@shapis Almost 20 years ago, I followed Lawrence Lessig’s RSS feed. He made a request for software that could be used to advance slides on a remote computer. I knew AppleScript fairly well and thought, “how hard can that be?”. I wrote a one script that would “listen” for the text “Next Slide” in iChat and then try to advance whatever was open in PowerPoint. I wrote another script with a basic UI so the presenter could easily “type” Next Slide while presenting. It was basic, but it worked. I think I shared the code with an MIT license. Even though the code was free and Dr. Lessig already agreed to meet with a class about IP Law at the university I was working for at the time, he also contributed $50 to my project. He could have just downloaded the scipts and used them without paying anything, but that simple act changed my life. I realized that some people who could afford it would pay for code I even when I was giving away. Most people don’t, but enough do that I’ve been able to continue contributing my code, helping to fix bugs in other people’s code and sponsoring other projects today.
@L4s so does this mean I can no longer threaten to cancel my service and get an offer to pay 50% for 2x the speed? There might be an element of agism or elder abuse happening here too. When I check on what my parents pay for internet, they will just keep paying the marked up cost for slow service. They end up paying 2-3x more than someone who calls for new service and for a plan so slow the provider no longer offers it.