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Free Can Mean Big Money - The Open Source Economy
Gentu writes "People are always accusing Open Source proponents of being communists, but an editorial by the OSNews publisher, ex-Red Hat employee David Adams, takes a critical look at whether Free and Open Source Software is really anti-capitalistic or is, in fact, only a product of the free market at work. Does wide availability of high quality, low cost software harm or help the world's economy?"
Gee, I don't know: It is that whole guy with an AK pointed to my head telling me that I really like the government deciding that it owns everything and what I can and cannot do facist sort of aspect thing that I think just might be bad.
Perhaps you meant socialism or democratic socialism?
Communism can work.... although the USSR failed, it failed only because of the Arms Race with the United States -- if those funds were left where they should have been 'With the People', they would have remained.
China is an interesting hybrid of Communism and Capitalism, I am not fully aware of to what degree, but hear that it keeps their astonishing population fed (for the most part) as opposed to suffering and starving as compared with the Capitalist counterparts.
This attitude is amazing. Communism killed more people than the Nazis. Ever hear of the Ukranian famine of the 1920's, ever look at what collectivisation did in the USSR, ever look at the cultural revolution, ever seen 'The Killing Fields', ever heard of the Katyn massacre?
My grandfather escape death by communism by luck and courage. What you're saying sounds to me like what someone whose parents escapes the death camps must feel when told that the Nazis were not that bad.
This attitude that Communism was a quaint little belief that was not implemented correctly is abhorrent. The MILLIONs killed by Communists around the world deserve more respect than that.
It's just the same as saying that the Nazis were nice guys, it's just that they didn't implement their ideas correctly.
/* You might have hard-drives full of applications that you've written, but who knows about them? And thus, who knows about you?
*/
See, the whole point is, who cares? As long as HE'S happy with his software and doesn't really give a flying fuck about what you or some corporation thinks about him or his software, then it really doesn't matter who knows about them. The only person that truly counts is him. It's his software. he doesn't have to give it away or even let anyone else know it even exists. "OH, but how is he going to get a job?" What if he doesn't WANT a job writing software? Hard to imagine, I know, but it's true. I gave up programming because I found out I really don't enjoy it much. I've got several "in house" (erm, my house) applications that I use for myself, and only myself, and I really have no desire to see them out in the "wild".
The whole point of "freedom" (including software) is making a conscious choice on whether or not you want to share. I don't need the GPL to dictate whether or not I want to share (and consequently, I choose BSD if it matters), and when I develop my own software, I'm under no obligation to you or anyone else to release my source, my licensing, or even the application itself unless I deem to. isn't freedom great?
If you were me, you'd be good lookin'. - six string samurai