I agree that Apple has been far more closed even than Microsoft, even from the very beginning. Apple created their own hardware platform, and kept it locked. Microsoft never did that. I think they would have, though, had they not co-opted IBM’s hardware platform.

I’ve been proud of Google’s willingness to stand up for their good ethics, too. It’s been very surprising, and a good example to set. I was also proud of Qwest for standing up to the NSA. Google execs must keep a cleaner nose that Qwest execs, though, since they didn’t suffer the same fate as Qwest for standing up for what’s right.

The market force issue you brought up will be interesting to see, played out. It highlights, once again, our need to change corporate laws to be more inclusive than just a motivation for maximal profits. Even so, Google has a good degree of wiggle room. If they do evil things with fiduciary responsibility as a rationale, they are still taking the evil route. Wiggle room exists, and wiggle room does not just have to end in evil deeds. Wiggle room can be used to create good deeds, where evil was supposed to happen. It will be a real character test.

They have amassed a lot of trust from people, and they have made many people dependent upon them. Well, many people have allowed themselves to become dependent upon them, more accurately. But they have always been very good at giving things out, keeping openness in place, and operating with a core of good values. Man, I hear you, I hope they can keep that up. If they can, I think it will change a lot of things.

So lets start a side that analysis a companies code of conduct and rates them on a fair scale. Microsoft’s talks about integrity. I know people have been skewed by bad press and misconceptions about their deeds, but those started from somewhere and it wasn’t because they had integrity, it’s because the people that ran Microsoft never had integrity in the sense we know the word.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc

I ask people not to create other Microsoft in apple or in fact google. I ask that people look at companies code of conduct and how well it’s followed. I know it’s a hard to gather such mass that you can change these companies. It took years to change Microsoft and it took a little bad press. I think it might be Apple’s time.

If who you are is well integrated with your principles, that is, you’re at peace with and committed to your principles, there is not a lot to live up to. Personally, I’m well accustomed to following my principles, where they exist, even when the cost is high.

Fighting for principles is another matter. Depending on the principles, some probably should not be fought for. But if they are well-founded principles and beneficial to everyone, fighting for them is great — but it’s much, much harder than just living up to you own. It can be a lifetime’s effort, frustrating in the extreme, with little tangible reward.

It sounds to me like Alfred is trying, in those psychologically manipulative ways, to get people to stop fighting for their principles. I don’t think that’s a good idea. I do, however, think that people’s principles should be well examined before fighting for them.

Am I optimistic? Yes. And no. In the short term I am not. People are slow to learn, and they are slow to change. And they are even slower at important realizations. Usually people only have a handful of truly major realizations throughout their life. I think we have a lot of people who need some major realizations.

But in the longer term, yes, I’m optimistic. You can see a lot of good realizations happening. We also have been able to accomplish some very incredible things. Our awareness is expanding into areas that will one day, perhaps inevitably, allow us to escape many of the orthodoxies we adhere to, to our detriment. I am optimistic that we all have this potential. I am optimistic that we can find ways to coexist that are truly, mutually beneficial.

However, there are principles that need to be fought for. And there are principles that need to be lived up to. And even more importantly, I believe, there are principles that need to be discovered.

Hehe. Quit hammering on my keyboard and travel out into the world to help people? I do what I can, and not all that I can, I know. I afford myself some personal indulgence. I “waste” a good hour or two each day doing yoga, and sometimes will waste days at a time playing some video game. I’ll waste hours in the day working on the computer to make money. And grow food in the garden. The rest of the time is mostly spent researching and writing. Those principles won’t be discovered on their own! Well, maybe they will. But I tell myself, perhaps wrongly, that I might help. It is something that I imagine myself good at. And it is something that others have also said. And, I love writing. Sometimes I need to, too. It helps me release things that somehow grow inside.

Thanks William, for the kind words about my intelligence, spirit and talent. The gloom and inevitability of atrophy hangs over us all. Did you have something more specific in mind that I ought to be doing? I’d love to hear it. I have often thought about doing one or another hands-on, individual helping undertaking. My trouble is, and I’ll wager that many good people share this problem, is that I have no idea what I should devote myself to specifically.

By writing, I can share my education, my diverse experiences in life, and my thoughts, all within a context that I think is critically important to discovering those new principles — the context of feeling within the awareness of oneself in relation to others. Awareness and feeling. It sounds so simple, but both of those are quite fertile, as gardens go.

Now, last time you posted something here, you seemed to indicate that you knew me. I asked for a reminder — I am not at all good with names. But people, I always remember. You never helped me out with that. Are you toying with me?

Are you really optimistic?

Quit hammering away on your keyboard. Come out of your basement and help one or two people that need it.

Your intelligence, spirit and talent are going to atrophy.

-William Graham