabden@sbc_global.net says...

> much like a modern day corporation taking credit for its
> employees doings while they work for the company - as every programmer
> knows.

sure thing.   You invented the code, the exact code that just happens
to fit with that there insurance software spec, in your bedroom on a
computer you made from bits of naturally occuring material you found in
the garden with a language you invented.  Then this corp guy comes
along with money and steals it all (somehow!) whilst not providing the
reasoning for writing it in the first place nor an above average comfy
western lifestyle, nor, along with countless other naughty corps,
underpinning the entire computer industry and being intricately related
to every other global industry.

The cheek of these corp guys, next thing you know they'll pay billions
in tax and underwrite the government and the nation's infrastructure
and an emormous bunch of people's retirement will be paid for by that
darned profit that does make it past the tax, sheesh - whatever next
eh?   Let's bring it all down!  Worked a charm in, erm,  now where did
it work a charm again?

[in short and more seriously - sure corporations can rip you off and
are *far* from ideal, but let's never pretend they're some stand alone
bad guy from which we 'ought' to be 'freed', nor that the work you do
while employed by them is somehow entirely your credit]

> It's kinda like saying Ford was an inventor. He wasn't. He was a guy
> with money that broke down the problem with building custom cars by
> turning them into a commodity. Smart, yeah, but nothing new. People were
> doing the same thing in plenty of other lines of work, from making
> clothes to canning food to whatever. Suddenly, these guys are geniuses.

> I mean, do you think in the 1200's when the maid of some Lord in England
> needed to do laundry she took a shirt from the hamper, wet it, soaped
> it, rinsed it, hung it to dry; then went and got another shirt... etc.?
> The assembly line has been around since women started having kids.
> Applying it to cars wasn't genius, it just happened to be the right time
> for more than a few custom-made cars. Once you could sell 100 cars, you
> get the guys together and say, "Harry, you make me 100 bumpers, and show
> Dick how to attach them to car. Jim, I need 100 engines, take 5 guys and
> make them."

Sure, easy.  I'd have thrown together something similar if i hadnt been
quite so pure, just wasn't enough of bad corp guy i suppose.   Could
revolutionize the manufacture and distribution of some emerging tech
tomorrow if i wanted too, just don't have the cash, or that bad corp
guy thing.

.