Bonum Certa Men Certa

Shut Up and Learn to Maintain an Application Suite

Article by YOU Can Call Me "Mr. Developer" Actually, You Can Call Me "SIR Mr. Developer"



Summary: "Try and maintain a complex piece of software like a browser or an office suite, and then you'll understand."

Ah, the good old days... People used to complain, and we would tell them to stop snivelling and learn to code.



Now they pretend that even Free Software can do unethical things. Where do they get these ridiculous ideas?

Free Software can't be unethical. You can always change the code, so PLEASE stop whinging about how it "spies" on you or got your dog pregnant -- we seriously don't care. We are just volunteers.

I know there was this guy -- Shopman? Schtolman? Wait, Torvalds! He used to talk about something like this, but seriously, who codes in a bathrobe?

Google Street View logs WiFi networks, Mac addressesYou never hear Greg talking about that kind of nonsense. I mean, he's too busy coding (and putting on some clothes first.)

But the rest of you, for crying out loud -- just because "stuff happens" on your side and we get "data" about it on our side, doesn't make it "spyware" -- we aren't spies. As I said, we are just volunteers.

You don't understand ethics because you probably don't write any code. I mean you say you do, you even showed us your GitHub repo, but you certainly haven't written any code for us, so we don't expect you to understand.

I don't mean anything by it, you know -- when I laughed at you on Twitter, I didn't say you were "crazy" or "stupid", just LOL. If we can't laugh, that's a serious problem. Then again, so is all this (frankly, very uninformed) whinging.

"But the rest of you, for crying out loud -- just because "stuff happens" on your side and we get "data" about it on our side, doesn't make it "spyware" -- we aren't spies. As I said, we are just volunteers."Sometimes we sell data to Google. It's not YOUR data, it's OUR data. We're the ones who found it. Yes, we wrote code for your browser to send it to us.

You can turn it off, you know. Just go to about:config and click "Yes I'm sure", then agree to the EULA and email us a letter stating that you understand and agree to proper usage of our trademarks, then click "Show All settings" and add the key "browser.surveillance.telemetry.justkidding.spyonusmaybe" and set it to string value "0x3b338912" and we won't send any data in until we think of another way to make you even MORE free.

I don't think you people get why we do this stuff. It's all to help us help YOU. And this is the thanks we get!

When we sell the data, we also put that into helping YOU. But first we print it all out and go at your personal information really firmly with a rubber. Your privacy is totally safe!

Didn't you learn anything when people tried to say that Ubuntu Unity Amazon Lens was spyware? Mark Shuttleworth explained all this, he said that if you trust Canonical with root access then obviously, you're giving them permission to do whatever -- and if you gave them permission, you shouldn't complain. And that's what trust is all about!

So really, we aren't even asking for root access. Just sending some data from your software to our servers which is absolutely and in every way perfectly useless for indicating anything that you're doing in a way that could you know, somehow "track" what you're doing. Just think of it as random numbers, alright? Random numbers that aren't at all important.

"Sometimes we sell data to Google. It's not YOUR data, it's OUR data. We're the ones who found it. Yes, we wrote code for your browser to send it to us."What I'd like to see is any of you whingers and peons try to maintain your own web browser, alright? I mean, it looks easy, but it's really hard work! And then a bunch of uppity know-it-alls -- sorry, I mean you people start talking about "ethics" like we did something wrong! And they you say we are spying on you! We are a non-profit, Hello? EVERYTHING we do is ethical.

Try and maintain a complex piece of software like a browser or an office suite, and then you'll understand.

Until then, PLEASE just shut up already, it's not helping anything. Turn off your computer and go put your tinfoil hats on, but don't bother us with a bunch of silly nonsense. Come back when you want to contribute some code, or help pay for our time, when you've grown up a little.

Thanks!

"Try and maintain a complex piece of software like a browser or an office suite, and then you'll understand."Also, by all means, please feel free to copy and share this with your other loser friends who have nothing better to do than complain all the time.

Yours Sincerely,

Fed Up Developer Tired Of All The Whinging

(Sir Fed Up Developer Tired Of All The Whinging, to you.)

Public Domain

Recent Techrights' Posts

Links 16/08/2025: "Hey Hi (AI) Data Centers Are Driving Up Electricity Bills for Everyone" and the Case Against Booking.com
Links for the day
X.Org is Still Not Dead
Oracle still developing it
Microsoft is getting ready to cause many employees to resign
Having already laid off many workers earlier this month, it now tries another approach
"Maybe the Problem is You"
they probably felt like they had no choice because they really needed this Microsoft money
GNU OS, Powered by Hurd
Choice is good, as long as choices exist that respect the users' freedom
 
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Friday, August 15, 2025
IRC logs for Friday, August 15, 2025
Slopwatch: WebProNews and Google News Promoting Fake Articles About "Linux"
Google News is being flooded by these slopfarms, so when Linux news is being sought online (via Google News) many people will read bots that spew out FUD
Original European Patent Convention (EPC, 1973), Routinely Violated by the European Patent Office, Now in Geminispace
hundreds of thousands of European Patents must be immediately revoked
Gemini Links 16/08/2025: Politics and Alhena 5.2.8
Links for the day
Gemini Links 15/08/2025: Leasehold, Slop Bubble, and Xobaqu
Links for the day
Links 15/08/2025: Flight Attendant Strike, Floods, and Tropical Storms
Links for the day
Links 15/08/2025: German Government Falls Short on Free Software, Russians Breach EU Systems
Links for the day
Microsoft is Still Losing Cyprus
The market share goes down, so share prices go up
Microsoft Accenture is in Trouble
For one thing, its debt doubled in a matter of months
News Will Slow Down and Slop Will Contribute to the Slowdown
In recent years every time there was some holiday or major break the number people who "came back" shrank
Upgrading IRC Network of Techrights
a new version of the daemon we've used since 2021 was released very recently
"Register Debate Series" About Microsoft in the UK is Controlled by Microsoft (US)
The Register is run by Microsoft "Analysts", so the debate is doomed from the get-go
IBM is a Terrible Model for Red Hat
"Most likely caused by laying off too many people"
Microsoft Problems in Palestinian Territory and Israel
Microsoft stock (share price) goes up when market share goes down
Slave is Not a Bad Word, We Need to Use It Sometimes
Who does such exclusion of words benefit? What sort of expression will be deemed impermissible and subjected to CoC enforcement?
National Day of Action
"This Friday, August 15th, there is an organized, petition-based, protest of Wells Fargo in major cities across the US," Richard Stallman wrote
Our Gemini Editions Now Contain 100,000+ GemText Pages
Our Gemini Editions aren't small, even if Gemini Protocol is still the 'underdog'
The Relations Between the United States and Europe Deteriorate, Should Europe Continue to Rely on American Tech Giants?
The shallow notion that made-in-USA software is fairly safe for Europe to rely to is coming to a standstill
Techrights and Tux Machines Running as Usual During Vacations
No interruptions, maybe temporarily slowdowns
Gemini Links 15/08/2025: ADHD and "Random Weird Things"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Thursday, August 14, 2025
IRC logs for Thursday, August 14, 2025
"Article 52. PATENTABLE INVENTIONS" in the European Patent Convention
Some time tomorrow we'll have a complete local copy of the EPC
Serial Slopper (SS) Still at It, Still Misusing Plagiarism Tools and Cheatware for Images and Text About "Linux"
All the slopfarms are a very big problem
Reddit Deletes Stuff, But Not for Being False or Misleading
Yet another one of those articles that speak of a man in his 50s as if he's terminally ill
Times of India and India.com Are Clickbait and LLM Slop
Google continues to reward bad actors
The More "Market Share" Microsoft Loses, The Higher the Shares Go
People joke about the same sort of thing in relation to IBM
To OIN, Software Patents Are Not a Problem
Had software patents ceased to exist, OIN too would cease to exist and its staff would be unemployed.
Microsoft's Bankruptcy in Russia is Only the Beginning
Due to politics it mostly makes sense that Windows is being phased out, also in part due to policy changes
Microsoft-Funded Publishers Lied to Us About Vista 10 and Now Advocate Us Owning Nothing
They want you to own nothing, but they also want you to buy a PC on which to become Microsoft's slave and they make it harder if not practically impossible to remove Windows
Articles Promoting and Celebrating Wayland Are LLM Slop
New example (100% slop)
European Patent Office (EPO) Reformation Project
It's a stain on the EU's reputation
The Register MS, Dominated by American Editors, Says UK Should be Run (Digitally) by Microsoft US
The Register MS is sponsored by American money, run by Americans, and its chief editor is a Microsofter from the US
Slopwatch: Google News and Other Slopfarms
Google News is rewarding sites that misuse LLMs and cheat the Web
Gemini Links 14/08/2025: Drought, Climate Experiments, and LLM Slop Considered Detrimental
Links for the day
Links 14/08/2025: Second-hand ThinkPad and Enhanced Surveillance on Chipsets from the United States
Links for the day
Moral Standards From the Masters of Linux
They get hung up on minor language issue and promote this crazy theory that racism will go away if only everyone spoke a little differently (no matter where he or she came from)
Links 14/08/2025: Data Brokers Hiding Opt-Out Pages From Google, "Fight Chat Control"
Links for the day
FSF Infrastructure Under Constant Attack
The disconnect (literally) has had an effect on credibility
Feels Like The Register MS is Trying to Diversify a Bit
If The Register MS goes back to being The Register US (or UK), that will be a nice improvement
Gemini Links 14/08/2025: Reading Journal and LLM Fatigue Revisited
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, August 13, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, August 13, 2025