Thanks for the feedback, guys. I was hoping I wasn't stepping to far out of line with my rant.
Though there's only been two replies so far, it looks like the post has gotten several views.
I think people should not have to be forced into paying their own way. People should feel compelled to pay their own way out of a sense of decency and responsibility. Not helping out with the costs of producing software such as Cumulus is similar to catching a ride to work with someone each day but never offering to pay for gas or any other expenses...simply along for the free ride. What is interesting with that is that if the person that owned the car suddenly told the free rider that he couldn't haul him anymore because of expenses, the free rider would speak badly of the car owner for not "letting" him ride. People are strange creatures.
A small story...
One Friday a deadbeat is hanging out on the street corner when a nicely dressed man walks by. The man stops for a moment, opens up his wallet and hands the surprised deadbeat a twenty-dollar bill and then continues on his way. The following Friday the deadbeat is on the same street corner when the well dressed gentleman comes walking by again, stops, and again hands the happy deadbeat another twenty-dollar bill. The deadbeat starts anticipating and looking for the well dressed man on Fridays...the deadbeat thinks the man is a saint or something.
This goes on every Friday for a several months and the deadbeat eagerly looks forward to his Friday windfall from this wonderful, well dressed man. One Friday, though, the well dressed man comes down the street but passes by the deadbeat without so much as nodding. This infuriates the deadbeat who already had plans for "his" twenty-dollar bill so he hollers at the man inquiring where "his money" is. The well dressed man responds that he doesn't have the time nor resources to continue to give the deadbeat the twenty-dollar bill each week but he is in need of someone to do some work for him and that he would gladly pay the deadbeat to do that work.
The deadbeat is infuriated that this well dressed man is telling him that if he wants *his* money that he will have to work for it, the very nerve of him implying that he should work for *his* money!!! What an insult!!!! The deadbeat then unleashes a string of obscenities and degrading remarks towards the well dressed man, the man's family, the man's dog, and anything else that he feels he can say against the well dressed man....and storms away.
Though the deadbeat had not worked for any of the twenty-dollar bills that the well dressed man had freely given him, over a period of time he began to rationalize that the man owed him that money, that it was *his* money and *his* to use as he wished. When the source of that free money ended suddenly, in the deadbeat's eyes, the well dressed man was a shyster, a person not to be trusted, and a greedy snob.
Sadly, much of our global society (and a
tremendous amount of the American society...I won't get into our broken welfare/free-loading system) identifies with the deadbeat...somebody looking for a free ride or a free twenty-dollar bill.
Apply that little story as you like.
Best wishes,
Ed
