This is out and out ownage. Patreon has basically been Ashley Madison'd. Source code, internal dev documents, cron jobs, and the entire 13GB database is out.
I realize it's only one of your points, and not intending on cherry-picking.
> produces a podcast that profits from ad sales
There are different forms of ads. He's not saying that ads suck, and it wouldn't be a conflict of interest for him to do ad-reads on ATP while making an iOS content blocker.
Overcast also has a skip-fwd button that you can configure in sensible increments. I know I use it maybe 2-3 times per podcast episode.
Podcast ad-reads are incredibly effective, and I haven't heard one person complain about them.
There are good/better/best forms of advertising, none of which are punch the monkey, malvertising, and those that CPU hog, use your cell data, and drain your battery.
For me, I'll keep blocking on the web, going pee during a TV commerical, DVR skipping, podcast forwarding, etc.
I wasn't calling JG that, I was calling all those around him in the Apple tech press who also piled on with the insults like "jackass".
The point is that one side is name-calling and insulting the other, while the other side is trying to advance a technology for a large number of devs and internet users.
I'm just a commenter on HN with little skin in the game, how I conduct myself matters little in this debate. How the primary parties in this story act is important and revealing.
I get the sense it's unintentional. This isn't how you want your launch to go. The impact on this project is large - SE, Reddit and GitHub.
It's not clear whether JA is leading the group's effort, but he's definitely the one speaking the most.
The group shouldn't have been surprised at the continued stonewalling. Perhaps they had a Plan B, perhaps we're seeing it or a hurried Plan C. In any case, I'd agree that the project is getting visibility and attention, but I definitely wouldn't have planned for this. It's too ugly.
Either way, they're forcing his hand. He's been sitting back while others have been simply trying to get a spec.
If he wants to be grumpy, cool. GH, SO, and Reddit will forge on. If we wants to litigate, cool too; bring it on.
Those 3 communities have large overlapping userbases. This baby is being born, Gruber or not, and nobody will remember in n years about the current kerfuffle.
Given that it'll have StackOverflow, GitHub and Reddit behind it, that's definitely a large enough boost (or at least a large united front) to have this flavour be dominant. What does that Venn Diagram look like, I wonder: SO, GH, Reddit inside the whole online Markdown community.
Gruber seems to be a bit of a dick about it. Maybe he got surprised and it hit him harder than expected today. No surprise though, he's now about to be usurped. He sat on his hands for years. In the release today (and forever) they give him large amounts of due credit. The Talk Show crowd (I'm a listener) will grumble, and fanboys on Twitter will support him and jeer Atwood personally, but oh welp. There's one party actually advancing technology, the other resting on laurels.
He kind of mentioned being a benevolent dictator on the [podcast 88 discussion](https://overcast.fm/podcasts/episode/344902019595#t=4527), but what important decisions has he actually made lately? It seems to me he just points back to his implemention perl script. Genuine question. He hasn't made a spec because (loosely) "why have a spec; just do whatever you want, take a look over here".
So it's a variant of his perl script. Great, that sounds exactly as he mused everyone should do. I can see how it rubs him the wrong way with "Standard Markdown".
Also: by doing this, the group will be forcing his hand. They've released it magnanimously, invited him to be a part of the process for years. He didn't respond in kind, labeling it "Atwood's crusade".
He may not like the name "Standard" enough to do something about it. He can choose to pursue legal options. I doubt he wants to spend any money on that. You've got to assume GH, SO, and Reddit went over the Markdown license on DaringFireball.
He can choose to be grumpy about it, but this is happening. Those 3 entities have massive persuasive force with their user bases; enough to become standard.
Agreed mostly, but then you're at YouTube's mercy. YouTube pulls TWiT videos all the time due to takedown notices over content that is played in-show as part of the discussion. i.e. let's play this new interesting advert from Company X, or a clip of last week's TV Show Y. Oops, your entire show is now gone.
YouTube has been apparently awful at having humans being contactable to sort this stuff out. Guys From Queens have related the same experiences.
Own your content. Yes, it's expensive, and a cost of doing business, but TWiT's got some revenue.
I often see soft discussion on consumery sites like apple.SE and DIY.SE.
My instincts are to vote to close, but there are just too many. Kind of makes me sad when I go to their metas, and the mods there are most definitely StackOverflow users. It seems the same standards aren't applied across the SE board. Myabe this is not a bad thing because building community, etc.
My confidence is zero.