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South African Minister Locks Horns With Microsoft
naheiw writes "The South African minister of public service and administration on Monday addressed the opening of the Idlelo 3 free software conference in Dakar, Senegal, saying that software patents posed a considerable threat to the growth of the African software sector (video). Microsoft responded aggressively, saying that 'there is no such thing as free software. Nobody develops software for charity.'"
are they smoking micro-crack again?
Quick, someone tell these people they don't exist!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLPC_XO-1#Software
PS: What is the chance that the person who said that at Microsoft will be looking for a job very shortly? Having your upper management assert that they are moving toward a more open model and then having some bozo say something like this must look terrible even to the Microsoft Marketing Department (tm).
Tomato wedge sperm darts that are Republican.
Like the people in the RIAA, Microsoft just doesn't get it. The fundamental issue is not about whether software development is a charity (although sometimes I think that is a motivation), but about Economics 101 and prices in a competitive market. If they had paid attention in class, they would remember that, in a competitive market, the equilibrium price is found where price = marginal cost. The marginal cost of an additional unit of any digital work is very close to zero. So MS, the RIAA, and many others are engaged in an attempt (futile in the long run, IMO) to construct an economic perpetual motion machine by legal schemes and other rent-seeking behavior.
http://www.microsoft.com/licensing/programs/open/opencharity.mspx
Oh, the irony! Or is it hypocrisy?
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
the 2 things MS is terrified of having to compet on.
If you mod me down, I will become more powerful than you can imagine....
... if you don't allow patents, and therefore don't allow programmers to get money in exchange for coding... Huh? I'm calling shenanigans on you. Patents are not a mechanism by which programmers get paid for coding. They are a mechanism by which legal departments of companies harass their competitors, and by which companies that produce nothing engage in extortion. Programmers get paid to build software.Microsoft, in spite if its using the word to death, is simply too large and complex to innovate. Real innovators are far too likely to feel stifled and leave the company.
They aren't capable of admitting, or possibly even acknowledging this any more.
They came to my uni in 2002, and the main speaker, their head of whatever they call their hiring department (he did introduce himself, but I was only there for the pizza) went on what I can only describe as a polite tirade against 'hackers', meaning the proper meaning, not the criminal one. They didn't want them, they wanted people who thought like microsoft did, and were able to do things the microsoft way. A way we were assured was nothing like open source, and far superior.
Their problems quite obviously run deep, and to be frank it was obvious from that one meeting, I was not alone in coming away with that impression (note, not one person at that meeting went to work for them). They want to distance themselves from their hacker origins, but those very same people are what's driving the real innovation in the industry.
"It looks like you are trying to innovate! Maybe I can help you
A.) Wade through mountains of bureaucratic paperwork.
B.) Convince your technically conservative superiors of the merits of your plans.
C.) Steal someone else's idea and market it better.
You've chosen to steal someone else's idea. Good choice!"
Yes folks, it's Clippy's bigger brother, Hangy the wire coat hanger. He helps you abort innovation before it causes real problems AND put the new cover on your TPS reports!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton