For_Iconoclasm

This is false if you're only using Fios for internet service. Verizon asked me if I was providing my own router, and I said yes. The tech who "installed" and activated my ONT confirmed that I was using my own router so that he could activate the ethernet port on the device. There was nothing to bypass—it fell within their expectations.

I hear it's a challenge to avoid the standard Verizon router if you also have TV or phone service through Fios.

There is an extremely simple logical construct surrounding this: consent is not the default state of the other party.

What is not easy to understand is how people don't understand this. :\

Most people that I know use foobar2000.

I use LastPass, but also use generated passwords to answer security questions. For these questions, one can enable the options for only using alphanumeric, unambiguous characters.

Oh, it is absolutely a problem! But, having people not knowing what they're talking about has always been a problem. Nothing short of a strictly-enforced policy mandating that HR departments need to have decent knowledge in a certain area will change that.

Besides privacy, it could turn out that HR involved in other domains are broken relationships. If anybody has any examples, I'd love to hear them.

I would answer that rhetorical question with no, HR departments have not have heard of social engineering attacks in computer security. Almost any company asking for a password will have a brain-dead HR department in charge of that policy; it's not like your fellow future programmers thought that one up.

> defining "evil" would be a good start

I think the best way to tackle this would be defining specific tenets the way that the FSF does with freedoms 0-4. They don't just say "You have to be free!" ... there is the legally-binding license itself, containing some light legalese, as well as the 4 freedoms specifying the idea to the common man, despite clearly.

So, a license that comprises "We won't be evil. We promise!" wouldn't be good enough, but the some clear rules could be set. The non-evil most people would care about would probably be related to privacy.

I agree that specifying all of the business practices which many people believe are evil would be a non-trivial task dependent on the nature of the company.

> I see a lot of votes for python, but a disproportionately small representation of python fans in the comments.

This is probably because describing the virtues of Python (clean & simple syntax, one right way to do everything, easy-to-use yet comprehensive standard library) just feels like beating a dead horse. Almost everybody in this community has heard of Python. The circle-jerk factor on HN is still somewhat low when it comes to this topic.

I currently use Python personally and professionally, and I love having it as my go-to language. However, I'll be happy to add some more languages to my repertoire in the future.

Or, if all of the engineers quit instead of building the tools, then those websites cease to be for lack of workers.

I'm not going to argue with your opinion like others are doing, but I find it very interesting that you have this viewpoint. It would sort of be like a car enthusiast preferring an automatic car for its smooth, self-maintained shifting, or a skilled cook preferring a boxed meal because it is easier to make.

> programming, ultimately, is thinking.

I very rarely feel slowed down by my environment. It's possible for it to happen, but most of my time is spent thinking about a problem, not typing.

Duly noted! Although, I was not praising Jobs nor Apple in post. I was drawing a comparison (showing similarity) between the ideals of RMS and the ideals he was against. He is hypocritically fighting oppression in one field with oppression in another, and frankly I believe a person has more of a right to what goes on in their mind than what goes on in a computer.

Steve Jobs is not quite topical to what I said.

My biggest gripe with Stallman is his "I know what's best for you" mentality. His moral standards are more important than whatever you can come up with.

During a question & answer session somewhere, someone asked him a question about videogames. The questioner mentioned that the best games are just not free software. Stallman's answer was that the person should "adjust their tastes" and play free software games.

Adjust their tastes?

That is plenty more restrictive than using non-free software. I'll proudly wear "digital handcuffs" than sit in Stallman's oppressive, disrespecting, dogmatic ideological prison cell.

I appreciate what RMS has done for free software, but as soon as I learned that he thinks his interests are more important for me than my own, I decided it might be time to develop my own Stallman-libre philosophy on FOSS.