Richard Stallman: We're heading for a total disaster

[NickStone]

The following video is 2 years old but I believe is still relevant and interesting today.

[perspectoff]

I don't watch videos. Can you summarise the main points which I can read in a few seconds instead of being forced to watch minutes of a video?

I very much respect Richard Stallman...

[GreyGeek]

... I very much respect Richard Stallman...

And, he was spot on in that video. He recounted some of the history of print drivers and the introduction of "licenses" which caused him to create the GPL and he discusses the difference between software developed under the GPL and "open source" software, a distinction many people do not understand or appreciate. He denounces the walled gardens created by Apple and others and how they diminish personal freedom. Classic Stallman. The interviewer was somewhat of an ... arse who didn't understand the topic or ask significant questions. At a couple of points he tried to be confrontational but failed miserably.

[perspectoff]

Thank you. I really like Richard Stallman. In some ways he reminds me of Alan Watts, lol. ...or maybe Hobbes or John Locke (with his Social Contract theory).

Unfortunately, IT folks don't often understand the "high philosophy" of things. Stallman is a philosopher at heart, a pragmatist by choice, and an altruist by evolution.

Like Linus, I think. :-)

[GreyGeek]

I agree with your assessment.

[SteveRiley]

Unfortunately, IT folks don't often understand the "high philosophy" of things.

"IT folks" are resonsible for a great deal of operational maintenance of a modern business. High philosophy must often (sadly) take a back seat to technical practicalities. A CIO is paid to direct an organization to use its information assets for competitive advantage and market differentiation. A CIO is not paid to make philosophical decisions.

[GreyGeek]

Amazing! Me the conservative and Steve the Liberal on reverse sides of the fence!

I agree with what you say is the role of the CIO, but he is directed by and is obedient to the CEO, or he is out of a job. Therein lies the rub. Many, if not most, CEO's today seem to lack a moral or ethical compass, if not outright illegal in their behavior, as the emails and papers revealed in the Combs vs MS trial proved. Not to be picking on Gates and Ballmer, but they come to mind the quickest. The biggest problem with CEO's today is that their view of the world extends only 90 days into the future and focuses only on "maximizing shareholders returns", which is what they use to justify their plundering of the corporate profits, exploitation of people and the planet.

[SteveRiley]

Hey, I have the same grumbles as you about corrupt C-suites!

But remember: we hear only about evil ones in the news. One definition of "news" is: that which doesn't happen every day. We aren't going to hear about the tens of thousands of honest, non-corrupt CEOs because these guys aren't newsworthy. For example, the CEO at my employer is an exemplary man, and has managed to build one of the top-rated (here, here, here) firms in Silicon Valley to work for.

Oh, and we have a CIO (more) who's an aboslute blast, one of the smartest people I've ever met.

[dibl]

Many, if not most, CEO's today seem to lack a moral or ethical compass, if not outright illegal in their behavior, as the emails and papers revealed in the Combs vs MS trial proved.

I think that opinion (supported by actual misbehavior) reflects the worst of the CEOs of publicly-held corporations, who are of necessity focused on the quarterly performance figures. But don't forget, there are many, many privately-held companies, of various sizes, with highly effective CEOs who are respected by shareholders, customers, and employees alike. Prior to retirement, it was my honor to serve for five years as president/CEO of a 200-employee engineering firm, which was 100% owned by the ESOP. It was a great job and we made a lot of folks a lot of money when we sold the business to a major U.S. public corporation.

[GreyGeek]

Steve,
Here is a video clip of your CIO explaining something to a reporter:

While researching her I noticed she has the same degree that my daughter obtained, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, so I know what that degree entails. How did your CIO pick up her computer information knowledge? Post graduate education?

Dibl:
My view of CEO's mid size businesses and small business owners in general comes from eighteen years experience in running my computer consulting/programming business. I had developed a skeleton of a GAAP enterprise accounting system that I would customize for businesses. I would guesstimate that at least 1/3rd of the CEO's/owners who asked me to bid on computerizing their businesses took me aside during my evaluation phase (where I acquired the information necessary to place a proper bid) to ask me privately about a second set of "special" books (or reports) which would give them a "quick picture" of their real bottom line. Listening to them weasel around what they really wanted was eye opening. When I stated that my system is GAAP and cannot be modified to give them what they wanted they instantly lost interest in my bid.

Unfortunately, dishonest businesses create advantages over honest businesses that allow them to gain market advantages, often driving the honest business out of business. One classic example is Microsoft. After judicious bribes to Congressmen they got a law passed that allowed THEM to pay new employees using stock options, taking wages off the expenses off the books, resulting in higher profits. To make matters worse, they pocketed the exercise price employees will be required to pay to take ownership of the stock. So, in effect, you and I paid to have Win95 written, and we paid again when we bought it. The MS vs DOJ trail brought this to the front burner and the laws were changed, but Microsoft had already gained a strangle hold on the PC market place. I could go on with dozens of other examples ranging from the torpedoing of OLPC to torpedoing the ISO committees.

In other areas consider Exxon. Three months before BP's Deepwater Horizon exploded and twenty years AFTER the Valdez oil spill in Prince William sound, Exxon settled its last court case evolving that spill. On average it settled all of its court cases for less than ten cents on the dollar. This after promising that it pay to make whole both the sound and businesses damaged by the spill. BP, on the other hand, took a direct route to profiting from its own oil spill by buying the two most toxic and least effective dispersants they could find ... because they owned a major share of the company that made them. The ecology will be paying for years the decision by management to override the on-site engineers and not shut down the well, just the way people paid with their lives for Theokol's management overriding the on-site engineers and forcing the launch of Challenger.

[SteveRiley]

While researching her I noticed she has the same degree that my daughter obtained, a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration, so I know what that degree entails. How did your CIO pick up her computer information knowledge? Post graduate education?

She surrounds herself with smart people and listens to them.

[dibl]

I would guesstimate that at least 1/3rd of the CEO's/owners who asked me to bid on computerizing their businesses took me aside during my evaluation phase (where I acquired the information necessary to place a proper bid) to ask me privately about a second set of "special" books (or reports) which would give them a "quick picture" of their real bottom line. Listening to them weasel around what they really wanted was eye opening. When I stated that my system is GAAP and cannot be modified to give them what they wanted they instantly lost interest in my bid.

Interesting. This is not the place for a GAAP debate -- if I'm ever in your neck of Nebraska I'll buy you a beer and learn more. While GAAP specifies how costs and revenues are to be recorded on the books for public reporting, and other aspects of determining profitablity and potential liabilities, it should not restrict the ability of management to pull interim reports about financial activity in the current period, which is what most CEOs and CFOs are very interested in. Which is not the same as "cooking" the books. When I first got involved with executive management of our engineering firm, we had to wait until the middle of July to find out how we performed in June. It was painful, and pretty useless as far as exercising anything resembling realtime management control. The process of improving our cost accounting and management information systems was also painful, but eventually we got to more of a "weekly"-based system of tracking our performance and making necessary adjustments. All without monkeying with GAAP accounting principles.

[GreyGeek]

She surrounds herself with smart people and listens to them.

Wise move. At the Dept of Rev, my last job, the suites frequently listened to the app salesmen with the bobbing heads, instead of folks in their own IT department who knew the needs and requirement fully. Turns out there was/(is?) a good ole'boy network running. It has cost the state tens of millions of dollars and strapped the state with marginal and expensive to modify or maintain programs.

[GreyGeek]

... it should not restrict the ability of management to pull interim reports about financial activity in the current period, which is what most CEOs and CFOs are very interested in. Which is not the same as "cooking" the books. ...

My GAAP skeleton contained all the usual journals, ledgers, postings, reports, etc., for an enterprise system which had up to nine subsidiaries funnelling to the master set. It was made very clear in most instances that while the GAAP books gave something for the IRS to audit, if need be, their "special set" of books and reports were something they didn't want the IRS to see. If I had any suspicions about their intents for those "special sets" I didn't submit a bid.

[SteveRiley]

In (mainly) the US there is a train of thought a CEO has one duty only and it is to increase the quarterly figures for the benefit of the shareholders.

We've had a couple quarters lately where our revenue fell slightly short of guidance -- like 3 to 4 percent. Wall Street hammered us both times -- even though we're still quite profitable! Plus, we've been hasseled by an activist investor for over a year now. So it's likely that we'll go private soon. Personally, I can't wait. We'll be able to make some structural changes to the company (revenue recognition methods, quota retirement changes, functional realignments, others) that we'd never otherwise be able to do. Not having to worry about Wall Street breathing down your neck can be a very liberating thing.