wonder what esr is up to

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > YOSPOS > wonder what esr is up to

double ohm seven: Jul 14, 2016

oh not much, writing services no one wants, begging for cash to make it day-to-day

http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=7348 posted:

The work on NTPsec is going very well. Unfortunately, since we lost our CII funding in September, my personal situation isn�t.

Ever since the Destroy Full-time Employment Affordable Care Act smashed my wife�s legal job out of existence, we�ve felt under some pressure at Chez Raymond. While Cathy was full-time employed, my earnings from royalties and consulting contracts were what we saved against a rainy day or retirement. Since then we�ve had to live on what I make and occasional legal piecework.

The NTPsec funding came on-stream just as we were starting to worry seriously about money. That kept us out of trouble for a little over a year, but now that�s gone, and the legal piecework market is apparently flooded with attorneys whose jobs were also crushed by the ACA around the same time my wife�s was. It�s a buyer�s market and a lot of what she�s being offered these days is not just scutwork, but would barely cover her expenses after travel.

(For reasons I don�t understand, law seems to have been hit harder by the ACA employer mandate than any other professional field except higher education. I hear non-tenured faculty are even hungrier than lawyers these days.)

So now it�s been five months since either of us has been drawing anything like a salary. We�re burning savings, and Cathy � who grew up poor and thus finds a state of no income viscerally terrifying in a way I do not � has started to look like a shell-shock victim. This is damaging my morale.

The only bright spot is my Patreon feed. Right now it�s pulling $1,392 a month, which is actually rather a lot for Patreon but nowhere near enough to cover our living expenses. That would take about $3,000 a month; the big items are mortgage and medical insurance driven stratospherically up in cost by the same disastrous government bungling that cost my wife her job. Then, of course, there�s income tax; with that I figure we�d need $5K a month to be sure of keeping our heads above water.

Thus, even with the Patreon, we�re fast approaching the point where if someone were to offer me a day job, I�d have to take it. And that would be unfortunate for the long term; the infrastructure work I�m doing and expect to do in the future is tremendously important. Somebody�s going to need to design and field NTPv5 to fully cover the IPv6 transition, and it looks increasingly like that somebody needs to be me.

To everyone reading this who is already contributing to my Patreon feed as an individual, Cathy and I thank you. Someday the rest of the world may be grateful, too.

Now I�m appealing to those of you at corporations and institutions. If you use open-source software (including, say, the browser you�re reading this through) you almost certainly rely on code I wrote every day. Soon, you�ll very likely be relying on my code to provide time service for your computers.

If you have purchase authority for software, please use it to sign your company or institution up as an �Institutional Supporter� of my Patreon account. For $100 per month, you will help ensure that all 50+ of my projects stay under maintenance � and your organization will be listed as a sponsor every time I do a project release after you sign up.

Please don�t wait; do it now. Don�t kid yourself that essential infrastructure like time service is somebody else�s problem; it�s your problem, and this is how you can be sure it gets solved.

GOOGLE+
Eric Raymond Eric Raymond
This entry was posted in General by Eric Raymond. Bookmark the permalink.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 07:53

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# ? Apr 23, 2024 16:33

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

he's busy standing around digging in his ear with his apartment key and wiping it on his pants

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:01

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

I'll be straight honest.

ESR is probably living on less than I do per month. he better learn to fuckin shop and cook

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:06

Stymie: Jan 9, 2001; by LITERALLY AN ADMIN

i don't

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:07

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

"The only bright spot is my Patreon feed. Right now it�s pulling $1,392 a month"

lmao

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:10

TOOT BOOT: May 25, 2010

Please have your company donate $5k/mo to me or you might have to work with me, might be a better pitch

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:13

Sagebrush: Feb 26, 2012

what was the last piece of software esr released

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:14

TOOT BOOT: May 25, 2010

SmokaDustbowl posted:

"The only bright spot is my Patreon feed. Right now it�s pulling $1,392 a month"

lmao

People that do nothing but draw anime porn get multiples of that on Patreon

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:14

BONGHITZ: Jan 1, 1970

haha poverty

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:17

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

TOOT BOOT posted:

People that do nothing but draw anime porn get multiples of that on Patreon

I don't want to sound like a narc but I bet a lot of people on patreon are also on disability, and they're not reporting their poo poo

I'm on disability, with a legit disability, and every so often I have to send my caseworker 3 months of bank statements showing that I'm not receiving unreported funds lmao

SmokaDustbowl fucked around with this message at 08:38 on Feb 11, 2017

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:34

TOOT BOOT: May 25, 2010

SmokaDustbowl posted:

I don't want to sound like a narc but I bet a lot of people on patreon are also on disability, and they're not reporting their poo poo

There's a couple ways of looking at it, that they're cheating the system or that they're making sure they have basic income/healthcare if Patreon ends up just being a fad

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:40

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

TOOT BOOT posted:

There's a couple ways of looking at it, that they're cheating the system or that they're making sure they have basic income/healthcare if Patreon ends up just being a fad

as long as they report their funds it's cool, but I'm sure a large portion aren't and they're loving it up. if they're loving it up they usually get caught though

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:44

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

I have no idea how you could work a patreon while you're doing other poo poo, especially when it's tax time

I wouldn't mind a patreon so I could have some money for beer, but it'd be a nightmare with tax and disability

SmokaDustbowl fucked around with this message at 08:53 on Feb 11, 2017

# ? Feb 11, 2017 08:50

Agile Vector: May 21, 2007; scrum bored

chez raymond

TOOT BOOT posted:

Please have your company donate $5k/mo to me or you might have to work with me, might be a better pitch

lol

# ? Feb 11, 2017 09:00

SmokaDustbowl: Feb 12, 2001; by vyelkin; Fun Shoe

all the old hackers are libertarian, yet they love donations

# ? Feb 11, 2017 09:02

TOOT BOOT: May 25, 2010

Libertarians love voluntary donations they want to replace like 75% of government services with them

# ? Feb 11, 2017 09:16

Agile Vector: May 21, 2007; scrum bored

freedonations on the land

# ? Feb 11, 2017 09:16

Arcteryx Anarchist: Sep 15, 2007; Fun Shoe

so Eric mooches off his wife, doesn't understand taxes, and lies about any of use using his software

# ? Feb 11, 2017 10:00

WINNINGHARD: Oct 4, 2014

iirc eric s raymond has cerebral palsy

# ? Feb 11, 2017 10:29

Arcteryx Anarchist: Sep 15, 2007; Fun Shoe

so he's possibly a libertarian secretly collecting disability as well

# ? Feb 11, 2017 10:40

Moo Cowabunga: Jun 15, 2009; [Office Worker.

esr's babes

# ? Feb 11, 2017 11:10

A Pinball Wizard: Mar 23, 2005; I know every trick, no freak's gonna beat my hands; College Slice

how does he know Obama shattered his wife's job like a t1000 frozen in nitrogen

lke is this just typical libtard "must be the government because unregulated corporations never fire anyone" poo poo or did the law firm yell "THIS IS BECAUSE OBAMA! OBAMA DID THIS" as they lit her desk on fire

# ? Feb 11, 2017 13:30

Tankakern: Jul 25, 2007

here's a writeup of that ntp vs ntpsec debacle

A rift in the NTP world

# ? Feb 11, 2017 13:32

Sweevo: Nov 8, 2007; i sometimes throw cables away

i mean straight into the bin without spending 10+ years in the box of might-come-in-handy-someday first

im a fucking monster

A Pinball Wizard posted:

how does he know Obama shattered his wife's job like a t1000 frozen in nitrogen

lke is this just typical libtard "must be the government because unregulated corporations never fire anyone" poo poo or did the law firm yell "THIS IS BECAUSE OBAMA! OBAMA DID THIS" as they lit her desk on fire

esr is a lying racist sack of poo poo, so i'm assuming he made up or exaggerated the whole thing and then repeated it so many times that he believes it himself.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 13:57

Cold on a Cob: Feb 6, 2006; i've seen so much, i'm going blind
and i'm brain dead virtually; College Slice

esr posted:

I expect most other hackers confronted with sudden wealth will make similar choices. Reporters often ask me these days if I think the open-source community will be corrupted by the influx of big money. I tell them what I believe, which is this: commercial demand for programmers has been so intense for so long that anyone who can be seriously distracted by money is already gone. Our community has been self-selected for caring about other things -- accomplishment, pride, artistic passion, and each other.

OK, so maybe I'll break down and finally get a cell phone. And cable broadband so I can surf at smokin' speed. And a new flute. And maybe a nice hotrodded match-grade .45 semi for tactical shooting. But really, I don't want or need a lot of stuff. I'm kind of Buddhist that way; I like to minimize my material attachments. (My family gripes that this makes me hell to buy Christmas presents for.)

I'm not going to minimize my attachments by giving it all away, though, so you evangelists for a zillion worthy causes can just calm down out there and forget about hitting me up for megabucks. I am *not* going to be a soft touch, and will rudely refuse all importunities.

I'm not copping this harsh attitude to protect my money, but rather to protect the far more precious asset of my time. Because I don't want to have to become a full-time specialist in deciding whose urgent pitch to buy, I'm going to turn everybody down flat in advance. Anyone who bugs me for a handout, no matter how noble the cause and how much I agree with it, will go on my permanent poo poo list. If I want to give or lend or invest money, *I'll* call *you*. (Sigh...)

And yes, there are causes I'll give money to. Worthy hacker projects. Free-speech activism. Firearms-rights campaigns. Tibet, maybe. I might buy a hunk of rainforest for conservation somewhere. Megabucks are power, and with power comes an obligation to use it wisely. I'll give carefully, and in my own time, and only after doing my homework -- too much charity often kills what it means to nurture. And enough about that.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 15:46

akadajet: Sep 14, 2003

i don't think i'd like this guy irl

# ? Feb 11, 2017 15:54

power botton: Nov 2, 2011

did he like never sell his stock or anything? like how is he broke. he'll be the first to tell you how modest and good with money he is.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 16:12

power botton: Nov 2, 2011

lmao his patreon is a minimum of $20 pledge. if you aren't going to give him at least 20 bucks a month its not even worth taking your money

# ? Feb 11, 2017 16:16

kitten emergency: Jan 13, 2008; get meow this wack-ass crystal prison

power botton posted:

did he like never sell his stock or anything? like how is he broke. he'll be the first to tell you how modest and good with money he is.

https://lwn.net/Articles/75129/

# ? Feb 11, 2017 16:37

Agile Vector: May 21, 2007; scrum bored

akadajet posted:

i don't think i'd like this guy irl

hes like gomez addams cousin but not cool

# ? Feb 11, 2017 17:16

DaTroof: Nov 16, 2000; CC LIMERICK CONTEST GRAND CHAMPION
There once was a poster named Troof
Who was getting quite long in the toof

power botton posted:

did he like never sell his stock or anything? like how is he broke. he'll be the first to tell you how modest and good with money he is.

va linux stock tanked in less than a year and never recovered. esr was probably not allowed to sell his shares that early. either way he apparently went down with the ship

but if you ask him i assume he'll blame obama

# ? Feb 11, 2017 17:38

The Management: Jan 2, 2010; sup, bitch?

seeing esr broke and begging for money makes me happy. he's a terrible person and deserves nothing but misery.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 17:58

Sagebrush: Feb 26, 2012

Did anyone ever figure out the actual ethnicity of the people with "feces colored skin" who terrified him at the parade

# ? Feb 11, 2017 18:04

DaTroof: Nov 16, 2000; CC LIMERICK CONTEST GRAND CHAMPION
There once was a poster named Troof
Who was getting quite long in the toof

i'm kinda curious how he thinks the aca wrecked his wife's legal career

my first guess: she didn't want to tell him the real reason she got fired and knew if she blamed it on obama he'd believe it without reservation

# ? Feb 11, 2017 18:09

Agile Vector: May 21, 2007; scrum bored

*employer flips through list of excuses to fire incompetent employee with exceedingly racist husband*

'hmm… obama?'

# ? Feb 11, 2017 18:15

power botton: Nov 2, 2011

Cum is worth more than 5x as much as ESR in the free market.

# ? Feb 11, 2017 19:17

fritz: Jul 26, 2003

Sagebrush posted:

Did anyone ever figure out the actual ethnicity of the people with "feces colored skin" who terrified him at the parade

i think one of the previous times it came up the consensus choice was 'ethiopians'

# ? Feb 11, 2017 20:44

George: Nov 27, 2004; No love for your made-up things.

this warms my heart

# ? Feb 11, 2017 21:03

George: Nov 27, 2004; No love for your made-up things.

oh my god check the comments. first one is a dude telling him to get a job and it spirals out of control from there

# ? Feb 11, 2017 21:13

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# ? Apr 23, 2024 16:33

fritz: Jul 26, 2003

George posted:

oh my god check the comments. first one is a dude telling him to get a job and it spirals out of control from there

tron guy's trying to stem the tide

quote:

Jay Maynard on 2017-02-10 at 12:25:07 said:
Eric is bound not to be the only high-caliber techie whose age and politics render him unattractive to the Silicon Valley Left. Not only that, but I�m certain he�s far from the only one who refuses to have anything to do with the People�s Republic of Commiefornia.

We typically respond to something like this by saying �looks like a market opportunity!� If there�s tech talent out there that�s not being taken advantage of, then there should be money to be made by harnessing it, right?

Jay Maynard on 2017-02-10 at 20:17:53 said:
It also occurs to me that for political correctness to be used against the Left in employment, there must first be a set of desirable employers that aren�t controlled by the SJWs and not afraid to tell them to go pound sand.

Right now, these seem thin on the ground. Got any thoughts on how to reverse the situation?

# ? Feb 11, 2017 21:43

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Serious Hardware/Software Crap > YOSPOS > wonder what esr is up to

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