See here:
It spreads distrust and destroys social standards in common.
Thus, paranoia is an inevitable reaction.
The problem with the internet is that if you add commerce and a clueless general population, you get behavior that is only appropriate in dive bars.
Make the same internet, put an IQ test on the door, and let in 120s and up and you'll have someplace worth attending.
Don't expect support-contract-like behaviour from a list - remember they're volunteers, there's no "SLA" and they don't work for you.
Ah, the old "bad behavior exists, therefore your example must be of the bad behavior"!
No.
I've (repeatedly) seen people go on to these lists, ask a polite question, and receive STFU NEWB or analogue response very quickly.
Generally, the more difficult the question the more likely it is to receive this response.
Ever wonder why Stack Overflow is so popular? Volunteers there get imaginary internet karma points and so have incentive to answer questions.
You usually get a better answer at Stack Overflow than from the official lists.
But few businesses want to rely on a software plan that begins "And if there's a problem, we know this INTERNET FORUM..."
Investors will panic and flee the room, with good reason.
You only need one 9/10 to organize the project and avoid pitfalls.
Everyone else can write the bog-standard code that doesn't improve between someone with a 5/10 and a 10/10, or at least not by any metric measurable for business logic.
So they offer the 7/10s half what the 9/10 makes, and hire on a 5:1 ratio.
"No support contract."
Thus what they see is the possibility of problems that take days or weeks to resolve, while getting told STFU NEWB on some mailing list.
That's the experience many clients have had with FreeBSD, for example.
These tendencies are general bureaucratic tendencies and can also be observed in private industry, but generally only when the inbound money is so huge that bloat is an affordable luxury.
Some government offices work better than others.
Others... yeah.
First, there's all the rules that make sure rules first go to minority- or female-owned companies, or to companies in at risk zones.
Next there's all the regulation.
Next there's government slowness. It's not market responsive.
The result is that people who are interested in running a business go away, UNLESS their business model is making money off government by charging it extra for all of its special demands.
It's no wonder the DC area is growing faster than anywhere else and salaries are higher there.
Like many political ideas - most noteworthy being communism - they sound good when you think about them on a local scale, where everyone knows everyone else personally, but once you start adding in layers of detachment the rules break down very quickly; the "best and the brightest" aren't likely to win very often when fighting sociopaths.
Maybe we need to localize then. Divide up into units of 150 people and make those part of a pyramid all the way up to someone at top.
If only there was some system of government in history that had done this...
There's a difference between "good enough" and "elegant" when it comes to design.
Our society is a chaotic blast of all sorts of noise, from physical sound waves, to electromagnetics, to sheer ugliness.
It doesn't reflect a consistent design philosophy.
The high number of electromagnetic wave emitters inevitably creates other problems as well. But we're so focused on "good enough" that we ignore this.
Step 1:
Get rid of all regulation.
Free market, yo.
Step 2:
A young girl is murdered and rape in a cab in a horrific fashion.
The democracy demands solutions!
Step 3:
Regulate. When that doesn't work, regulate some more.
Step 4:
Prices are high and a de facto exclusive license exists. People notice this is bad and want deregulation.
Before people get in and start "social engineering" and applying "universal morality" in order to make a perfect world to fit their neurotic needs.
If we're lucky, these cosmic Dark Ages will rub off on earth.
He has not acquired a fortune; the fortune has acquired him. -- Bion
