How do Free Software creators even make a living? Do they all just live off welfare...

How do Free Software creators even make a living? Do they all just live off welfare? I don't think they would make enough off donations alone to survive, do they?

yeah

They get paid by their employer you fucking moron, or they sell support for their product, or they do it in their free time. Look it up and stop creating garbage threads

by getting a fucking job you idiot

A programming job? For a company that produces proprietary software?

They can pay the employee(s) to work on open and/or free software to assist in some other aspect of their corporation. It's not rocket science

but then how do those companies make money

There are companies that need software developed that aren't software companies dipshit.

You think every single division in a company makes money for the company? Are you stupid or underage? Where does an internal IT support department generate revenue?

>666
nice

I'd make non-proprietary software all the time if I knew how to program, I'm just too dumb for programming :(

/thread

>I'm just too dumb for programming :(
No you're not. You just have to stop being beta cuck defeatist and actually put effort into it.

This. Get a programming book, any one, a notebook, and a computer, and get to work. You're not getting any younger

The heavy lift is done by professionals paid by big corporations. The fat geek in his mom's basement creates mplayer skins.
Hope that helps.

Guys, I'm reading "The C Programming Language" and the exercises make no sense to me, I also suck at math!

how2contribute to the linux kernek

You need to practice, practice, practice. Some things come easy for some people, but those same people struggle with things you'd find easy.
Go on GitHub, claim an issue, fix it, create a pull request, get it accepted. Just like basically any other open source contribution

They create open source software so they can list it on their github and eventually get recruited by a proprietary software company.

I know, but knowing that programming isn't easy for me, just makes me want to cry myself to sleep every night, I really don't wanna do anything else.

>something is hard
>better give up
either find a new life goal or study like you actually want to learn how to write competent code. We're not here to hold your hand and make you feel like a smart boy. You need to take control of your own life and stop making excuses with your defeatist attitude

OP makes a good point.

By keeping the other depts. productive.

they have jobs

And those of us who actually know what we're talking about made good counter points
>keeping other departments productive
>same thing as generating direct revenue
while you are correct, IT support departments generate exactly 0 revenue from their actions. The company pays them to keep the other departments running, but they do not get paid by some external source for doing so

>And those of us who actually know what we're talking about made good counter points
you seem upset

you seem to have run out of actual arguments. OP had a question, we answered it

I'm not arguing. I'm just an observer observing all the good points ITT

>an open source programmer's endgame

So why "observe" op having a point and ignoring all the other valid points?

because OP was the first post I read

ok cool bro

Can confirm. Cannot even get an internship with a crappy company anymore without at least 3 or 4 of your own projects on github.

>while you are correct, IT support departments generate exactly 0 revenue from their actions. The company pays them to keep the other departments running, but they do not get paid by some external source for doing so
Building maintenance doesn't bring in any revenue either, yet most companies continue to pay them good money. Very strange.

Some companies also use free software because it's cheaper than building something from the ground up, add functionality to it because they want it to do something it doesn't, and contribute those changes back to the project because GPL.

Since free software may be freely redistributed, it is generally available at little or no fee. Free software business models[45] are usually based on adding value such as applications, support, training, customization, integration, or certification

I managed to get a job with 0 public repositories
Exactly, thank you for further proving my point. My point is that companies keep departments that don't generate revenue, because asked how do companies make money (in relation to open source development) as if companies only have departments that generate revenue. Please follow the conversation

>Very strange.
It's not strange at all. In fact you seem to be missing his point. The benefits of paying for maintenance far outweigh the cost savings of not doing it.

Likewise, google, facebook, amazon, even fucking microsoft, all pay developers to work on linux software and linux kernel development. The benefits of paying these developers to work on free software far outweigh the cost savings of letting it go unfunded. They make billions of dollars off of linux and linux infrastructure.

are you 12 years old?

Are (((you)))?

this guy is confirmed as a 12 year old

Now, now, children. user provided an argument which was debated against (mostly) politely. There is no reason to turn the thread into a "no, you're (((younger)))" shit throwing competition

this guy is confirmed as a 12 year old

yeah except that's exactly what a 12 year old would say. they would just copy my post exactly

lmao this guy is actually 12 years old guys hahahah

>code is a not a program
>a program need not have an application
>an application need not provide an economically useful benefit
>an application is not a platform
>a platform need not have users
>users need not provide revenue
>revenue need not yield profit
>let's all just kill ourself this instant from existential dread
...I don't even work in IT and I just realized my own shitpost was so unoriginal that I read something similar someplace before. If it wasn't Paul Graham or HackerNews it was some shit they and Reddit like.

Then I had to go find Mr. Bean.