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Comment by oefrha | Hacker News Reader

That's a lot better than some frontend library adding an "Easter egg" so that every website using it, including some very serious ones, had Santa beards on their buttons on Christmas a few years back (can't find the story now). Of course you may argue it was users' fault who should have vetted every single line of their dependency, but let's be real.

Unfortunately there are a lot of unprofessional people in open source, and while I hate to stereotype, they are especially prevalent in the JavaScript community where it's typical to have hundreds to thousands of unknown dependencies in every project. What can be done? I don't know. (Before I'm labeled as entitled -- I spend a lot of time on open source, without the unprofessional behavior.)

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"js library easter egg christmas" brought me to this HN post: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18758697

Sorry to be that guy, but if you are using an open source library and it adds hats that you're unhappy with that means you did not check the library you are including.

Maybe not looking at code one includes in a product has become much too common practise, but if some library for a button (funny I never felt the need to use one) includes special stylings on special days and you included it, that is on you. Sure it would have been nice of them to point this out if they didn't, but after all you are taking someone elses code for a button so you should know what it does.

Unfortunately? It's a chance that there are a lot of "unprofessional people in open source".

And what whith the whole being "professional" as a value system, which I fear has often to be taken in the very narrow USofA centric PoV ?

I can't relate to the sentiment that everything has to be aseptized in order to conform to a very strict and dehumanized, bland and sfw (aka professional), just to cater to the work environment culture of a few.

If in your freetime you don't like something coming from an open source project that doesn't owe you anything, don't use/associate. If you don't like it in your work place, there's a reason you're paid I guess? Or change job, or do an internal fork.

If you’re the kind of person putting Easter eggs in libraries knowing full well that it will be used in what you would call “dehumanized” settings*, please put in an advance notice that professional (or dehumanized, or whatever) people shouldn’t use your stuff. People will never use your stuff again after the sabotage anyway, why not make it clear up front unless you derive pleasure from chaos?

It’s also very weird that professionalism is somehow “USofA centric” to you.

* Thanks Semaphor for jogging my memory with the link. It was a corporate open source project ffs, with clear marketing and expectations that it should be safe for “dehumanized” settings.

I feel like expecting every human being to tolerate gratuitous whimsy regardless of circumstances is the real "narrow USofA centric PoV".

Not everyone lives in the same culture of superficial and dishonest niceness as you, in which people ask "how are you" but don't actually give a shit.

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