gpg 1.4

Robert J. Hansen rjh at sixdemonbag.org
Sat Jan 17 01:46:36 CET 2026


> Which segment of users are these?
> 
> That's not a sarcastic question. It's a sincere one.

Ironically, I ran across a commentator today who had a paragraph almost 
precisely on point here. (Anyone trying to infer my own politics from 
the fact I'm citing Jonah Goldberg is, of course, living in sin. I read 
from across the political spectrum.)

	"One of the foundational insights of Mancur Olson,
	the legendary economist, is the problem of
	concentrated benefits and diffuse costs. Take sugar
	subsidies. They make sugar slightly more expensive
	for everybody, costing the country writ large
	billions, but the subsidies reap huge profits for a
	handful of domestic sugar producers. So every time
	someone suggests getting rid of them, the tiny
	number of Big Sugar barons starts writing checks to
	politicians and starts screaming about the dangers
	of not having a domestic supply of sugar in
	wartime.

	This dynamic is a feature of all politics. The
	people who care, for whatever reason, have more
	influence than those who don’t."

Likewise, FOSS needs to be careful not to let the people who speak the 
loudest on mailing lists drive feature development. We really need to go 
out to where the users are, meet them in their own places and 
environments, and find out what's most useful to them.

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