By only allowing those with worthless money (the people that don't have it don't necessarily not help society) to have possessions? By putting artificial limits on the amount of resources that could otherwise have been consumed? Odd.

That doesn't make any sense. If money is worthless then how did they use it to get possessions? Sounds worthwhile to me...

Second, if other people (aka society) really find those people helpful, then they (society) wouldn't mind voluntarily giving them money. The guy who fixes my car helps me out, so I give him money. The clerk at 7-11 helps me out, so I give him money. How is being a jobless bum helping me out? How is it helping anyone out?

Capitalism is convenient for the elite who want to get richer at the expense of everything else, convenient for corporations who want the government to do their bidding, and convenient for those with the power to help others in need to say "I can't help you, I don't have any money!"

Can you even explain what you mean or is it just mindless babble?

I also wasn't really talking about bartering at all.

I guess I don't really know what you're talking about then.

That's a straw man argument. Getting "bailed out" is the polar opposite of capitalism. And I agree, that shit needs to stop.

Funny thing, though - if you're against the government giving money to companies and interfering with businesses then you're probably pro-capitalist.

That is quite a stereotypical statement. Well done. I merely feel that money itself is (and especially will be in the future) useless, as it merely artificially limits the amount of resources that can be consumed. A society without money wouldn't necessarily let people leech off of their work for no good reason.

Wow.

Are you really claiming money limits resources? Are you sure it's not the other way around? Or do you honestly believe that I could grow an infinite amount of wheat and feed the world, but money is somehow limiting how much wheat I can grow? And in a world without money, we could produce an infinite number of cars, computers, houses, and everything, because none of the resources required to produce them would be limited by money, either? How would that work?

That's clearly ridiculous. Resources are limited. Scarcity is a fact. Money, prices, and the market system are just a method of dealing with scarcity.

Money is a medium exchange. It's easier to use than bartering. Can you imagine a software developer having to say, "I'll write some software for you in exchange for some of those apples you're growing?" And you'd have to do it everywhere you wanted to buy something. Interesting idea, but I think I'll stick with money.

As for leeching off society... money is convenient for doing that, too. If I walk into a store and say, "I want to buy a pound of apples, here's $5" the clerk doesn't have to look me up in a database to know I've done my fair share. Presumably I earned the $5 by providing something of value to somebody at some other time, but the store clerk doesn't have to worry about it. All he needs to know is that I have $5.

Funny how I never see capitalists whining that people aren't giving them free shit.

Makes me wonder who's the real "greedy pig"?

Trolling?

apt-get install imagemagick

Was that so hard?

If you want to play games, buy a 360...

Comments like this kinda piss me off, because they make Linux users look like idiots.

If you want to brag about the size of your e-penis, and how you "only use linux," then more power to you.

But it's pretty ridiculous to basically tell other people, "Linux isn't good at that, so fuck you, you shouldn't use a computer for it."

I use Linux on all four of my computers at home. But do you know what I would do if I wanted to play a Windows game? I'd install Windows on one of them.

It's an operating system. Get over it.

In the US, as an individual, you have to get a prescription for it from your doctor.

That's not saying much. Here in Colorado college students can get medical pot licenses for nausea. Maybe California is more strict.

Firefox vs Chrome just got a bit more exciting.

Does anybody actually use Firefox any more? Every reason people used to give in favor of Firefox now applies to Chrome, times ten.

Because I want to run Windows apps and use Linux. What's there to not understand about that?

That's as silly as saying, "I want to live in France, but only speak Chinese."

Nobody's going to stop you, but you should realize you're making things more difficult than they need to be.

And the only thing you're proving is that you've turned a decision over operating systems into a religious issue. Or that you're too cheap to buy a $300 Windows PC. Or that you're a masochist.

I have to admit, I really don't see the point of Wine. If you want to run Windows apps, why not use Windows?

The way Sun was being run they would have gone bankrupt and all the projects would have been lost anyway.

Your comment describes the situation perfectly. You want all the goodness, but you don't want to pay for it.

Butthurt much?

Thanks for the advice. But I already have a "real job," and considering mine sounds significantly better than yours, maybe you should be taking advice instead of giving it out.

IMO, that sounds like a fail on your part.

It's not a journalists job to know about developing software. That's what they hired you for.

When somebody hands you a project, it's your job as the programmer to say, "This project will take X months to complete; require these tools and resources, which cost $Y; and will delay the other project(s) I am working on. Do you still want me to start this project?" And if they say, "Well we need it in half that time for $0," it's your job to explain why that isn't reasonable.

Getting business connections and capital are two parts of starting a successful bank. Doing so demonstrates you're somewhat trustworthy and have some financial sense.

How will you convince people to trust you with their money otherwise? Once you're big enough you can go by reputation, but until then most people will want evidence that you're not just some scammer. The easiest way of doing that is to get capital and business connections...

I don't personally know anybody, but there are thousands of banks in the United States, so it must be possible to start one...

In fact, a quick web search turns up this news story about people starting their own banks. And little more searching turns up the FDIC site for bankers, which presumably has information and forms required for opening a bank.

As others have pointed out, the main difficulty would be establishing credibility. "Hey, I'm some guy, trust me with your savings," just isn't going to cut it.