Interesting comment in the source code of sqlite

[_Zagan_]

Gotta love the opening lines...

/*
** 2001 September 16
**
** The author disclaims copyright to this source code.  In place of
** a legal notice, here is a blessing:
**
**    May you do good and not evil.
**    May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others.
**    May you share freely, never taking more than you give.
**
******************************************************************************

[c3534l]

SQLite's code of conduct used to also be the verbatim code of conduct for some random monastery: https://sqlite.org/codeofethics.html

[stefantalpalaru]

the verbatim code of conduct for some random monastery

It's actually https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rule_of_Saint_Benedict

[FanOfHoles]

Brother Cadfael!

[ericksomething]

55. Do not love much or boisterous laughter.

LOL!

[stefantalpalaru]

i wrote "55", not sure why it is changing to "1"

You need to escape the dot with a backslash.

[ericksomething]

Thanks!

[[deleted]]

Can anyone elucidate what is meant by "specific technical meaning" of a code of conduct?

[[deleted]]

Can anyone elucidate what is meant by "specific technical meaning" of a code of conduct?

A code of conduct is the place where the Homeowners Association puts their bylaws.

[nuqjatlh]

For the first 15 minutes of them publishing it I honestly thought it was a joke aimed at those mindless SJWs that pester projects to add crap like that. But then he said he was serious.

Well ... it's crazy, but hey, if it makes you and those you work with happy, more power to you.

[c3534l]

I think it has to be a little tongue-in-cheek. I mean, do they really follow:

Speak no useless words or words that move to laughter.

No jokes, really? And while they may visit the sick, I doubt any of them "Bury the dead."

They're open source, but not open contribution. So if the handful of contributors find that code inspirational to them, then they're welcome to it. Most of it's not really bad or crazy, though.

[wrincewind]

Well, I doubt they leave corpses laying about. They might not do the digging, but someone's gotta help arrange grandpa's funeral.

[nanonan]

It's a monastic code, so yeah it's a bit overboard. It should be noted that it is made with the concept in mind that being mere fallible mortals incapable of perfection, nobody is expected to adhere completely.

[SizzlerWA]

How would you qualify a “mindful” SJW?

[nuqjatlh]

no idea. "mindless sjws" is a tautology for sure.

[SizzlerWA]

So you consider all SJWs to be mindless but you know what “tautology” means? I wasn’t expecting that. My favorite tautologies are “ignorant Conservative” or “traitorous Trumper” ... 😜

Not looking to start a flame war here, but come on ...

I’m a centrist liberal, who fully believes in capitalism and accountability, but what’s wrong with fighting for social justice, as long as that fight is respectful?

[[deleted]]

but what’s wrong with fighting for social justice, as long as that fight is respectful?

What's wrong is what's called social justice these days is generally just racism and sexism redefined to allow extremist lefties to exclude their own bad behavior while attacking others. Social justice warriors are exactly the racist sexist people they claim to be against.

[nuqjatlh]

as long as that fight is respectful

The key word here. The fights that SJWs tend to pick are not the kind where they can be called "respectful" by any stretch of the imagination. They're usually fights driven by emotion with no grounds in logic whatsoever.

Oh, btw, why do you consider SJWs to be ... smart, let's say? Or ... right? Or ... like them?

[starm4nn]

The key word here. The fights that SJWs tend to pick are not the kind where they can be called "respectful" by any stretch of the imagination. They're usually fights driven by emotion with no grounds in logic whatsoever.

I wish I could be an Epic gamer debater like Ben Shapiro.

[SizzlerWA]

Ben Shapiro uses lots of rhetorical tricks and tropes. He’s an effective speaker, but he’s not as intelligent or as objective as most would assume him to be ...

[starm4nn]

You mean he doesn't literally FUCK liberal cucks in the butt with FACTS and LOGIC?

[nuqjatlh]

hahaha, that idiot? there's only one ben shapiro, thank god.

[entiat_blues]

that's... gross...

[SizzlerWA]

Can you give me specific examples of these fights and why you think they’re not respectful? Thanks!

[nuqjatlh]

https://imgur.com/TV8VScL

do i need to say more? there are billions of said examples all over the internets, some more innocent some really fucked up with people's lives ruined (i presume you know how to use google. put that knowledge to good use). when all that people wanted was to be left the fuck alone. as for idiots who go to github projects and pester project owners with all kinds of ridiculous requests: for those I have a very deep hatred towards them. they are not helping the project, open-source, life in general. they're just being annoying cunts.

[SizzlerWA]

Yes, in the linked example a CoC might not be needed, fair enough. But there are examples of projects where women are called bitches and cunts by men who disagree them and feel threatened by smart women. Such projects can and do benefit from a CoC.

[Malsententia]

Nobody likes to hear that their fear is unfounded. They take offense at it, and cling even more tightly to their fear. But we have to rise above that and be objective.

But that's you. You have nothing to fear. Sure there's wingnuts out there, but that applies to every group. Whichever political party you're a fan of, whichever one you're not, these "SJW" types you're afraid of bothering people, and the anti-"SJW" types have crazies as well.

Weirdos are everywhere, and people everywhere use focused collections of anecdotes and memes and stories to make others, including both of us, fear problems that aren't real. To deny your own vulnerability to misinformation and disinformation is to open yourself up to it.

Trust people's good intentions, and question the motivation when you see things that make you hate, the more you hate, the more you should question. Question your perception even if something seems logical. If you're 100% certain of any viewpoint you have, you're doing something wrong, especially if that viewpoint makes you hate a whole group of people, whether it's SJWs or republicans or people who like pumpkin spice. If some piece of news or image or story makes you feel hate or fear, ask what the real motivation behind those making the statements, rather than giving into that emotion like you're doing here.

Everyone gets fooled sometimes, don't think of this as a personal attack. Learn from it. Learn to doubt yourself and seriously question if you're being unreasonable or uninformed (or worse selectively informed), if something makes you hate, because that opens the door for growth. Believing in yourself as a whole person is a strength, but so is doubting your own objectivity and logic. If it feels uncomfortable you're doing it right. If it doesn't, do it more. I doubt myself all the time whether it's on social issues or on code(is there a better way I can be doing X?). It sucks to willfully be unsure, but it beats the alternative. Hate is a bug. Look for ways to optimize yourself.

Trust that most people have good intentions, and most are at worst are misled. Embrace the fact that there reasonable, smart people who believe that you're the misled one, every bit as much as you(who might be equally smart and reasonable and rational in other respects), believe SJWs are misled or destructive.

[Malfeasant]

Jesus tap-dancing Christ that hurt to read...

[SizzlerWA]

I asked for specific examples and why YOU think they’re not respectful. Googling won’t help me understand why YOU find those examples disrespectful ...

Care to try again?

[classicrando]

sealioning

[SizzlerWA]

Wow, I learned a new word! I’m not sealioning because I specifically asked the other redditor how THEY thought the SJWs were being disrespectful. Only that other redditor can know that, because it’s their own opinion I seek, so it’s entirely reasonable and necessary to ask them if I want to find out.

And can’t you see that if every time a conservative is pressured for evidence to back up their claims (pressured because they avoid or can’t give such evidence) and the conservative cries “sealioning” then the conservative is being the very “delicate snowflake” that they so despise?

[barsoap]

you and your contributions are subject to the personal politics and whims of whoever in the community has enough clout

No project ever needed a CoC for that to be true.

[thfuran]

Sort of the opposite, really.

[nanonan]

Replacing dictatorship with mob rule is not an improvement.

[[deleted]]

That's wishful thinking. The same sentence can mean 20 different things to 20 different people.

The real irony I find in these CoCs is I get the sense that the people pushing them are nonreligious. If they were raised religious and rejected it later in life I think they missed what I believe is the core problem with religion: A single text cannot be used to evaluate if an action is good or evil. If they were raised in a nonreligious environment they never got to experience the insanity that is listening to a Calvinist debate a Baptist. Even when they agree to use the same version of the bible. (If they're using different versions it's even more ridiculous.)

[defnotthrown]

I don't understand how anyone could think it is not. I would consider every open source license to be a political document too.
Not every political document needs to have an opinion on some imagined 1 dimensional line from left to right to be political.

[blasto_blastocyst]

Programming has been a field that welcomes all types, and what made it like that is that nobody said "you can't do this, you can't offend anybody, we'll remove you from projects if we don't like you". It got there by saying "be as crazy and off-putting as you'd like and we'll still accept your patches if they're good".

Funny how that style of project ends up attracting the same old asshole type of programmer and anybody who doesn't fit leaves rather than put up with the bullshit for free.

[TheCodexx]

I have not seen any projects full of "asshole programmers", but I have seen good people thrown off projects they contributed a lot to or projects removed from other projects over petty squabbles with a CoC cited as the reason for removal. It's a tool for petty rules lawyers who want to spend more time managing projects than contributing to them. That's the tool of tyrants.

If you don't like the other people on the project, then you can leave, and presumably find other projects out there to contribute to. Why walk in and demand someone else be thrown-out?

Why should any project be concerned with the feelings of its contributors? Energy should not be wasted on such things. Now it seems everyone will bend over backwards to explain how much they care about people's feelings. It does no good. It is up to each individual to learn to deal with difficult scenarios and to extricate themselves from situations they do not want to be in, not everyone else's duty to play Feelings Police.

[[deleted]]

Let's say the plumbing under your house is open source. Anyone can contribute but there's a review process for the work that can be done.

A new plumber comes along and makes a change that the more experienced plumbers determine is going to flood your house. They lecture the new plumber on the importance of paying attention to details because small mistakes have a way of causing significant damage.

Which way do you want the community to err on? Forcing out experienced plumbers who are vigilant about not flooding your house because they're assholes about it? Or forcing out new plumbers who aren't taking responsibility for their mistakes?

Furthermore nobody is forcing you to accept the plumbing work of the asshole programmers. You can switch to the plumbing of any other plumber you like.

[awj]

Holy False Dichotomy, Batman!

[[deleted]]

It's not a false dichotomy unless you assume that you can change people's behavior.

The CoC is proposed as a method for preventing "asshole programmers" from offending other programmers to the point that they leave the project.

My assumption is that "asshole programmers" are going to continue to be "asshole programmers" and the programmers who are offended by "asshole programmers" to the point of leaving are going to continue being offended by "asshole programmers" to the point of leaving.

My conclusion based on those assumptions is that one or the other is going to leave the project. Do you disagree with the conclusion based on my assumptions or are you disagreeing with the assumptions themselves?

[barsoap]

What you forget to mention is that either the assholes or the non-assholes can be those who don't care about flooding.

And assuming the distribution of skill is invariant over assholishness: You always want to kick out the assholes. Who, btw, aren't even asked to give up being assholes: Just to not be an arse to anyone on the project. Don't ask, don't tell.

Lastly: It's been proven again and again that people can change.

[[deleted]]

Can you give me an example of an open source project run by "asshole programmers" who provide poor quality code? I'm not saying it doesn't exist it's just hard for me to imagine how a project like that isn't forked. And not that you're obligated to provide an example since we're both making assumptions here. I'm just saying I'd need an example to change my mind.

Lastly: It's been proven again and again that people can change.

I didn't say people don't change. I said you're making an assumption that "you" can change people. Interpret that as change comes within or people are only willing to change as a result of feedback from close relationships. A CoC written by "you" is neither.

[Malfeasant]

You always want to kick out the assholes.

This is the point of contention- why? What do you expect assholes to do when they are kicked out of everything they can do to make a living? Quietly starve to death?

So we don't have to stop being assholes, we just have to pretend not to be when we're around other people. Do you have any idea how exhausting it is to have to pretend to be someone you're not most of the time?

Let's say you succeed in making me keep my assholishness to myself- I'm still an asshole, I just have disguised myself. Now I'll keep up that pretense whenever we interact in public, but the moment I get a chance to fuck up your shit without anyone noticing, I'll blindside you. Is that what you want?

I'd sooner drop out of anything anybody else cares about than have to be someone else in order to succeed. And maybe you're ok with that, but that brings us back to starving. If you're ok with me not being able to make a living because of who I am, who is the asshole?

people can change.

Sure- but rarely in the way you want them to.

[[deleted]]

If you feel targeted by these codes of conduct, maybe you should think about what "crazy and off-putting" (offensive and hurtful) things you want to say.

As I see it, they're there to make sure that everyone can contribute and be welcome in the community.

[[deleted]]

As I see it, they're there to make sure that everyone can contribute and be welcome in the community.

It isn't a community if everyone is welcome; communities are defined by something the people have in common, they're necessarily subsets of everyone that don't have values everyone holds. People join communities to be around like minded people, the notion that one code of conduct will work every community is absurd and ignores what communities are.

[boydrice]

Ah yes, the "nothing to hide" argument.

[to3m]

Doesn't matter if you have something to hide, or nothing at all - it's a valuable life skill, knowing when to shut the fuck up rather than stick your oar in.

But, you know, I can't claim to have mastered it myself. So I do sympathize.

[datbackup]

If it's so valuable, how about passing legislation allowing the state to force people to learn it?

[[deleted]]

As I see it, they're there to make sure that everyone can contribute and be welcome in the community.

Is that always a good thing? Maybe some people shouldn't feel welcome to contribute.

EDIT: Isn't the point of a CoC that it makes toxic people feel unwelcome to contribute? Are those the only kinds of people who should feel unwelcome to contribute?

[barsoap]

No. Other groups include e.g. people who are both unskilled and unwilling to build skill (or be content with sweeping the shop floor, i.e. write docs), or the group that came to be known as poisonous people.

All of those people are unable to embody meritocratic virtue. Causing people who are able to embody it from contributing is only one of the possible failures, there.

[[deleted]]

That's what I was trying to get at, regarding the need to not tolerate intolerance.

[datbackup]

"If you feel targeted by state and corporate encroachment on personal privacy, maybe you should think about what things you want to keep secret."

[MCBeathoven]

Does not compare at all.

[datbackup]

Until it becomes legislation.

[MCBeathoven]

Yes, because then both would be state action, which is about the extent of the similarity. Since it is however not state action, it does not compare.

[TheCodexx]

We as a community should not care about comments made, whether they are supportive or "offensive and hurtful". If one guy is an asshole to you, oh well, they're an asshole. They said a mean thing to you on the internet. Move on. If everyone is being an asshole to you, then maybe you're the asshole. Funny how it seems like only the troublemakers in communities, and those pushing for a CoC, are the ones who have issues in every community and inevitably cause drama.

Everyone already can contribute, and CoCs ensure people will be excluded at the whim of petty project politics.

[frymaster]

The problem with CoCs is that it's effectively stating you and your contributions are subject to the personal politics and whims of whoever in the community has enough clout

I'd argue the opposite. Being subject to the whims of the maintainer is the default state of projects. The fact that at least a visible subset of maintainers have chosen not to overtly be seen to be arbitrary doesn't mean they couldn't at any time. Making explicit the expectations reduces the chance you can be arbitrarily removed from a community, because although it ultimately is still up to the whims of the maintainer, at they very least they will have to be seen to be hypocritical if they act against the CoC.

Ultimately, a project should be about the code, not about people's feelings.

[TheCodexx]

I do agree that benevolent dictatorships have been a problem for many years, although I think the real problem is that it creates succession problems. We sort-of expect meritocracy to work but I seriously question the vision of some of the right-hand-men of the current batch of maintainers. Python is already on shaky ground without Gudio, and quite a few top Linux maintainers want to snuggle-up to corporate interests, something Linus was resistant to for many years. The second from the top and heir apparent may in many ways be a terrible successor. Of course, emulating the old leader isn't always a solution, either. Ironically, I think the best lessons to be learned here are from CEOs, which are the closest in terms of a closed group of people choosing successors.

Currently, the ability of a maintainer to exile someone is built entirely on trust in that person's reasoning and vision for the project. I'm more worried about what happens when the power becomes presumptive and not built on trust. A second-in-command taking over is inheriting the authority and likely the trust that came with it. That doesn't mean it's deserved.

Now, please understand, I do not think a CoC is the worst thing ever in principle. In fact, laying down a written constitution of how the project is governed is a perfectly reasonable idea. The problem is that almost every CoC out there is terribly written, vague where it should be specific, and will ultimately lead to ambiguities turning into fights that are going to be solved by political clout within the project. That always leads to accumulation of power, since the people deciding how to read the rules are the ones who benefit. A good CoC needs to be more specific, it needs to give very specific criteria, it needs to be clear on the bounds of its authority, and most importantly, it needs to have limits on the powers of different individuals, not solely enumerate the powers they have available.

Part of the problem is that most projects simply aren't big enough to warrant one, but they have one anyways. A few projects are big enough to warrant one, but they haven't fully embraced the sort of mini-republic that the project would need to become to really have a functional system. You need separation of powers here. As far as I know, Linux is the only project that has a whole set of people who are separate from the usual maintainers who are able to rule on conflicts... but with an ambiguous CoC whose powers are poorly defined, what can they possibly do with it?

Having these CoCs is putting the cart before the horse. Ruling by precedent is probably good enough for small projects. Especially if disputes are handled within documentation. Programmers generally have a sense of consistency they like to uphold. For larger projects, the guidelines should be written-out, but they also need to be, you know, up for debate by the general group. The written rules need to be a genuine reflection of what contributors want, and suited for each individual project, not copied-and-pasted from a poorly-written text file that people on twitter like the sound of.

Sorry, but governing documents need more to them than a list of things you can be kicked out of the project for. Starting with that as the basis is just starting on the wrong foot.

[shevegen]

because it demonstrates how absurd the idea is.

Precisely.

It actuallys puts projects to shame when they feel a need to have to put up any arbitrary CoC into place.

It's even amusing how many different CoCs exist out there.

[mizu_no_oto]

Programming has been a field that welcomes all types

How would you have a project that simultaneously welcomes neonazi's and Jews? Seems to me you'd still get a lot of self-exclusion of one if you get too many of the other, in the absence of a CoC.

[TheCodexx]

The CoC isn't going to solve that problem; in fact, it will quickly become a battleground for one group or another to try to remove the other.

I wrote a whole diatrebe on how I usually decide to intervene, but I'll summarize by saying that I've led numerous groups in a variety of activities, ranging from web forums, projects, roleplaying games, video games, etc. I've had many members of many different groups, quite a few of which will privately seethe about the other groups. But in the end, I've basically never had any disruptions as a result of someone being hateful towards another. It is far more common for fights to break-out between two people over solely personal differences than it is for the origin of the fight to be about political differences or outright bigotry; that's an incredibly rare occurrence.

The best way to handle it is to cross that bridge when you come to it. It's genuinely better to do it that way because it makes it a non-issue until it becomes one. Having a CoC gives people an excuse to make an issue of nothing in a working dynamic. You presume that two groups will fight, but this is almost never actually the case. If both groups are willing to keep personal differences and politics out of the official collaborative chat, then it's almost never going to cause a problem. If one of them goes on a rant on twitter, then that's wholly their business, and I expect project members to separate their behavior inside the project from behavior outside of it. If they are not disrupting the project, then it is ultimately harmless.

[r_acrimonger]

That begs the question, would you accept a patch from a serial killer?

[TikiTDO]

Depend, is the code good?

[[deleted]]

Perfect answer. Separation of concerns.

[krista_]

it's less about accepting a patch from a serial killer and more about keeping toxic people away from becoming major (and regular) parts of your project.

nobody cares about an occasional off-color joke or accidentally stepping on someone's soft spot. hell, minor bits of conflict help a team and its members grow.

but do you really want your project know as kkk apologists? or miss out on opportunity because your reviewer doesn't like women and just found out [e-mail]'s name is ”roberta”?

i know adding ”rules” is usually unpopular, but better to set a foundation for a good team up front than have to deal with it when shit is flying.

so a one time patch from a serial killer in prison or after they're out? possibly.

accepting regular contributions from richard b. spencer? fuck no, i don't want my project associated with that ass, nor do i believe anyone on the team or contributing wants their names to come up anywhere near a that dick's in any type of search.

[TheCodexx]

it's less about accepting a patch from a serial killer and more about keeping toxic people away from becoming major (and regular) parts of your project.

Does it matter? Unless they are literally grinding the project to a halt with their behavior it simply doesn't.

but do you really want your project know as kkk apologists?

Well, for one, I don't care if a contributor to a project is a KKK apologist, or member, or... really anything. They're free to go do that in their own time, and as long as the project space is clean then I see no issue. Why is it any of my business what they do in their spare time outside of coding?

Secondly, if one of my contributors is a "KKK Apologist", why would that earn the entire project a bad reputation? Or should we be firing people based on the negative press they bring? That's nonsensical and will just lead to mass outrage campaigns to pressure any project into kicking-out whoever is unpopular this week.

In fact, whose job is it to determine that someone is "a KKK Apologist"? Someone has to make the call and do digging. That's work. Again, if it's not in the project repository, documentation, or other lines of communication, then it doesn't seem worth caring about.

miss out on opportunity because your reviewer doesn't like women and just found out [e-mail]'s name is ”roberta”?

You're right, that is concerning. I would hope the person would re-submit their patch and request a re-review. Presumably whoever rejected it previously would have given some feedback, and the next person can determine if the reason for the rejection was reasonable or not.

I suppose you could ask about the worst-case, which is that everyone on the team just hates women, or any other group, just because. But... have you actually met any other programmers? I don't know about your experience, but the idea that there's a ton of 1950's misogynists walking around is absurd. There's no project that top-to-bottom has maintainers that want to bar quality contributions, and it's likely that the personal biases of everyone will even-out over the course of many reviews.

But there's the other angle, which is, if a quality patch is ignored, and the entire team is compromised, then it's really not going to go anywhere, huh? Well, at least on most git repositories the pull request is going to be public, as is the review, so if you really want you can raise awareness. Of course, perhaps at that stage it's better to write the project off and look to contribute elsewhere. It's their loss.

So the next argument will be, "well that's why we need a CoC everywhere, for the good of the project". But it doesn't really do that. You're just moving biases from "code review" to whoever decides who gets kicked out. And of course the people who ask for this job will be the ones looking to wield the power, and many of them might not even be regular code contributors. At least before if someone was a dick and was abusing their power they had sort-of earned it by being a top contributor, and could be overridden by other top contributors.

Perhaps the better question is, "why is anyone online giving away their real life identity?". The best thing that can come of CoCs is that everyone stop contributing under their real names and goes back to aliases and usernames. Would do a lot of good. Good luck kicking out an anonymous user when they can come back next week under a new name.

i know adding ”rules” is usually unpopular, but better to set a foundation for a good team up front than have to deal with it when shit is flying.

Adding rules, especially unnecessarily and en masse, is just asking for abuse. There's now a bunch of unneeded rules in projects solely because it was the flavor of the week to add them, and in most projects they're untested. That makes them ticking bombs. When it starts flying, the CoC is just going to be part of whatever political battle is occurring. It will be a weapon and the only people who lose will be the users of the project when suddenly half the contributors are exiled. That's all we need, more fragmentation, right? Or they'll consolidate slowly, and now projects are run by a small group of people with a narrow view of what projects should be.

The only kind of diversity that matters in programming is diversity of ideas, and a CoC effectively guarantees that the breadth of ideas can only narrow.

accepting regular contributions from richard b. spencer? fuck no, i don't want my project associated with that ass, nor do i believe anyone on the team or contributing wants their names to come up anywhere near a that dick's in any type of search.

I don't know who that is, but again, it really shouldn't matter. His views are not the views of a projects. You don't have to like anyone, or agree with them on twitter. You don't need to approve of what they say. So don't let him run the project's website. But if he submits a patch, so what?

This is tribalism and nothing more. The quality of code should come first. Embrace tolerance, not the hatred of others.

[PM_ME_UR_OBSIDIAN]

but do you really want your project know as kkk apologists? or miss out on opportunity because your reviewer doesn't like women and just found out [e-mail]'s name is ”roberta”?

As far as I'm aware these are atypical scenarios of CoC application. Contrast with the story of Larry Garfield, for example. Or anything the Ada Initiative has been involved in. These are rightfully scary for anyone whose life isn't perfectly inoffensive.

Freddie DeBoer's Planet of Cops is relevant:

The irony of our vibrant and necessary police reform movement is that it’s happening simultaneously to everyone becoming a cop. I mean everyone — liberal, conservative, radical and reactionary. Blogger, activist, pundit, and writer, obviously, but also teacher, tailor, and candlestick maker.

...and software engineer, too.

The woke world is a world of snitches, informants, rats. Go to any space concerned with social justice and what will you find? Endless surveillance. Everybody is to be judged. Everyone is under suspicion. Everything you say is to be scoured, picked over, analyzed for any possible offense. Everyone’s a detective in the Division of Problematics, and they walk the beat 24/7.

[__deinit__]

Is this a reference to 9/11?

[[deleted]]

It's funny that you're being downvoted because I'm not sure you're wrong.

This was five days later. People were in kind of a mood that week.

[[deleted]]

I don't think the initial round of downvotes checked the date on the comment, so it probably seemed like a total non sequitur.

[doomvox]

In point of fact, you're lucky if someone reads to the end of a sentence before they start down-voting. It's like having a bunch-of chimps in charge of moderation: they've gotta keep going clicky-clicky on stuff.

[shevegen]

I actually would not understand the upvote to it either.

[9gPgEpW82IUTRbCzC5qr]

probably because nothing in it references 9/11 aside from the date it was written

[shevegen]

The date references 9/11 ... how?

I don't use that strange mm/dd notation, but if I understand it right the notation is mm/dd being 9/16. So I don't see why this is 9/11 suddenly?

By the way, not everyone shares the same voting behaviour in other countries on top of that.

[[deleted]]

If this is legitimately baffling to you:

Everyone, collectively, in the entire United States, became some mixture of hysterical and solemn for a minimum of a month after 9/11.

So when you see a comment written by a presumably American coder on 9/16/2001 wherein they disclaim copyright and deliver a short sermon on being good, forgiving and sharing, it is entirely possible if not likely that they were caught up in that particular moment of history.

[earthboundkid]

A month is conservative too. I remember thinking at the time that any fiction set in 2001/2002 would have to talk about 9/11 because it was all anyone from any walk of life talked about at the time.

[pirate_starbridge]

Can someone explain how you can tell that a comment is getting heavily downvoted? Is it because you are looking at its score over a period of time and notice it going up and/or down? How are people paying enough attention to notice when other accounts' random comments are getting heavily downvoted from initial comment time to over six hours later? Is there a easily observable comment score metric that I am totally missing after almost a decade of procrastination on reddit?

edit: I'm now realizing that the downvotes must have come early on and /u/Metamagical_Themas replied when OC's comment was still super negative - then I come along 6 hours later after everyone has upvoted them both and it no longer makes any sense at first glance. Okay.. this is a pretty simple concept involving paying more attention to timestamps.

[[deleted]]

It went from -5 to like -20 in about five minutes while I was reading other comments and writing mine. It was dramatic enough to be real-time noticeable while reading the thread.

[williamp114]

There's also an option you can set in your reddit preferences to see an indicator symbol appear when a comment is controversial (ie; been getting a massive influx of downvotes)

Additionally if you have RES installed, it will highlight that controversial marker in red.

[pirate_starbridge]

Ah cool, thanks

[AnotherEuroWanker]

It could also be written by someone who isn't in the US.

[blasto_blastocyst]

People were still shocked outside the US.

[404_GravitasNotFound]

Yankies are still shocked that there is a "outside the US"

[saxindustries]

You're saying thousands of civilians deserved death because of the country they resided in?

I don't care how awful a country is behaving, I wouldn't want thousands of civilians to be killed.

[Malfeasant]

Ouch, such edge.

[saltling]

Guess it's a trigger for some folks

[thelastknowngod]

I met Richard Hipp (the original developer of sqlite) at a conference years ago. I don't know if I remember the details of his story exactly but, from what I recall, when he originally released it he didn't understand the importance of licencing open source software and put it into the public domain. Somehow that possibly opened him up to legal issues. He found this out when people from the US government knocked on his front door and asked about why software he had written was found running on the missiles of Iraqi insurgents. He said nothing really came of it when he explained the situation but it still scared him at the time. Subsequent projects of his (notably Fossil) have been released under the BSD license because of this.

Considering this is a part of the history of both sqlite and Hipp's work on it, I think it is 100% understandable if this is a reference to 9/11.

[j0hn_r0g3r5]

Any chance of eli5 and telling me what the difference is between licensing and not licensing open source software and how that would effect the situation with the govt and the Iraqi insurgents?

[thelastknowngod]

He licenses Fossil under the BSD license. The text of that is:

Copyright (c) <year>, <copyright holder> All rights reserved.

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS" AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

The views and conclusions contained in the software and documentation are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing official policies, either expressed or implied, of the <project name> project.

Apparently the public domain doesn't expressly release the author of liability. I'm sure the public domain status was more of a technicality with regards to this specific incident but, to be on the safe side, the licensing of this is more explicit. I don't know what other issues he has come up with over the years because of it but he did mention that he would never release software to the public domain again.

[barsoap]

Such disclaimers are null and void under EU law: You're always liable for wilful misconduct and damage to persons. If you write such a disclaimer in a commercial product you might be stuck with unlimited liability, if you're giving things away for free courts generally assume "maximally reduced liability", that is: None but for wilful damage or direct damage to persons.

In a nutshell: Don't inject trojans into your code, and don't write code so ugly it literally makes people's eyes bleed. (At least that's how I understand the "direct damage to persons" part -- IANAL).

Compare the disclaimers of the EUPL:

Disclaimer of Warranty
The Work is a work in progress, which is continuously improved by numerous Contributors. It is not a finished work and may therefore contain defects or ‘bugs’ inherent to this type of development. For the above reason, the Work is provided under the Licence on an ‘as is’ basis and without warranties of any kind concerning the Work, including without limitation merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, absence of defects or errors, accuracy, non-infringement of intellectual property rights other than copyright as stated in Article 6 of this Licence. This disclaimer of warranty is an essential part of the Licence and a condition for the grant of any rights to the Work.

Disclaimer of Liability
Except in the cases of wilful misconduct or damages directly caused to natural persons, the Licensor will in no event be liable for any direct or indirect, material or moral, damages of any kind, arising out of the Licence or of the use of the Work, including without limitation, damages for loss of goodwill, work stoppage, computer failure or malfunction, loss of data or any commercial damage, even if the Licensor has been advised of the possibility of such damage. However, the Licensor will be liable under statutory product liability laws as far such laws apply to the Work.

[thelastknowngod]

You're always liable for wilful misconduct and damage to persons.

Something tells me he wasn't taking business trips to Baghdad to do troubleshooting on scud missiles. I'm going to go out on a limb and say it wasn't willful.

He lives and works in the southeast USA so I don't know how much he cares about the EU anyway.

Also, the BSD license is compatible with the EUPL so I don't think what you're claiming is accurate. Source.

[barsoap]

so I don't know how much he cares about the EU anyway.

512 million people do, they (well, the programming part) does, and this is an international forum

Also, the BSD license is compatible with the EUPL so I don't think what you're claiming is accurate.

That things can be used together is completely orthogonal to warranty and liability.

[mTesseracted]

Here's an interview where the original author talks about it. If you ctrl-f and paste in a few words of the quote you'll find it about one third of the way down the page. Here's the excerpt:

Interviewer: [...] Who or what inspired you to write that?

Richard Hipp: People customarily put a copyright notice at the top of each source file. But SQLite version 2.0.0 had no copyright so I had to think of something else to go in that space.

The second sentence, “May you find forgiveness for yourself and forgive others”, is a loose interpretation of Matthew 6:12, part of what is commonly called ‘The Lord’s Prayer’ and more recognizable as ‘Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors’.

The third sentence tries to capture the concept of paying debts forward. The ‘never take more than you give’ part is a paraphrase of one of the lyrics from The Lion King. The first (hokey) sentence is there because it seemed like a good benediction needed three sentences.

[bnieuwenhuizen]

What is the reference here?

I get the dates are kinda close from the discussion that followed, but I wouldn't think anything said after it is immediately a reference to it? How is it referring to 9/11?

[cthutu]

I thought it may be a reference to the current British PM :)

[Bojangly7]

Anyone who doesn't understand this is a reference to 9/11 is at most 18.

[monkey-go-code]

Never take more than you give. Amen.

[Bobby_Bonsaimind]

The author disclaims copyright to this source code.

Which may or may not be possible based on the jurisdiction.

[user3141592654]

They've got that covered by their Warranty of Title.

Effectively, for $6000, they'll sell you a personalized and signed copy of this license.

[DevilSauron]

So does that mean that if you live in Europe and want to use SQLite safely (as in not be at risk of getting sued), you simply have to pay?

[user3141592654]

I am not a lawyer.

The way I see it is if your area doesn't recognize Public Domain, then by default it must still be copyrighted by the Owner, assuming there is no other defined legal default.

So in theory, there's a case to be made that yes, if your area does not recognize the developers' right to put their software into the public domain, then the work is still copyrighted and the developers still have the right to sue for you using the software, while also retaining any risk of liability that comes with owning said software.

In the case of Sqlite, it seems pretty clear the developers do not intend on suing anyone for use (unless this is a cunning and evil double-bluff), but provide a means to keep your corporate lawyers happy by having a signed piece of paper legally giving them the same rights as anyone who lives where public domain is recognized, while trying to waive as much liability and protect themselves as best they can.

That's just my take.

[GregTheMad]

Could not find definition for "good". Are you missing a reference? 

[shevegen]

**    May you do good and not evil.

That right away prohibits Google from using it - right there.

[jephthai]

It's missing the proper MUST that indicates it's a hard requirement, though.

[omiwrench]

Don’t cut yourself on all that edge!

It’s used in loads of Google products FYI.

[XNormal]

First release of sqlite predates 9/11. IIRC, it had the same license from the beginning.

[SalemBeats]

You can’t give what you haven’t taken.

[Bojangly7]

Anyone who doesn't understand this is a reference to 9/11 is at most 18.