a) moronic

b) completely tangental to the point under discussion

The list of "things that people could do" is quite long. You, for example, could go live in a hole far, far away where there is no internet. To qualify for this list, things do not have to be: profitable, rational or feasible. However, when a company like Microsoft creates a product, they consider all of those things, likely in that order. Thus when you propose that "a thing Microsoft could do" is to find every game created within every calendar year, then, at great expense, replicate the antiquated equipment on which that software ran, then market and sell it very cheaply despite the costs of research, licensing and quality assurance, I think that is a thing which Microsoft is very unlikely to do. I don't think it would be a very clever thing for Microsoft to do, nor would it be good for gamers, because after the inaugural release of a million games from 1993 nobody cares about Microsoft would cease to exist as a commercial entity, having wasted all of it's resources on this terrible, terrible idea.

On the other hand, why were you even compelled to write this? The most imaginative, creative scenario you could imagine was that if software copyrights expired very quickly, you would like to pay someone for that software? Which is totally already a thing you can do, and the proceeds (in reality) would go to the creator of the software?

In conclusion, the internet has broken me. I have no more will to live, and I can only hope in the distant future a giant, faceless corporation will populate different planets with clones of all the people born in each year, so that my clone can go and live happily on the planet 1991 forever. Hopefully your clone will not be present.

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7103831

Points: 2

# Comments: 0

In other words, if you only use people's listening preferences, you can only recommend established tracks well. Adding an editorial component lets you get ahead of the curve.

Nobody is going to be working on a project and say "My client requires the use of obscure data structures, better Google some!". You can bash the multitude of jQuery questions, but having worked in a variety of settings, some people need things spelled out for them. You need a lot of simple questions with alternate wordings, different permutations of libraries, etc. Even though you can generalize these answers, they're hard to find from Google, and a lot of people will read "Undefined variable foo? Nonsense, my undefined variable is baz. Better open a new ticket".

On the one hand, FB isn't doing anything evil. On the other hand, it shows how much clever stuff you can do by looking at people's intent based on information you already have.

Was language a contributing factor? With the exception of Montral Quebec tends to be like a completely different country, and they definitely prioritize French language services. I could see getting an English-speaking specialist would be tough, especially in a smaller place.