React is not encumbered by "large-scale user-tracking, data silo lock-in, selling of data to advertisers". Nor it is of any much benefit to Facebook whether devs adopt React or not. In the grand scheme of things, they could not care less.
Perhaps you meant for people to stop using Facebook instead?
Perhaps I should have chosen the words "funded by" instead. It shouldn't make a big difference to a reader willing to understand the true meaning of this appeal.
> Nor it is of any much benefit to Facebook whether devs adopt React or not. In the grand scheme of things, they could not care less.
Open-source is not a uni-directional thing. Otherwise, why would companies like Facebook use it in the first place? There are numerous reasons why large companies are leveraging open source. See [1] for a list. Using React equals supporting Facebook.
> Perhaps you meant for people to stop using Facebook instead?
That's like asking people to stop using telephone. Facebook has them locked in. There are alternatives to React, but there are no alternatives to Facebook (for most people).
[1] https://www.quora.com/Why-do-huge-profit-oriented-software-c...
How about you thinking this through though?
We shouldn't e.g. use Firefox because it's largely funded by Google's search money?? We shouldn't use Node because Blink is funded by Google again? And what if Facebook decides to fund some open source platform? Will that be tainted too, and we should avoid it as well?
Or maybe it's only when a company has created/controls the project? Then we shouldn't use Golang because Google? We shouldn't use LLVM because is funded by Apple? We shouldn't use Java because it's funded by Oracle?
>Using React equals supporting Facebook.
Barely, and it gives way more value to the community than it does to Facebook. Facebook could close down its React involvement right now, and it would hardly affect its market cap or its ability to find developers to work there.
>That's like asking people to stop using telephone. Facebook has them locked in. There are alternatives to React, but there are no alternatives to Facebook (for most people).
There are 100s of alternatives, including good old email, myriad IM and chat and video apps, sms messages, Slack, and so on, one button personal blogs, and so on, including other social web and mobile apps and platforms.
Merely 25 years ago we had almost none of those options and NO Facebook and we got on just fine. Now we have ALL of those options, and for some reason we just can't do without Facebook?
Besides, if there's really no alternative to people using Facebook that paints your proposal in an even more useless light: hey people, you can't stop using the $50 billion behemoth's crap, but you can hurt it with less than a pin-prick by not using some GOOD stuff it produces for developers. That's not "making a difference" that's nonsensical.
You are right but you are being pedantic here. This is all about political agendas and supporting the good ones versus not supporting the bad ones. Please stick to the essence of the discussion.
> Facebook could close down its React involvement right now, and it would hardly affect its market cap or its ability to find developers to work there.
Please list me the reasons why you think Facebook is using open source then? And don't be selective.
> There are 100s of alternatives, including good old email, (...)
Yes, there are alternatives but they are not accessible because users have been locked into the network of Facebook. That was the point.
Very simply: because it gives them some developer good will and cheap PR for next to nothing. They want React for their internal use anyway, and it's just a minimal amount of time to have their devs maintain a project page and accept public comments and changesets.
It makes their devs happier too, to think that they don't just work for FB, but also give something back to the community.
But for FB, the corporation, and for their scale and their core business, React and all the value their open source efforts put together bring in, is insignificant -- statistical noise.
> it's just a minimal amount of time to have their devs maintain a project page and accept public comments and changesets.
It's really a lot of work to maintain a project of this size, and all of its issues and documentation. I'm guessing it easily doubles the total amount of work.
> It makes their devs happier too, to think that they don't just work for FB, but also give something back to the community.
I would go further and say that these devs would be unhappy and question the meaning of their work without such projects.
> But for FB (...) React (...) is insignificant
Perhaps, perhaps not. But I am personally not supporting this any further, and doing my best not to be hypocritical by on the one hand criticizing Facebook and how they abuse their users in every conceivable way, and on the other hand applauding their open source efforts.
And I think that you greatly overestimating it.
Especially for a company like Facebook, whose business doesn't depend on developers anyway (even their "FB apps" platform is not such a big thing compared to FB core).
>It's really a lot of work to maintain a project of this size, and all of its issues and documentation. I'm guessing it easily doubles the total amount of work.
For a tiny team of a few devs, compared to the 1000s FB has on its payroll. Even if they spend like $1 million per year for just the "public open source" part of it, it's still peanuts.
>But I am personally not supporting this any further, and doing my best not to be hypocritical by on the one hand criticizing Facebook and how they abuse their users in every conceivable way, and on the other hand applauding their open source efforts.
Is that hypocritical though? Sounds more like calling something bad bad, and something good good, even if it comes from the same entity.
Which is something we should strive for maybe?
I can answer that with simply: not if the good is reinforcing the bad.
Because then it is hypocritical by definition.
I'm a bit disappointed here, because on other occasions developers in this community tend to be all in uproar over ethical matters.
Now don't get me wrong, I find Facebook and particularly Zuckerburg to be detestable, but no one is forcing me to utilize Facebook. I have a free choice to not engage. There has to be some amount of personal responsibility. Now I get that many times, as was the case with Sony, the consumer does not know about misdeeds until after the fact but with Facebook, at this time, their misdeeds are well know.
It is my opinion that those who continue to engage with Facebook are OK with Facebook's intrusion into their online affairs and that is fine, they see the value proposition different than I do. What Facebook offers is more valuable to them than their online privacy.
When Sony put a root kit on their music CD's and hacked millions of computer and got nothing more than a slap on the wrist, I made the choice to not engage in business with Sony. To this day I have not bought a Sony product, it has been painful at times (my boy wants a Playstation) but I don't have to engage in commerce with them and I won't because I do not agree with their ethics. If they had an opensource project that fit my need I would consider using it, as that is a different kind of engagement with the company. The same goes for a business relationship, I would not preclude Facebook or Sony from places that I would enter into a business relationship with, but they would be on mutually agreed upon terms and if I did not like the ethics of the contract (say I was contracted to develop a rootkit) I have the freedom and personal responsibility to disengage.
I think this gets to a deeper issue with society, in that if we don't like something, we are told/trained to whine about it until it changes, but the reality is people like Zuckerburg don't care about whiners and therefor nothing ever changes. Whereas when society valued personal responsibility more, it directly affected companies because people see it as their duty to disengage, which also means taking your money elsewhere. This is something the Zuckerburgs of the world understand. (please don't take this as I said you where whining. that was not the intent)
If only that was true. See e.g. [1] but I suppose there are much better articles about this issue as the concerns are widespread.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2016/5/27/11795248/facebook-ad-netw...
Now I know there are the technically illiterate on the Internet but that is no excuse, if I get into a crane and start poking buttons (levers, hell I don't even know what controls a crane), I should expect the full ramification of injury to myself and the liability for injuries to others. Because I embarked on doing something that I should have gained at least a rudimentary education on before I just jump on.
Especially if they're one of the largest SV companies and can afford to give crazy wages.
Google hardly had anything special open-source wise for most of its existence. Apple ditto (they do have Webkit, LLVM etc) but it's not for them that people go to work there.