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Open Source: Facts and Figures
Eloquence writes "Much of the debate about GNU/Linux and open source is dominated by rhetoric rather than facts. David Wheeler has just released a new version of his "paper" (which, at 440,000 characters, is more of an e-book now) 'Why Open Source Software / Free Software (OSS/FS)? Look at the Numbers!'. According to David, this paper 'examines market share, reliability, performance, scalability, security, and total cost of ownership. It also has sections on non-quantitative issues, unnecessary fears, OSS/FS on the desktop, usage reports, other sites providing related information, and ends with some conclusions.' May come in handy when talking to your boss about Linux."
this seems like something that needs the "validation" of print. It would make for a very informative read, clear up a lot of misconceptions, and not suffer from the "I read it on the internet" stigma. People are more likely to believe something if it doesn't glow when they read it.
You'll have rhetoric as long as you allow people to make sense out of facts... For example, the same fact (let's say, "source code available to the world") can be interpreted two ways: "More secure because it has been scrutinized by all sorts of people" and "Less secure because it can be scrutinized by every possible hacker."
What follows is the rhetoric...
So, try each on that 300 MHz 128 MB and see what is best.
Most software I've seen on Windows severely underestimates "recommended", and I'm assuming Windows itself does the same.
The thing that gets me is how open-source vs closed-source debate is always OS-centric. True, you have Microsoft on one end and Linux OS family is one of the most succcessful open source products, but what's wrong with promoting open-source product on top of Windows platform?
OpenOffice.org, Mozilla Firefox and many other products off the SourceForge.net have a Windows binary available for download. Windows itself provides great hardware support with almost anything imaginable out there, and has nice OS-level features like fast GUIs and built-in support for burning CDs and what not.
If you look at a Linux box and a Windows box, the price difference from the vendor is generally $50-60. If you use the computer for 5 years, the cost of Windows is $10-12 a year. What's the incentive to go "free" and deal with ugly fonts, hardware issues and other problems related to Linux nowadays?
Moreover, promoting open source on Windows nowadays would set the ground for switch to Linux in the future. Guess what - the aforementioned OO, Mozilla and other apps work exactly the same way either with Linux or Windows. Thus a switch to Linux later on would not require such huge re-education costs, since the user lives in app world, not in OS world, and doesn't care whether it's kernel32.dll or kernel.org latest version, that's running on his machine.
. . .even though programmers contribute to the greater good of the world. . .
And that is one of the often overlooked benefits of Open Source(tm) software, people actually will pay you to write it if it contributes to the greater good of the world.
What they won't often do is pay you to write piece of uneeded and ill conceived piece of dreck just because the company needs something new to sell.
YMMV, of course, but I don't enjoy tossing rocks over a wall then tossing them back again simply as an excuse to earn wages. I'd rather flip burgers than write that kind of software, because at least I'd be contributing the greater good. People have to eat. They don't have to have software that they only bought because some salesman who thinks he has to do it to eat convinces them they need it.
There are better ways to run an economy than filching money from each other's pockets.
And sometimes, here and there, people don't get to do what they want, but rather what is needed. Good people actually like it that way.
KFG
Think of programming as necessary infrastructure for a business, not as its core business. Businesses have a lot of costs that aren't related to the core business.
For instance, employees need a place to park their cars when they come to work. Most businesses don't charge their employees to park; they don't consider the employee parking lot as a profit center. And yet, the people who build and maintain the parking lot have to eat too.
Just because the business doesn't charge its employees money to park, doesn't mean the guy laying down the tar and painting the lines in the parking lot has to work for free. And just because the business makes its software open-source, doesn't mean the programmer that did the work-for-hire won't get paid.
There are plenty of people who are clever enough to have found something that makes them feel happy and pay the bills at the same time. It's not an either/or situation.