Why Making Money From Free Software Matters

Glyn Moody sends in what could be a watershed article, if the recording and movie industries are paying attention. "People have been making money from free software ever since Richard Stallman started selling GNU Emacs on tapes for $150 a pop. That's been good for hackers, who have often managed to make a living from their coding by working for one of the startups based around free software. And as companies like Red Hat and Google have grown in size and profitability, so have the credibility and clout of free software. But there is another reason why the success of these new kinds of businesses is so crucial: in many respects they offer a glimpse of coming shifts in other industries that need to grapple with the conundrum of how to make money from goods that are freely available. In particular, they offer the music and film industries an example of an alternative to fighting people's natural instinct to share digital abundance, by making money from new scarcities."

Comments

Generational turnover

[paiute]

It is human nature to dig in one's ideological heels against change, especially when money is involved. Substantial changes or the oft-cited paradigm shift often have to wait for an older generation to die off.

Re:Generational turnover

[Stenchwarrior]

I agree with you. This is off topic, but I wonder if there is evolutionary value in resisting change? Maybe to make sure that which is new stands a rigorous test to ensure it has a rightful place in history? Or perhaps to challenge our already set ways and give strength to existing process?

Google, here I come...

Re:Generational turnover

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Oh, definitely. Two main things:

Assuming that you are the incumbent(whether The top dog, or just one of the people for whom the status quo is working quite well, thanks), every day you successfully delay change is another day of profit rather than loss, and risk rather than security. There may be a point where you cut your own throat by resisting change(either the cost of resistance simply becomes too high, and consumes all your profits, or your resistance actively precludes your taking advantage of certain options in the changed future); but until you reach that point, a rearguard action is totally rational, even if it is inevitably doomed on the medium to long timescale. The degree to which rearguard actions are logical is increased if you have access to overt or covert subsidies. In the media case, they've been very effective in lobbying for copyright infringement, and its tools, to be ever more criminalized and, once criminalized, made a greater law enforcement priority. Fighting change is always cost effective when you are using somebody else's money...

Second is that change is only really inevitable in hindsight. Many changes have been successfully fought, even though their proponents were convinced of their inevitability. Incumbents who don't fight change don't remain incumbents for as long as incumbents who do; because almost any change, unless it is truly structurally unsound, can push you over unless you push back; but only a relative few changes are irresistible(and, even in those cases, see point 1).

On the minus side, I would be rather more surprised to see a net positive value in change resistance("net positive" in the "overall value across a society" sense from econ). Incumbents, by virtue of being incumbents, so very often have access to other people's money with which to fight change. Therefore, it is logical to suspect that(because of that effective subsidy) a greater-than-socially-optimal amount of change-resistance is generated. Further, all but the most dramatic innovations have a period of manifest inferiority to existing, well-polished, methods. During this period, they can be smothered in the cradle at comparatively low cost.

Re:Generational turnover

[Anonymous Coward]

Substantial changes or the oft-cited paradigm shift often have to wait for an older generation to die off.

Why wait ?

Re:Generational turnover

[2obvious4u]

Except that the older generation is managing to codify many of their ideals in Federal and International law. We really don't have time to wait for them to die off.

Re:Generational turnover

[wealthychef]

evolutionary value in resisting change?

Oh, definitely. Two main things: (blah, blah)

No, it's way simpler: changing to a new state is risky. Evolution has taught to minimize risk and avoid it. Let someone else be brave, I'll stay here in my hole.

Re:Generational turnover

[MZeora]

Laws can change. Just Bugger the Elected Officials / Local Warlord enough.

Re:Generational turnover

[2obvious4u]

Yes if you can garner more than 60% of the popular vote and even then you'll be lucky to get the law to change. Just look at NORML. Oh and then there was prohibition and slavery. One of those required a war to change the law. How many other laws have you seen repealed?

Re:Generational turnover

[Anonymous Coward]

Each generation thinks it has the answer, and that the previous generation didn't.

It takes a while for each new generation to develop into an older generation, and realise that in fact, they knew jack shit - just like their parents before them.

Re:Generational turnover

[Dystopian Rebel]

Your words are extreme, don't you think?

Resistance to change of *some* types is due to generational refusal, I agree.

Of course our elders want to keep what they have. As people grow older, they focus more on their own security.

The young, once old, will do the same.

Give the older generation a good pension and full healthcare and I suspect they will step aside and let the OMIGOD Generation break all the toys.

Re:Generational turnover

[Sir_Lewk]

The problem with using slavery as an example is that a good deal of the country didn't want to see that abolished. That's why it only got changed when the situation escalated to war.

Re:Generational turnover

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

Exactly. Change does not always imply improvement.

In this case, it is interesting that a small number of people have managed to make a significant amount of money from free software, but that is a long way from showing that an entire industry with millions of people working to produce a vast and diverse array of new software every year could be sustained on the same basis.

Re:Generational turnover

[Red Flayer]

Evolution has taught to minimize risk and avoid it. Let someone else be brave, I'll stay here in my hole.

I disagree. I believe evolution has "taught" us to minimize risk in times of plenty, but to embrace it when competition for resources is stiff.

I also believe we have evolved to have some variety in levels of risk aversion. Coupled with the ability to have several or many offspring, a varied approached maximizes evolutionary fitness since a portion of your descendants will be able to adapt to change. I'm not sure if it's biological or cultural evolution, or some combination, that has done this.

Re:Generational turnover

[Attila Dimedici]

Change in and of itself is bad. In a perfect world there would be no change. However, since we do not live in a perfect world, it is sometimes necessary to change things to make them better. The problem is that the changes are not always an improvement on the existing. It is important to examine a change before implementing it to make sure it improves over the existing system. The only exception to that is when the existing system is completely broken.

Re:Generational turnover

[Timothy Brownawell]

It is human nature to dig in one's ideological heels against change, especially when money is involved. Substantial changes or the oft-cited paradigm shift often have to wait for an older generation to die off.

What are you saying here, I only need a source of income because of the influence of old people?

Re:Generational turnover

[hitmark]

or in religion. Heck, thanks to there being 3-4 generations walking around at any one time, old thoughts may jump a generation or two to find fertile ground elsewhere.

Re:Generational turnover

[Anonymous Coward]

The differences in generational perception of society seem to have a real role here. In the case of movie-making, for instance, it would seem that the logical choice in an open-market democracy, for movie makers that wanted to retain absolute control of their product, would be to retreat to the cinema, and abandon the once-profitable home market, which has been undermined by technological progress of other influential markets. Yet, the reaction by anyone with a stake (government, business) in this market niche, has been to enforce controls over the consumer, instead. To me, it seems like we are looking at much more than a mere economic shift here; there's a whole new level of undemocratic control being leveraged onto a new generation of people who, it would appear, perceive themselves as having no alternative but to subject to this assertion of influence. Over what? Entertainment? I enjoy a good flick, but man oh man, talk about not being worth it.

Re:Generational turnover

[Red Flayer]

That's not proof. That's an incomplete anecdote which only considers times of plenty (as differentiated from times of scarcity in my prevoius post).

They'll eschew the "weird food" unless they are starving, at which point those who take risks by eating the "weird food" survive to procreate while those who will not perish. Furthermore, there are plenty of adventurous people who would try the "weird food" despite cultural unfamiliarity with it -- and these people may have some reproductive advantage. I know some people who prefer adventurous mates.

Thus we have some scenarios where risk-taking is rewarded.

Re:Generational turnover

[spazdor]

Honestly, if you spend our first date picking uncomfortably at the Japanese delicacies you ordered but can't bring yourself to taste, I'm at least 50% less likely to impregnate you.

Re:I own the most scarce of commodities

[captain_dope_pants]

Free as in beer is great - if I had a ton of money I'd write giveaway, open source stuff all the time as I enjoy programming. Unfortunately I ( and most other people) have to earn a crust: It's just the way of the world. I try to give as much as I can if someone has a "donate" button on their site to support the guys - everyone's gotta eat.

Fundamentally different things, though

[BadAnalogyGuy]

You can't really equate software and music/movies. Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it. Maybe you watch it or listen to it more than once, but it's the rare consumer that uses the media as the means to an end.

Software is typically a means to an end. You don't install Linux just to have Linux. You install it because you want to do something with it. Same with web browsers, office suites, and just about any other software. The exception would be games which are meant to be consumed similarly to movies and music. But on the whole, most software is meant to help you create something else. Whether it be a resume, a presentation, a spreadsheet, even more software, the software exists as a tool, not a thing to be enjoyed in and of itself.

That's why it doesn't make sense to compare the music/movie industry to the general free software industry. The media industry is involved in making consumables, and that means they provide a finished product to the customer. The software industry provides tools which have ample room for customization and service work. The two industries start from different premises, so that's why software can be free whereas media cannot.

If you want to compare the industries, it makes sense to compare the media industry to the niche game software industry. But here you'll find very similar actions. Anti-piracy is the norm. Expensive packaged software (or downloadable paid software) and expensive CDs/DVDs are analogous. Even the antagonistic attitude between the customers and the producers is similar. It's just inherent in any industry that needs to protect its IP because that is precisely what it is selling.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[betterunixthanunix]

Actually, movie and music companies make a lot of money selling usage rights, to each other and to advertisers. Whenever you hear a well known song in a movie, the studio that produced the movie had to pay some music company for the rights to use the song like that. Likewise with commercials, or MacDonald's using movie characters for kids meal toys, and so forth. "Consumables" are not the be-all and end-all of music and movies.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

"You can't really equate software and music/movies. Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it. Maybe you watch it or listen to it more than once, but it's the rare consumer that uses the media as the means to an end"

That's always been the trouble with `software', it don't ever wear out. The producers of the software would like if it was a consumable product like movies, which is why they would like to move us to software-as-a-service, in the Cloud.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[AnonymousClown]

You don't install Linux just to have Linux.

Speak for yourself. I install Linux so I can say "I have Linux at home." with an air of superiority over the Windows people and an air of non-conformity and superiority over the Apple people. It's kind of like wearing Che Guevara t-shirts only for technically inclined folks. I may do that: get some Che Guevara T-shirts, Birkenstocks, grungy shorts, and pump my fist in the air and yell "I"M STICKING IT TO THE MAN!" every time I boot up Linux. Then I can feel all good about myself.

Yep.

I have a really pathetic little life.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[miffo.swe]

"You can't really equate software and music/movies."

Thats where you're wrong, software do equate music, movies and photos etc. When you buy software, you get a bunch of bits with no promise that it will do anything at all. The only thing it has to do is perform roughly as stated in the brochures and its advertising laws that stands between you and a pile of worthless ones and zeroes, not copyright.

A new form of copyright with mandatory guaranties from the manufacturers would differentiate software from media but today, its exactly the same.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Eraesr]

Also, in the case of "free" software, don't they mean that the source code is free, yet the full, compiled product has to be paid for? That's also something that can't be done with music or movies. You can't give away movie sets, cameras or unmixed multi-track recordings for free.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[dkf]

You can't really equate software and music/movies. Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it. Maybe you watch it or listen to it more than once, but it's the rare consumer that uses the media as the means to an end.

Most people treat software the same way: they get it, they use it, they have no way to modify it (even without the legal barriers; the issue is that most people aren't programmers). Going the other way, there's a fair number of people who remix music and and make movies containing clips from other films.

Looks to me like the distinction you're drawing isn't really there and you're just being an ignorant snob.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[IBBoard]

That's also something that can't be done with music or movies. You can't give away movie sets, cameras or unmixed multi-track recordings for free.

That depends. Some of the Blender movies do it. You can't give away physical props so easily, since they're physical, but that's a fundamental difference with physical versus digital.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[jamienk]

The conceptions of what we "do" with music and film have been limited by the sales and "IP" models. Remixing, adding/replacing tracks, mashups, even sampling, all come about as a consequence of ignoring the "consumption" model as you describe it. So does all "traditional" or "folk" music. There are places that film and music can go that we can't easily think of today. Try to come up with your own examples of what can be done. If you can't think of anything or if your ideas don't seem all that revolutionary or important, maybe you're not an artist.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[IBBoard]

If you want to compare the industries, it makes sense to compare the media industry to the niche game software industry. But here you'll find very similar actions. Anti-piracy is the norm. Expensive packaged software (or downloadable paid software) and expensive CDs/DVDs are analogous. Even the antagonistic attitude between the customers and the producers is similar. It's just inherent in any industry that needs to protect its IP because that is precisely what it is selling.

Which "niche games" market is that? Presumably not the independent-yet-original-and-good games market like 2dBoy (World of Goo) and Stardock (Sins of a Solar Empire) compete in, where they're happy to have no or minimal DRM because pirates could be customers and customers are customers and should be treated as such.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[McDutchie]

The two industries start from different premises, so that's why software can be free whereas media cannot.

Your opinion is belied by the fact that there is plenty of free media out there.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[shentino]

Trust me, it takes skill to make music.

The RIAA is proof of that...in the sense that even cat /dev/urandom does better.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Kjella]

Software is typically a means to an end. You don't install Linux just to have Linux. You install it because you want to do something with it. Same with web browsers, office suites, and just about any other software. The exception would be games which are meant to be consumed similarly to movies and music.

I think your distinction is also why we see so much decent free software minus games and not so much of the others. It's a tool and refining it to make a better tool is desirable to most people. Games and such I want to consume, you go through a campaign or story or levels of difficulty but you don't go over and redo and refine many times over. It's no surprise to me that the most common open source games are FPS and strategy games where you play the same maps or procedurally generated ones over and over.

If you want to compare the industries, it makes sense to compare the media industry to the niche game software industry. But here you'll find very similar actions. Anti-piracy is the norm.

My impression would be quite opposite, that the mainstream game industry has far more and worse DRM than the niche games. Niche games tend to not have the time and money to waste on creative new DRMs, they might slap a standard copy protection on it but that's also it. More often than not they rely on the fact that they are niche to say "Please pay for this game, we don't have execs with multi-million dollar salaries we're just hoping the numbers work out so we can keep making games." and I'm sure it has some effect.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Interoperable]

I agree, but I think that there are other significant differences that sink the comparison as well. Notably, open-source software is a collaborative effort but music fans do not, in general, have a reciprocal arrangement with the artists to create the music (except, perhaps, for some rhythmic clapping in live shows). Open-source requests that the community contribute whereas music is more of a one-way street. One could argue that musicians share ideas constantly and the arrangement parallels the divide between open-source developers and users, but I think that it's more pronounced with music.

Another, more practical and more relevant consideration, is that open-source developers usually develop as a hobby and have other jobs to pay the rent. Musicians shouldn't be relegated to being hobbyists. Arguably, most of the money for starting bands and even established bands comes through live performance, but I dislike the idea that recorded music sales are simply not an option for new bands.

The article suggests that, because copyright is unenforceable for recorded art in the digital age, the supply of that art is effectively infinite and hence the value is near zero. Perhaps enforcing scarcity of a resource through legislation is fundamentally flawed, but the result of a product that has zero value is undoubtedly that no one will produce that product. The act of copying may be free, but recording studios aren't. If artists are expected to make all their money off live shows, then they certainly won't be investing in high-quality recorded productions. Piracy certainly won't end music, but recording engineers might be looking for new work.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[BadAnalogyGuy]

I meant the niche of game software, not niche game software. You're not the first one that I've inadvertently confused with the bad wording.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[2obvious4u]

You missed the point of TFA. Even music and movies create new scarcities which can be monetized, even if the original work itself cannot be. Here is an article with a clip that explains it much better than I can.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

It's hard to say Stardock is in the games market because their "games" are so bad the best feature they have is the lack of DRM. Their "games" are basically just ads for the desktop malware products they sell.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Yvanhoe]

Yes, the things are different. But OSS counters the argument "You can't make a living by giving away stuff.". Yes you can, but it takes a clever businessman to manage it. No one claims anymore that OSS is something you can easily dismiss, but do you remember how it was 15 years ago ? Nowadays, people who give movies or song for free only encounter marginal successes. This doesn't mean the Google of online music won't appear.

If you sell sand $100/kg in the middle of the Sahara it is not a workable business model. Even if you have a mine employing 1000 people, protecting this business plan would be silly. Well, selling $30 DVDs that can't be read easily whereas it is free to download a rip that provides more functionalities is exactly the same situation.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[patSPLAT]

They really are different things.

First off, people do modify software on a daily basis. Customization of software is ubiquitous. Open source is an extreme model of customization and it has been successful because it addresses in a very specific way needs that are peculiar to software.

Customization of movies is *not* prevalent. You watch the movie that James Cameron made. Or the movie that Michel Gondry made. There is an entire notion of authorship is important to music / movies / books, and is utterly out of place in software.

Remixing is a practice of quotation, not customization. It is a way of leveraging the audience of another artwork to bring authority to your own, and as such is and will always be a loaded and potentially manipulative practice. Take a close look at Shepard Fairey's legal practices of defending his acts of appropriation as Fair Use, while suing those who appropriate his own work.

Remixing is similar to open source development in the way that it leverages the source work, but the effects are totally different. The audience of remixes remains fragmented. Open source software behaves in a different manner -- forks tend to merge back together, defragmenting the audience and increasing the value of the centralized project.

Here's the real issue. To those who would discard copyright, the question is what is it's replacement?

Without a legal framework to control distribution, content creators have already turned towards pervasive DRM as privatized solution. Sacrificing copyright also means sacrificing fair use. Or re-use of any kind, for that matter.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[HungryHobo]

source code- sheet music/lyrics.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[b4dc0d3r]

Sometimes both the code and product are free but support costs money.
Sometimes the code is free to download but the compiled version contains trademark or other branding, like CentOS and RedHat.
Sometimes you can buy installation CDs but you can also download and build the code yourself.
Some companies take software they didn't write and put it together in a target way, like Music-centric linux (Ubuntu studio style), or Real-time linux, or whatever else.

Björk, Nine Inch Nails, Public Enemy, Stardust, and in a limited fashion Erasure, have given away parts of the music and allowed fans to re-mix the music. so yes you can give away unmixed tracks, it's been done. The discussion is about music, the article is about music... bringing movies in just makes it more complicated. Animated movies as the other poster said are certainly possible but could require huge piles of data (all fo the models, the environments, the animation and rendering software).

Free software doesn't have just one revenue stream, there are numerous different ways to get money. The fundamental problem is that music does not require support. Most of the revenue streams either assume you're paying for physical media or support. With music, most people don't need the physical product since it's going on the iPod anyway. And they don't need support.

The entire point of the article was that open source software has many solutions, and free music has several options, but music still needs more options in order to be successful. It's not a solved problem, and the open-source model is only an inspiration. Jill Sobule is an example, but she's hardly the typical case. If you're the right person at the right time you can do that, but most people won't make it.

(yes I'm talking about the deserving garage-band people, not the attractive but unmusical pop tarts we have on the radio - they wouldn't make it without heavy AutoTune and would barely be able to scrape by on concerts - Ke$sha on SNL and the recent Black Eyed Peas on American Idol pretty much proved there are some things you just can't do live, but I'm editorializing now).

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[westlake]

Actually, movie and music companies make a lot of money selling usage rights, to each other and to advertisers.

The commercial has a short life-span.

Typically that of a single add campaign. It does not cover the costs of a $200 million dollar production.

MacDonald's using movie characters for kids meal toys, and so forth

The tie-in - the sponsor - now dictates what can be produced. No giant transforming robot toy? No Wall-E.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Locklin]

Characters and story lines can be borrowed and shared. How many times do Shakespeare's characters show up in modern film?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[IBBoard]

I've not played it, but I thought Sins of a Solar Empire was quite popular amongst strategy gamers. I just picked them because they're the other company I know of who doesn't do DRM (or, from a bit of reading up, does absolute minimal DRM in terms of some kind of link of CD keys to allowing access to updates on up to three machines, which is presumably all remote and doesn't stop you doing anything with your game other than updating it).

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

It was popular for a single month and then fell of the charts, what does that tell you.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[mR.bRiGhTsId3]

They still have the fundamental similarity in that they are easily duplicated but require a lot of up front funding/resource to be sunk into their construction. Software requires either a lot of time and/or money to produce the first build. Music/movies require a lot of up front funding to produce the master copy. The investment has to be recouped somehow. Sure, in the case of small free software projects the authors have no desire to recoup the investment, but I'm sure they would be a little more interested in doing so if they had donated several million dollars worth of their time to something.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[harlows_monkeys]

Free software doesn't have just one revenue stream, there are numerous different ways to get money. The fundamental problem is that music does not require support. Most of the revenue streams either assume you're paying for physical media or support

I'd say the fundamental problem is that support as a revenue stream incentivizes the wrong thing. Being good at programming and being good at providing support are not the same skill. In fact, good programmers are often lousy at dealing with customers and their problems. Why should a programmer's income be based on how well he provides support, instead of how well he programs?

Even worse, if a particular programmer is good at providing support, he makes the most money by making sure his software isn't as good as it could be. It should have bugs and problems, just as long as they aren't enough to drive people to his competitors, so that he can sell more support.

Similarly for music. Many musicians are great in the studio, but suck at concerts. For some kinds of music, the whole notion of a concert doesn't even make sense.

A good system for paying creative people (programmers, musicians, artists, and so on) should make their money be tied to their creative output, not some ancillary thing. Programmers should be paid to program. Musicians should be paid to make music. etc.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[kandresen]

There is also another important difference. Music and movies are made to express something, they are usually not made upon demand.
Software on the other hand should be made because someone needs it. Anyone needing the software enough should be willing enough to pay the price to get it done, with open source, this additional work may be provided back to the community to ensure the company don't need to develop the same software again when ten versions later a serious problem is found in the old version. If they did not contribute back, they would now need to do the work again, but having contributed the code most likely made sure all the aspects the company needed has been taken care of, and even improved!

Software developers in the Open Source world do not expect to be selling millions of versions of any software - they expect to get a request for providing the functionality that a company demands, get paid for making what is needed, and move on to the next demand. The continuous improvement of the code base make Open Source the clear winner in the long run. There will not be any room for a Software company thinking the old way of make once, sell everywhere anymore.

Music and Movies on the other hand...

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Hanul]

I "consume" movies and music to set a mood, to gain insight and knowledge, to expand the mind. I also remix movies and music. So, these "consumables" are there to provide something meaningful (for me). On the other side, I like to install Linux (and other free OS), just to have it. Maybe I play around with it, but generally I just like the fresh and untouched installation. It is like meditation. So, you see, you can have it always the other way around.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[colinrichardday]

But how often do you have to boot up Linux? Doesn't it just keep running?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[IBBoard]

It tells me that I don't pay attention to computer games.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[oliverthered]

jees man, you've been buying the wrong type of music and watching all those shitty films they put out?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[oliverthered]

people were watching films before they cost $200 million dollars, personally I think they were better back then too.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[BitterOak]

That's always been the trouble with `software', it don't ever wear out. The producers of the software would like if it was a consumable product like movies, which is why they would like to move us to software-as-a-service, in the Cloud.

Actually, software does "wear out", and a lot quicker than music or movies. What happens with software is that new versions come out that fix bugs and add important features, and generally there is a charge to upgrade. Hardware upgrades also dictate software upgrades over time. Case in point: my dad still listens to LPs that he bought in the 70's, but how many people still write their documents with WordStar for CP/M?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[martin-boundary]

It's more like the world evolves around the software, making it look like it wears out. The software still does what it always did, but the protocol it uses is no longer recognized by newer servers, the specialized API calls are deprecated, the ASCII only input can't handle Unicode, etc.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't really equate software and music/movies. Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it. Maybe you watch it or listen to it more than once, but it's the rare consumer that uses the media as the means to an end.

Software is typically a means to an end. You don't install Linux just to have Linux. You install it because you want to do something with it. Same with web browsers, office suites, and just about any other software. The exception would be games which are meant to be consumed similarly to movies and music. But on the whole, most software is meant to help you create something else. Whether it be a resume, a presentation, a spreadsheet, even more software, the software exists as a tool, not a thing to be enjoyed in and of itself.

That's why it doesn't make sense to compare the music/movie industry to the general free software industry. The media industry is involved in making consumables, and that means they provide a finished product to the customer. The software industry provides tools which have ample room for customization and service work. The two industries start from different premises, so that's why software can be free whereas media cannot.

If you want to compare the industries, it makes sense to compare the media industry to the niche game software industry. But here you'll find very similar actions. Anti-piracy is the norm. Expensive packaged software (or downloadable paid software) and expensive CDs/DVDs are analogous. Even the antagonistic attitude between the customers and the producers is similar. It's just inherent in any industry that needs to protect its IP because that is precisely what it is selling.

I disagree -- the software that helps you gain new skills or improve existing skills such as job-related training or linguistics doesn't fall in either category you came up with.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Daengbo]

Merchandising, where the real money from the movie is made.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[lennier]

Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it. Maybe you watch it or listen to it more than once, but it's the rare consumer that uses the media as the means to an end.

So no consumers do remixing or DJing?

I guess not legally.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

Music and Movies are consumable products. You get it, you consume it.

You might, but I'm not that hungry. I just watch movies and listen to music.

Seriously, why do apparently intelligent people adopt this doublespeak? When was the last time you "consumed" a film or an album? Wasn't it still available to be used again the next day?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[colinrichardday]

Isn't setting the respawn to reboot a bad idea? Or is my sarcasm detector malfunctioning?

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference isn't as clear-cut as you would make it.

Videos that I *like*, I watch multiple times.

I run software to do things or create things, but I run Linux because it's a _pleasure_ to run -- like driving a sports car, instead of a dump truck.

Though, these current versions of Ubuntu desktop feel like driving a sports car... towing a camping trailer, and a howitzer behind that. The top speed is okay, but the throttle response and handling characteristics are "not crisp" on my 3-year-old hardware.

(Fortunately, there are plenty of other distros to choose from.)

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[brit74]

I keep reading your post, but I can't figure out what you're point is.

- You can't conflate free software users with pirates, or say they operate the same. When people download free software, they don't feel guilty about doing it. Some pirates might feel guilty, realize that the company only makes money through sales, and then pays. There's plenty of software that I've bought in the past that I wouldn't have paid a dime for if it was free and asking for donations. All those companies that operate under copyright would lose me as a customer if their software was "free, but please donate".
- You claim that "they're happy to have no or minimal DRM because pirates could be customers and customers are customers and should be treated as such". Actually, that's not their view nor have I heard them claim that's their justification for not using DRM. Their reason for not using DRM is that they don't want to inconvenience their actual customers. (I've seen Wardell go off on pirates, and call them "thieves".)

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[khakipuce]

Software also originates from a different branch of human endeavour; it tends to come from people with a Scientific/Engineering background. People in these fields are used to sharing ideas - publishing papers and the like, and it is small step from publishing a new algorithm in an academic journal to publishing the software that implements that algorithm.

People in these fields recognise that ideas are relatively cheap and need to be tested by peer review (in a way that’s what we are doing now on this forum) and that as well as the kudos of contributing to the greater good, improved employment prospects (and a more fun life) can come from being an expert in a field, and one way of demonstrating expertise is to publish..

As the parent says, a work of art is the end point, it is similar in that it needs to be published, but it is not a means to an end, it is the end itself.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[IBBoard]

You can't conflate free software users with pirates, or say they operate the same.

I didn't realise I had. Someone said that music/film was more like niche games and that niche games were equally strong on inconveniencing the legitimate customer for the sake of delaying the pirates by a few hours or so. I wondered which those "niche" games were and pointed out two examples of non-mainstream games/developers that were not pro-DRM.

Their reason for not using DRM is that they don't want to inconvenience their actual customers.

That'd be "customers are customers and should be treated as such". That was more just a general commentary, though, rather than any claim to it being their specific claim on what their view is.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[Caetel]

Pervasive DRM seems to me to be self defeating. If you are making it harder for people who legitimately purchased content to actually make use of it, you're only going to drive people to the alternatives - ie piracy.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[brit74]

That'd be "customers are customers and should be treated as such". That was more just a general commentary, though, rather than any claim to it being their specific claim on what their view is.

Well, I don't know. It looked differently in the comment: "they're happy to have no or minimal DRM because pirates could be customers and customers are customers and should be treated as such."

Someone said that music/film was more like niche games and that niche games were equally strong on inconveniencing the legitimate customer for the sake of delaying the pirates by a few hours or so.

Right. And that was another reason they weren't using DRM - because it gets broken.

As far as 2dBoy's and Stardocks opinions towards pirates, here's what they've said in the past:

"Demigod is heavily pirated," writes Stardock boss Brad Wardell. "And make no mistake, piracy pisses me off." "If you’re playing a pirated copy right now, if you’re one of those people on Hamachi or GameRanger playing a pirated copy and have been for more than a few days, then you should either buy it or accept that you’re a thief and quit rationalizing it any other way."
http://www.destructoid.com/demigod-dev-to-pirates-accept-you-re-a-thief-131731.phtml

"ricochet shipped with DRM, world of goo shipped without it, and there seems to be no difference in the outcomes. we can’t draw any conclusions based on two data points, but i’m hoping that others will release information about piracy rates so that everyone could see if DRM is the waste of time and money that we think it is."
http://2dboy.com/2008/11/13/90/

I've seen 2d boy say elsewhere that they didn't think pirates bought games, so there was little point in trying to block or convert pirates.

My point being that, neither of them have a positive view towards pirates. 2dBoy is somewhat neutral - seeing them as non-actors in the whole system, and Wardell hating pirates, but seeing the futility of trying to stop them. Their reasons for not using DRM didn't have to do with seeing them as potential customers.

Valve has said some things in the past about seeing pirates as potential customers. Admittedly, they also use DRM, and I think their "pirates are potential customers" is way of creating a constructive attitude towards the whole thing, and shouldn't be seen as thinking well of pirates.

Re:Fundamentally different things, though

[brit74]

"Even music and movies create new scarcities which can be monetized, even if the original work itself cannot be. "

One thing I hate about these types of articles is the way they dance past the issue of "can the new scarcities be monetized in a large enough way to compensate for the loss of monetization of digital sales?" Very often, the answer is "definitely not", but they never acknowledge that fact. Effectively, they end up saying: "You can't make money the old way, but you can make money the new way!" That sounds positive, until you examine the details: "Instead of X dollars from your work, you'll make 0.1X dollars from your work!" So sorry if that makes you bankrupt, I guess you'll have to find a different line of work and society will lose your contributions.

digital media has zero marginal costs

[Anonymous Coward]

"like free software, digital music has zero marginal costs. As basic economics teaches us, this means that the price of such goods will tend to zero. That's certainly happening in the world of computing, with Microsoft, for example, offering all kinds of cut-price deals on PCs (notably netbooks) in an attempt to discourage manufacturers from installing GNU/Linux. This knock-on benefit of free software is often overlooked, but is real and increasing as open source applications start to be deployed within companies"

"Instead of trying to stop digital goods being circulated freely, businesses need to find ways of making money around those free goods. For free software, that has meant selling things like authorised versions and services. The recorded music industry already successfully sells authorised versions in competition with free versions, so that approach is being adopted, even if not consciously. On the services side, the crucial thing to recognise is that services mostly sell scarcity - people's expertise and time - and that there are equivalents in the world of music"

Why Making Money from Free Software Matters

Cognitive dissonance

[silverbax]

I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people say 'software should be free' but at the same time 'I should get paid to work on that free software for you'.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[miffo.swe]

I think a large part of the "cognitive dissonance" stems from the fact that you get no guaranties whatsoever that said software will work. I can only talk for myself but i have a very hard time persuading myself pony up for something that may or may not work and where the seller takes no responsibility of the goods.

The industry put themselves in this situation when they used copyrights to protect their goods (software is traded as photos, movies or books, not real products). The upside, no guaranties, is offset by the backside, nobody thinks your product is worth the money.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[hedwards]

There isn't any. The more accurate statement is 'software should be free' but if 'you want me to work on it consistently for larger periods of time you'll have to pay me.'

It's not hard for people to find a half hour here and there to work on a project, but it becomes really difficult to find hours every week to do so without being paid. There are exceptions, but not many, and certainly not enough to support the ecosystem.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[zwei2stein]

Which is why OS companies make money of support:

They give software for free with no guarantees.

But if you want to guarantee that it works and want someone who you can wake up and 3:00 who will fix bug, you buy support. Or you pay them to train your staff to be able to work with it on peak performance. Or you pay commision for new feature.

This is incredibly similar to post-torrent artisty: Artist is paid for "consulting" if there is medium shift, he is paid for live performances and of course, he is paid create new works on commision.

It is basically model of where you only pay for things that are near impossible to pirate it: Good lecture is not replaceable by torrented pdf, neither is dedicated support or live show.

Free stuff to hook you up, pay up if you want quality service. "No guarantee" is not what OS is about, it is what you get for free (just like any closed software that people pirate is without guarantees)

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people say 'software should be free' but at the same time 'I should get paid to work on that free software for you'.

The software is free, the developer's time is not.

You're free to use the software however you choose, but if you want the developer to spend his time working to your schedule, then you may have to make it worth his while.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[betterunixthanunix]

The unfortunate reality of the English language is that "free" has two very different meanings. You are thinking of the "no cost" meaning, which is not what the Free Software Foundation is about -- the other meaning, "freedom," is what is more important. You should have freedoms with your software, particularly the freedom to use and modify that software, and also the freedom to study and share the software (how one can modify with studying is a mystery to me). Sharing is where people always get angry, since it means that people may be able to obtain the software at no cost -- but the benefits outweigh the potential losses here.

Personally, I choose to use the word "libre" to describe GPL (or similarly licensed) software, to help reduce the confusion. There is no confusing "libre" with some other term, and people who are unfamiliar with the word will generally ask for clarification (rather than assuming a specific meaning). Those who neglect to ask for clarification are generally the people who do not care about the issue at all; this is still better than someone who does not care about the issue and just assumes that I want to get my software at no cost.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[betterunixthanunix]

More often than not, proprietary software licenses absolve the vendor from any guarantees in situations where the software likely to fail (or likely to fail with catastrophic results). Really, if you want a guarantee, you need to find a company that specializes in high reliability systems, and for most people, the cost of contracting with such a company is too great and not justified by their needs.

With a company like Red Hat, you pay for a sort of guarantee -- you get to call them and ask for help whenever you want, or if you pay enough, they'll leave someone at your place of business to manage the systems. The guarantee you get is that within 24 hours, they will fix a problem or give you some sort of workaround, which is not quite the same as the sort of guarantee you seem to want, but it is apparently good enough for a lot of companies (and it is not all that different from any other vendor).

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not "I should get paid", it's more like "I give something to the community for free, but I don't want to starve while doing it". It's not like the developer gets paid for every copy of the software, neither does he become billgates-rich.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[dangitman]

Which is why OS companies make money of support: They give software for free with no guarantees.

That seems like a pretty shitty way to conduct business. It gives an incentive for creating crappy software that requires extra support. Shouldn't the ideal be to make great software that doesn't require much support?

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[dangitman]

The software is free, the developer's time is not.

But developers spent time developing the software. So, if their time is not free, then how did the software come to be free in the first place?

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[shentino]

You've never read an EULA, have you?

The only guarantee you get is provided by product liability statutes.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[laughingcoyote]

If you're saying "should", then sure, there's cognitive dissonance. But that's a straw man.

If you want me to work in your IT department to install and maintain software on your computers, that's a job, and you need to pay me for it. If you'd like me to design, program, and test POS or support software tailored specifically to your company, that's a job, and you need to pay me for it. You don't have to hire me (or anyone) to do those things. If you're a one man shop, and perfectly comfortable doing your installs yourself, no one "should" get paid-you've every right to do it yourself. On the other hand, if you're a large corporation, chances are someone's going to get hired to do installation, maintenance, and customization. They're no more being paid for the software installing and maintaining Linux then they are installing Windows-they're not getting a cut of the licensing on Windows either. They're being paid for their time.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[selven]

The word "free" has more than one meaning:

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Lunix Nutcase]

More often than not, proprietary software licenses absolve the vendor from any guarantees in situations where the software likely to fail (or likely to fail with catastrophic results).

Why do you limit this to just proprietary software? I've yet to see a single free software license that also doesn't have a disclaimer of warranty or fitness.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[dkleinsc]

I think a large part of the "cognitive dissonance" stems from the fact that you get no guaranties whatsoever that said software will work.

1. If I pay someone to modify an open source package for me, I can secure a guarantee from that person that it will do what I paid him to make it do. Legally, all that needs to happen is that there's a separate agreement above and beyond the requirements of the open source license that includes that guarantee. So, for instance, if the package was GPL, if someone modifies it for me, we can have an agreement that says that he's giving me the modifications with source code (as he's required to under the terms of the GPL), but also guarantees that it will do what I want it to. And this isn't a hypothetical: I've worked on projects that involved paying an outside contractor to do precisely that.

2. Proprietary software licenses universally disavow any and all warranties including the implied warranty of merchantability and warranty of fitness for a particular purpose. You have no guarantee whatsoever that Microsoft Windows will not set your computer on fire rather than be a functioning computer operating system.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[MBGMorden]

Easy - software is duplicable into infinity. When I'm done on software, I'm done, and as many people as want it can use that software at no cost to me. I can (and usually do) also work on my projects when I darned well please. An hour or two put in before I turn in for bed, or with the advent of netbooks even while waiting for a friend to show up somewhere I can work on something for 10-15 minutes. IE, I can invest time that is inherently less valuable into it. It also helps that often times I'll (and I'm wagering many, many other developers) write software that I personally am interested in using myself too, so I have an incentive to write it regardless of compensation.

That said, support, custom coding, etc, are face time. You are paying for the EXCLUSIVE use of my time, and you often want it during peak business hours. That's not the same thing.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong. It creates an incentive for creating software that seemingly requires support, but doesn't require that support in reality. In other words, it creates an incentive to build software that is better than it looks.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[dangitman]

Wrong. It creates an incentive for creating software that seemingly requires support, but doesn't require that support in reality. In other words, it creates an incentive to build software that is better than it looks.

So, it's based upon the deception of customers. Still doesn't sound appealing. As a customer, I'd rather know exactly what I'm getting, rather than being tricked into something. If the software doesn't need that much support, why should I have to pay for it?

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

Then someone come and make a better software that require less support(eg: less expensive) to take the market.

You though you was all wise and birllant, but you forget to account for competition. In the idea software world(free, open, pay for support) Microsoft is not a monopoly that has incentive to create shitty software.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[arose]

More often than not, proprietary software licenses absolve the vendor from any guarantees in situations where the software likely to fail (or likely to fail with catastrophic results).

Actually they usually have the same general disclaimers as free software, including the "fitness for general purpose disclaimer". The end result is that MS can ship buggy versions of windows, fix bugs for a while, then stop and force you to upgrade if you want the particular machine on the net. To be honest it's quite hard to pin down exactly what we are paying for with proprietary software...

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[tepples]

So, if their time is not free, then how did the software come to be free in the first place?

Getting a program to version 0.01 or 0.09 might be worth a spare-time development effort. But without some other sort of motivation, the developer may not feel like taking it to 1.0.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

But developers spent time developing the software. So, if their time is not free, then how did the software come to be free in the first place?

If the developer does it because the developer wants to do it, it's a hobby. If he does it because you tell him to do it, it's a job. In the second case, he'll probably expect you to pay him. Bear in mind however that all you're buying his time and the right to direct his efforts.

The software became free because the initial developers chose to release their work under a free software licence. It remains free regardless of whether or not you choose to help fund further development.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[dangitman]

Getting a program to version 0.01 or 0.09 might be worth a spare-time development effort. But without some other sort of motivation, the developer may not feel like taking it to 1.0.

So, basically the idea is that people who start worthwhile software projects and have new ideas don't deserve compensation, but the hangers-on who exploit those visions, do deserve to be paid? Sounds somewhat similar to the business model of those RIAA and MPAA middle-men.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Hatta]

Software is not scarce, developer time is. I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people think a non-scarce resource should be treated like a scarce one.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[HungryHobo]

that depends how you pay for your support: if you pay by the hour sure what you say may be true.

If you pay a flat rate for support then it's in their interest to get as few calls from you as possible.

So simple lesson: much as when hiring builders to work on your house, don't pay by the hour, pay for the work getting done.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[natehoy]

Several possibilities.

1. The software author was contributing to a project that he/she saw their own benefits from, and therefore were compensated by the resulting product. In a few smaller projects, a single person writes code entirely for their own benefit, then releases the code because someone else might want to use it, too. In this case, their time was "free" in terms of money, they compensated themselves with the results of their own work then offered out a copy of it for others to benefit from as well.

This, by the way, is why FOSS is often compared to "communism" (not the totalitarian kind as we've seen practiced, but the purer Marxian kind of "from each according to ability, to each according to need"). Everyone in a project like this is free to contribute whatever they can or want to, and everyone benefits from all of the contributions. Of course, where communism in the real world breaks down is in simple resource limitations - a lot of people want to take according to need, but not give according to ability. In the world of software development, you can have a very low number of givers and a very high number of takers and the model still works as long as you have some givers. And if the givers are benefiting themselves by creating what they themselves need, then they are building their own compensation.

2. The software was written under contract for a specific company to solve a specific problem and that company is not using the software for competitive advantage, so they release the code for others to use. It can also mean that software they use themselves can be improved by others at no cost to them, so symbiotic relationships can form.

3. The software was available in crude form and a company didn't want to reinvent the wheel, so they started with what was out there, improved it, and released the improved version as a way of "paying back" for the fact that the codebase saved them a crapload of development time. Or, in the case of a lot of projects, the company wants to sell you some hardware and they are OK with you doing other things with it once you've bought it (ie. what is now known as the Linksys WRT54GL series), so providing the source code moves more cheap generic-parts units off the shelf because the modding community wants to turn them into all sorts of crazy stuff.

In reality, most free software is the result of multiple of the above scenarios happening.

The fact is that while an author's time is not free, they can still give away the software under circumstances where enough people will give them small amounts of money (advertising on their download site, voluntary donations, or even kudos and appreciation to feed the ego for a spare-time project). They can also write software that benefits themselves and send it out, but if you want them to change it to suit your own needs you can offer them some money to make the changes, and the improved version can be released for all to enjoy.

I've seen projects where the original author makes the source code available, then uses "paypal voting" for new features. "Many people have asked me for feature 'x'. It's going to take me about 8 hours to write it, and I'm out of beer and nachos. If you want me to add feature 'x', send money and tell me it's for feature 'x' - when my donations for feature 'x' hit $400, I'll write it and release it for all to enjoy."

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[spidr_mnky]

How is it cognitive dissonance if people are actually being paid to work on free software? A hell of a lot of open source work is volunteer, but that "for you" part makes a big difference.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[zerocool^]

You don't have to hire me (or anyone) to do those things. If you're a one man shop, and perfectly comfortable doing your installs yourself, no one "should" get paid-you've every right to do it yourself. On the other hand, if you're a large corporation, chances are someone's going to get hired to do installation, maintenance, and customization.

Exactly.

Case in point, one of my good friends just left us (Rackspace) to found a company called Riptano that sells support for Cassandra (there's a story in Database Journal here).

They are committed (John and Matt) to building bits on top of Cassandra for support / management / etc, but also contributing in a big way to the project its self and not forking it.

I don't have the stones to strike out on my own like that, but MAJOR props to them - this is what the F/OSS community needs more of. It takes people with an abundance of passion about a technology to make something like this a reality. Plus, who knows, they may really turn this into a big thing if Cassandra takes off and people want nosql solutions.

(plug: http://www.riptano.com/)

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[HungryHobo]

If I pay for something I expect to get a guarantee that it will do what it's supposed to and if it fails then the person who has sold it to me should be liable.

If someone gives something to me for free they owe me nothing and there is no reason they should have to pay me if their product isn't good for what I used it for.

If on the other hand I pay for someone to service what I've got for free then I have every right to demand they put their money where their mouth is and guarantee that if they screw up and don't keep it in service that they cover my losses due to their failure.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[HungryHobo]

Have you never created any piece of software for the hell of it?
Work on it for a few days, weeks or perhaps even months and enjoy it but eventually I get sick of it.

Months later when I'm bored with it and it's not fun any more I'm not going to keep going for no reward.
If someone wants to pay me to add features they want then great.
If someone else wants to become an expert on my code and get paid to extend it then good for them.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

see: MacOS

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[b4dc0d3r]

You're thinking the same people are involved on both sides. (I'm taking "free" at face value since you're making an economic point.) Lots of people volunteer their code for the public good. Lots of other people are employed by companies which make money selling support for the free software. These people don't always have the same opinions. Even if they all think software should be free, they managed to get a job working on free software for money. The best of both worlds.

I think software should be free, and help out on free software, but I get paid to do proprietary stuff at work. If someone wants a database or website, I will charge for my time. But I keep running into bugs in proprietary software that I wish I could fix, so I write open-source versions of it or more typically I hack the bug fix by disassembling and patching.

If I release something open-source, it's my decision what to work on. If you want to decide, you pay for the privilige of deciding. But lots of other people will happily work on feature requests and enhancements for free, and they are not the ones with cognitive dissonance. If my software were more popular I might feel a change would benefit many people, but like most free software very few people use it, so I don't care.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Xeger]

The quote, actually, is "information wants to be free."

There's no _should_ about it. It's not a value judgement; it's an expression of one of the natural properties of information: that it tends to replicate itself in any way it's able, subject only to the constraints of the underlying medium (and of course to any artificial constraints placed on it, though those have a track record of working badly).

Even "information wants to be free" is a bit imprecise because it anthropomorphizes the information. Data has no intent, there's no "want" there; it just seems that the natural state of information is to propagate, and to mutate as it propagate.

Also, keep in mind that "free software" doesn't necessarily mean free as in beer. If you have heard someone saying "software should be free," they may have been referring to the fact that the source code to the software that runs your life should not be a trade secret locked away in someone's corporate vault.

As numerous generations of software pirates, malware authors and hackers have shown us, to someone of sufficient skill, the machine code to a piece of software yields enough information to mutate or copy that software. Protecting source code is an attempt to create artificial scarcity -- or security through obscurity, if you prefer -- and it doesn't work very well.

Maybe my argument convinces you; maybe it doesn't. It's not really my concern. I'm employed by an open-source software company whose business is growing tremendously year-over-year -- in the middle of a recession, no less! -- and one of the main reasons for our success is that our products are _open_.

Our customers are free to inspect, modify, ask questions regarding, and contribute improvements to the tools we sell them. Because we try whenever possible to leverage open-source dev tools, we enjoy the same openness in our infrastructure and development toolset. We are able to adapt our tools to work well for us, and contribute the improvements back to the community when we're done.

"Free as in beer" is not "free as in freedom." If your industry ignores this fact, it does so at its own peril. Don't be surprised if a lightning-fast innovator comes along and disrupts everyone. And if they do, look for open source to be greasing the wheels of their productivity.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

And yet the differences in the above have nothing to do with "proprietary" vs "open source" software.

You got a contractual guarantee from your vendor because you requested a specific contract for a work-for-hire scenario and were in a good enough negotiating position. That's not unknown in the proprietary software world either.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[bieber]

I believe your problem is that you don't understand the concept of "cognitive dissonance" in general. I'll just put aside for now the fact that "software should be free" and "I should get paid to work on that free software for you" don't have to conflict at all. Cognitive dissonance is a feeling you experience when you realize that you hold two contradictory views; it is not some kind of mental condition that makes you hold contradictory views. You seem to have the whole cause and effect thing a little mixed up there...

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Kjella]

I would have loved to work with a free software solution, had there been one in the line of business I'm in. I'm a consultant working on implementation of a closed source software product from another company. Very often we get asked for changes to make it work for that client that we have to just pass to our vendor as an "enhancement requests" which won't happen in anything close to the timeframe the client wants. I'm quite sure we spend more time and money creating workarounds and quickfixes than it'd take to fix the product and submit patches. So the money is there, the incentives are all correct, the value of having free software is obvious, what's the issue?

If the open source project wasn't competing with "itself", there'd be enough money in the system to package the product, provide support for it and develop it to keep and take customers from other products. But instead the competition means you get companies providing only support, but does nothing to evolve the software. Projects that only package it, but does nothing to evolve the software. Or companies rolling their own support, but does nothing to evolve the software. So the prices are pushed down, core development grinds to a halt and eventually the product is replaced with closed source that has kept up with the times. It sucks but there you have it.

I've wondered whether it'd be possible to use some form of hybrid license, where the company would license the code for some time (like 1-5 years) where all license holders could create and share derivatives but outsiders would have to pay for a (reasonable and non discriminatory) license before becoming open source. Not to really make a closed source product but to keep that base cashflow so core development continues. Sorta like "GPLish provided you and everyone you give it to holds a licence" for X years and pure GPL afterwards. It could just become a mess like the BSD advertising clause, but it could be the incentive to do more development and not just service and support.

The big downside is that there's no such community today, you'd have to try creating a new camp and you could only use BSD code in the process since this is obviously incompatble with the GPL. Hell, in the years there's a fee required to get on board it's not even OSI open source. Naturally code made into open source with that license should be compatible with the licence so you're buliding a codebase other people can create other temporarily non-free projects on. But that this in total could let people earn some for the development itself and an edge in support by baking the support fee into the licence while producing code for the community.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[jadavis]

But developers spent time developing the software. So, if their time is not free, then how did the software come to be free in the first place?

Someone paid them to spend time on it?

If you have free software, you're free to modify and distribute it as you please.

If you want free software, you can:

1. Write it yourself; or
2. convince someone who already has the software to provide it to you under a free software license (perhaps by paying them); or
3. convince someone to write it and provide it to you under a free software license (perhaps by paying them).

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Timothy Brownawell]

Wrong. It creates an incentive for creating software that seemingly requires support, but doesn't require that support in reality. In other words, it creates an incentive to build software that is better than it looks.

How long could such an illusion be kept up? I mean, the IT/sysadmin folks will know that they never actually call support, and as they talk and move between companies the software will get a stronger and stronger reputation of never actually needing support. At what point do the suits become aware of this reputation and stop insisting on buying support?

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[jadavis]

It's not "I should get paid", it's more like "I give something to the community for free, but I don't want to starve while doing it".

I don't see how those two things are different; nor do I see how either of those represent reality. Both of those sentiments seem to push the responsibility of feeding you onto someone else (who?).

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[The End Of Days]

Sharing is where people always get angry, since it means that people may be able to obtain the software at no cost -- but the benefits outweigh the potential losses here.

Let's be clear here. That statement is true for you. It does not have to be true for anybody else. Attempting to require it to be true is a removal of freedom.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

Software is not scarce, developer time is. I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people think a non-scarce resource should be treated like a scarce one.

Hint: When was the last time you bought a complete product for the cost of raw materials + fraction of manufacturing cost?

It honestly doesn't matter that the cost of your software is a few cents in Internet access charges and electricity. Software can and should be sold just like any other product. See RMS selling Emacs tapes...

Free no cost software is about as sensible as free no cost anything else... it makes sense in limited situations.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

You've seen any EULAs lately? It's not only pirated and OS software that comes with no guarantees, you know...

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[turgid]

Software is the most complex thing that human beings make. It is very difficult indeed to guarantee that software works perfectly. What is possible, though, is to make software as best we can to the highest standards, and promise to fix or mitigate any defects found in operation.

To "know exactly what you're getting" is very difficult (impossible?). It is only possible to make general assertions about what is known to work. I'm afraid that's the best we can do with software at present.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[ingenuus]

Software is not scarce, developer time is. I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people think a non-scarce resource should be treated like a scarce one.

It's not cognitive dissonance; you explain it right there -- a scarce resource is required to create a valuable but non-scarce resource.

By establishing a social contract where everyone gives you control (for a limited time) over the distribution of a non-scarce resource you created, the creation of more non-scarce but valuable resources will be encouraged.

The flaw in copyright is not that principle but rather the imbalance of its present implementation.

The entire purpose of copyright has been lost, and in its place given birth to the erroneous belief in an inherent moral that people should own non-scarce resources once they release them.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[williamhb]

The software is free, the developer's time is not. You're free to use the software however you choose, but if you want the developer to spend his time working to your schedule, then you may have to make it worth his while.

It's the open source ineconomy of scale. A million organisations can use a piece of software, and all want the same new feature added. But if any organisation says "add the feature, Joe" they have to pay full price for the change as if they were the only user, because the feature is given free to all the other 999,999 users rather than sharing the cost. So, of course, nobody does -- while the feature might be worth $1,000 to each of the million organisations it's not worth the $10,000 it would cost to develop to any of them. So it never gets developed.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

It's the open source ineconomy of scale

Which has to be balanced against the rather larger economy of not having to write, test and debug 30 million lines of code (in the case of the Linux kernel). I'll grant that this probably doesn't greatly mitigate the corporate disincentives you mention, but "ineconomy of scale" nevertheless seems a little harsh.

So, of course, nobody does -- while the feature might be worth $1,000 to each of the million organisations it's not worth the $10,000 it would cost to develop to any of them. So it never gets developed.

That isn't actually true. Start any discussion on Linux vs Windows, and you'll get a dozen astroturfers queuing up to explain how Linux is mainly written by guys working for Novell and IBM and isn't really an amateur effort any more. (I'm not sure why they think this makes a difference, but they're correct to say that business is funding a lot of linux development).

Probably doesn't happen so much outside the kernel and the big desktop environments, but it does happen.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[williamhb]

Which has to be balanced against the rather larger economy of not having to write, test and debug 30 million lines of code (in the case of the Linux kernel). I'll grant that this probably doesn't greatly mitigate the corporate disincentives you mention, but "ineconomy of scale" nevertheless seems a little harsh.

Actually, no. The answer to OpenOffice being behind the times (in some respects) is to buy a copy of Word or use Google Docs, not to roll your own wordprocessor from scratch. Likewise, before Linux companies bought a Unix or Windows, they didn't write their own. The cost saving is the much lesser one of a license fee. (Technically, the saving aggregated across all companies is actually the vendor's profit margin.)

That isn't actually true. Start any discussion on Linux vs Windows, and you'll get a dozen astroturfers queuing up to explain how Linux is mainly written by guys working for Novell and IBM and isn't really an amateur effort any more. (I'm not sure why they think this makes a difference, but they're correct to say that business is funding a lot of linux development).

Nope, economically the changes made to Linux by Novell and IBM are the ones that are expected to produce a positive return on investment to Novell and IBM. (ie, IBM pays for the ones that are worth more to IBM themselves than it costs to make -- IBM never thinks "this'll really help Oracle, so even though it costs us a lot of money, let's do it"). The ones that would produce a positive return across the market in total but not to the company paying for the development don't happen. Ever wondered why the "year of the Linux desktop" never happened? It was never economic for any one company to put up the cash to do it.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

Actually, no. The answer to OpenOffice being behind the times (in some respects) is to buy a copy of Word or use Google Docs, not to roll your own wordprocessor from scratch

I guess everyone's got their own pet feature they'd like to see in OOo. For me it was decent SVG import and export filters. Best of luck getting Microsoft to put that in Word, however.

You can always go proprietary, but that doesn't necessarily represent a saving. The cost of a site licence for 20,000 MS office users is non-trivial, even allowing for the fact that the licencee can probably negotiate some sort of discount. And then there's issues of vendor lock-in and forced upgrade cycles to consider, and there's still no guarantee that you'll get the feature that made you consider paying a dev in the first place.

You also miss out on the opportunity to get the software tailored to your own workflow at a level that you're unlikely to find with any off-the-shelf solution. I think you're being a bit one sided about this.

Nope, economically the changes made to Linux by Novell and IBM are the ones that are expected to produce a positive return on investment to Novell and IBM. (ie, IBM pays for the ones that are worth more to IBM themselves than it costs to make

So what are you saying? That it doesn't count if it actually makes sound business sense? It sounds to me like you've drawn your line first, and now you're discarding all the data points that don't lie on it.

The ones that would produce a positive return across the market in total but not to the company paying for the development don't happen

Difficult to make that stick in the case of Samba, for instance. That's got pretty widespread general support, and yet Jeremy Allison and Andrew Tridgell are both (I believe) paid to work on it. I believe Apache sees a lot of corporate investment as well, and it's hard to see how any of that is going to be tailored so it only benefits one company,

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[williamhb]

So what are you saying? That it doesn't count if it actually makes sound business sense? It sounds to me like you've drawn your line first, and now you're discarding all the data points that don't lie on it.

Have a look back a few posts at my original reply to you. That's the line I'm talking. (Much more specific and limited than you seem to want to widen it to.)

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

Have a look back a few posts at my original reply to you. That's the line I'm talking. (Much more specific and limited than you seem to want to widen it to.)

Fair enough:

A million organisations can use a piece of software, and all want the same new feature added. But if any organisation says "add the feature, Joe" they have to pay full price for the change as if they were the only user, because the feature is given free to all the other 999,999 users rather than sharing the cost. So, of course, nobody does -- while the feature might be worth $1,000 to each of the million organisations it's not worth the $10,000 it would cost to develop to any of them. So it never gets developed.

That's your line, right there. The points you'd like to discard are all the cases (which you've conceded occur) where business does in fact invest in Free Software.

The trouble I'm having is that I haven't seen a better justification for discarding them than the fact that they don't support your conclusion, which isn't the way logical inference is supposed to work.

I'm quite happy to believe that I haven't understood your point correctly, but if so, I think you need to explain it a little more carefully.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[williamhb]

That's your line, right there. The points you'd like to discard are all the cases (which you've conceded occur) where business does in fact invest in Free Software.

I really don't see the issue you are taking with this. That was the line and the conclusion. There was no other unstated conclusion. The cases (which I haven't simply "conceded" occur; I originally explicitly stated occur) where a business invests in GPL software is when it returns a positive ROI to them themselves (rather than to the industry as aggregate). The value to IBM of Samba is greater than the cost of paying its developers so IBM is willing to pay its developers. The value to IBM of KDE being a truly successful consumer market competitor to Windows is less than it would cost to achieve that, so, even though it would save consumers around the world billions in total, they don't put that level of cash into it. What a surprise, corporate finance doesn't like playing the "spend $1 to only get $0.03 back" game*.

So what's your problem?

*(This is complicated by there being a monetary value to killing your competitors, and a marketing value to being seen as a nice open source player, but since you're struggling with the simple stuff let's not go into more advanced areas.)

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

So what's your problem?

Well, as I read it, the exchange went like this:

You: Free Software doesn't attract funding from the business sector because such investments are seen as benefiting competitors more than they benefit the investor.

Me: Well, actually it does see quite a bit of business investment...

You: Those cases do not count. They benefit the business more than its competitors.

So my problem is that I don't think you can demonstrate that "all cats are white" by saying "that cat doesn't count because it is black".

Now if your point was that there are a number of cases where the open nature of free software acts as a disincentive to corporate investment, then I would have to agree with you.

But with all due respect, that isn't what you said.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[williamhb]

Well, as I read it, the exchange went like this:

You: Free Software doesn't attract funding from the business sector because such investments are seen as benefiting competitors more than they benefit the investor.

Me: Well, actually it does see quite a bit of business investment...

You: Those cases do not count. They benefit the business more than its competitors.

So my problem is that I don't think you can demonstrate that "all cats are white" by saying "that cat doesn't count because it is black".

Now if your point was that there are a number of cases where the open nature of free software acts as a disincentive to corporate investment, then I would have to agree with you.

But with all due respect, that isn't what you said.

No, with all due respect your paraphrasing is a blatant fabrication. I think you'd be hard pressed to find two consecutive words that are common between what I said and what you are now claiming I said. I stand by my original statement as I wrote it in its entirety. If you wish to have little fantasy arguments in which you shoot down things you'd like people to have said (rather than what they did say), well that's up to you. I have to say I think it's a bit childish though.

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[NickFortune]

No, with all due respect your paraphrasing is a blatant fabrication

Sorry, my fault. I hadn't realised that your communication skills were so perfect that any misunderstanding could only be explained by malice on the part of the other party.

Tell you what, why don't we resume this discussion in twenty years, after you've grown up?

Re:Cognitive dissonance

[Anonymous Coward]

Sorry, my fault. I hadn't realised that your communication skills were so perfect that any misunderstanding could only be explained by malice on the part of the other party.

Tell you what, why don't we resume this discussion in twenty years, after you've grown up?

Ah, "Why don't we resume this discussion after you've grown up?" Such an intelligent argument always employed in the most profound rhetorical discussions. I hear Churchill had it in the first draft of his "Iron Curtain" speech, surrounded by those equally eloquent arguments "Yeah but you smell" and "I'm not listening! I'm not listening!"

Doesn't apply to music and film

[Covalent]

I wish the post was true...but sadly it is not. Yes, linux is free but people will still spend money to get a "package deal" (i.e. a pre-installed system done by somebody who knows his or her stuff). Same thing with Google...anybody could write Google Docs, if anybody had years of training and a huge team of designers, etc. It's easier for people to just use Google Docs and "pay" by reading the advertising and giving Google access to their data. In the case of movies and music, though, there's very little parallel here. I don't want somebody's "package deal" of Star Trek...I want the opposite of that (i.e. a file that I can do whatever I want with). I'd be more likely to pay for the software that allows me to easily transform my digital copy of a movie to the format I want to watch it in than I would be to pay for the content of the movie. The "new scarcity" doesn't exist in this case. And until people can figure out a way to get people to pay for a movie that hasn't even been filmed yet (good luck with that), I think the MAFIAA is likely to continue its quest to stamp out all forms of entertainment that don't involve them gouging the crap out of customers.

Re:Doesn't apply to music and film

[Anonymous Coward]

Have you considered that movies *are* fairly priced? What if they wanted to sell a movie to you for $75 instead of $25? I remember when laserdiscs cost that much, so actually, I think prices overall have been dropping. Do you expect the actors and movie studios to do their job for free?? Everyone's time has a cost, or are you a monk?

Re:Doesn't apply to music and film

[shentino]

It's worth whatever I feel like paying for it.

If that's not enough to cover costs, then maybe the invisible hand is telling them they're investing too much.

Re:Doesn't apply to music and film

[garynuman]

laser disks failed because they were too expensive and impractical, also one must consider VHS, NOT laserdisk was the defacto standard back then. Laser disk was targeted at a niche market who bought into it knowing full well it was going to cost more... so comparing their price to dvd's/bd discs is irrelevant, cool strawman though.... and no one expects people to do their jobs for free, however consumers might be tired of the excesses of Hollywood. go to a damn wal mart and look how far the price of durable goods has been driven down by globalization.... now try to reconcile these genuinely cheap genuinely useful goods with a dvd that costs $25 dollars (the physical disk itself and packaging come in well under a dollar) because they paid tom cruise $50 million dollars to stand there and be short. it cant be done. see hulu and netflix for examples of old media doing new media right and dont try to justify a broken system.

Re:Doesn't apply to music and film

[kz45]

"It's worth whatever I feel like paying for it.

If that's not enough to cover costs, then maybe the invisible hand is telling them they're investing too much."

Maybe. In a market without copyright infringement. But in a world where you can make an exact duplicate with little effort, paying nothing becomes really easy.

Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[AnonymousClown]

RedHat sell FOSS services - pretty much all Linux and makes half their money from financial activities. RedHat is a FOSS vendor - I can't take that away from them.

Google is a search engine that uses FOSS for it's company - it makes its money from advertising and selling non FOSS software.As a matter of fact, Google is actually a shitty FOSS company - see Sketchup and Sketchup Pro. Where's the source for those things? Hmmmm? And Sketchup Pro is pretty expensive, btw, and it's closed and proprietary program.

All the software written by Google, how much of it is really open? Honestly.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[somersault]

Who ever said that Google was a FOSS vendor? They're primarily an advertising company, though yes they do a lot to encourage OSS development and some pretty cool technologies/ideas.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[LordLucless]

TFS said free, not FOSS. It's all about making money. It has nothing to do with proprietary/open source. And Google makes plenty of free software, even if it all tends to be webapps.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[AnonymousClown]

Who ever said that Google was a FOSS vendor?

It was implied when they compared it to RedHat.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[Lunix Nutcase]

And Microsoft makes a ton of free software too. So basically you made the term "free software" meaningless.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[LordLucless]

How so? If they don't charge for it, it's free software, whether Microsoft makes it or not. It's not FOSS - there's a reason people use that term, and it's to avoid the confusion the term "free" engenders.

This article was about how to make money, while giving software away. Google has done it through advertisement, and collecting personal data. Red Hat has done it through selling support. Microsoft has done it by using free software to ensure lock-in to non-free software (the "first hit's free, kid" business plan).

Just because they're Microsoft doesn't mean they can't make free software - hell, MS has released source code to some of their software too.

Re:Google is not a FOSS sofware vendor!

[martin-boundary]

FOSS means free and open source. If it's free and not open source, then it's not FOSS.

Authorship of software is different

[patSPLAT]

Thus far engineers are the only ones to directly profit from open source businesses.

The single biggest mistake open source advocates make when envisioning a future is the assumption that successful engineering practices will be successful artist practices. You don't sample a Britney Spears song to make a longer, better Britney Spears song; you sample it for reference. Whereas when you patch emacs, you aren't referencing emacs, you are adding functionality.

Even if an artist subscribes to the free->fame startup model, eventually the steps to monetization involve controlling the distribution of copies. For example, first Danger Mouse released the Grey Album to great acclaim, then formed Gnarls Barkley and released music in traditional commercial channels.

While copyright is bad for engineers, it is a 300 year old legal framework designed to compensate artists. Discarding it for nothing is short sighted at best, and at worst exploitive of artists.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[dylan_-]

For example, first Danger Mouse released the Grey Album to great acclaim, then formed Gnarls Barkley and released music in traditional commercial channels.

Thus becoming part of the 0.01%* of artists who actually benefit from copyright. Why should there be a law that protects only the interests of a tiny minority of artists, who are also the richest and therefore in the least need of protection?

Discarding it for nothing is short sighted at best, and at worst exploitive of artists.

Copyright is short-sighted at best and at worst exploitive of artists.

*Yeah, made up number. "Small percentage" is the concept I'm trying to get across here.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[dkleinsc]

Even if an artist subscribes to the free->fame startup model, eventually the steps to monetization involve controlling the distribution of copies.

Counterexample: The Grateful Dead. They not only allowed the distribution of copies, they actively encouraged it.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[patSPLAT]

The law exists to encourage the production of art. Making up numbers and inverting sentence structure is not a counter argument.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[orasio]

You started with the wrong foot.
"Open source advocates" are guys who think that open source is good from a technological standpoint.
They don't envision the future, they code. You don't want to extract an ideology from programmers talking about programming.

You should read some free software material. Free software _is_ about freedom, and about the balance between users and programmers. _Some_ of the ideas inherent to free software can be applied to the whole of society. The "balance" between the different actors is similar in software and in music.

Here's the thing. Software is easy to see, because free software is almost as old as proprietary software. Both had a similar start from a cultural standpoint. That's why it's easier to understand. On the other hand, we have had proprietary music all our lives, and almosta all business models are anchored to that. It's hard to see a world without copyrights in music. That doesn't make it a bad world, it just makes it unusual.

This is what _I_ think: 300 years ago, copyright arised as an bargain, an incentive for authors to publish. Publishing was hard and expensive, and required upfront investments. Right now, we don't need that. We would have the same amount of cultural production without copyright, so the public is getting nothing from copyright, and its costs are getting higher and higher.

I don't care if some music company wants to restrict distribution of songs they publish, let them do that, but I think it's nonsense that I have to pay for it. And it's nonsense that my internet connection is threatened by their whims. I think the only solution would be to go back to the bargain table, and get a better deal. With copyright, the public is losing a lot, and getting nothing in exchange.

(Of course, authors do have some inalienable rights that should be protected, like authorship, to prevent plagiarism and stuff, but a monopoly on distribution is not an inalienable right, it's just the result of a bargain)

Re:Authorship of software is different

[Anonymous Coward]

You don't sample a Britney Spears song to make a longer, better Britney Spears song; you sample it for reference.

• Sugarhill Gang swiped Chic's "Good Times" groove for "Rapper's Delight" as the rhythmic engine for their tune, not as a cultural reference (or only incidentally). Listen to it, it makes the whole thing work.
• Who the heck samples Britney Spears?

Re:Authorship of software is different

[Anonymous Coward]

Thus becoming part of the 0.01%* of artists who actually benefit from copyright. Why should there be a law that protects only the interests of a tiny minority of artists, who are also the richest and therefore in the least need of protection?

That is just plain nonsensical. They are rich because they made money via copyright, if copyright didn't exist then they wouldn't have become rich...
Neat little circular argument you've got there.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[dylan_-]

The law exists to encourage the production of art.

The avowed aims of a law are irrelevant. The actual outcome of the law is what is important.

Making up numbers and inverting sentence structure is not a counter argument.

Making baseless claims isn't an argument.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[jvkjvk]

You are incorrect. The laws as they stand exists to seek monoploy rents and to encourage profits by corporations. It is totally irrelevant what the intent may have been, it is entirely relevant what the actualy effects of the laws are.

Regards.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[Draek]

While copyright is bad for engineers, it is a 300 year old legal framework designed to compensate artists. Discarding it for nothing is short sighted at best, and at worst exploitive of artists.

Only if a) your primary aim is to compensate artists, and b) copyright succeeded in doing so relative to nothing at all.

The first one is a matter of opinion, and most legal frameworks around the globe are in fact aimed at maximizing the number of works, using compensation only as a means to that end, and the second one would require a scientific study on the matter to decide.

There have, however, been a couple aimed at comparing length vs number of works and while they've all determined that the optimum is around 15 years, IIRC they also determined that the current life+90 was inferior to no copyright at all so if for any reason (such as the US' rent-a-politician model of lawmaking) it becomes an "all or nothing" situation then nothing would be the rational choice.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[martin-boundary]

While copyright is bad for engineers, it is a 300 year old legal framework designed to compensate artists. Keeping it for nothing is short sighted at best, and at worst exploitive of engineers.

This is a classic impasse. The solution is to discard copyright for things that engineers want to use, and keep it for things that artists want to use (assuming they agree with you).

Of course, now you have the problem that lawyers have to predict things that engineers want to use, and things that artists want to use, and that's not easy. A simpler approach is to dramatically reduce copyright lengths (eg 20 years), so that engineers have to only wait a little while, and artists have to move their asses a bit more, and no lawyer has to predict who wants to use what.

Unfortunately, the lawyers will never go for it...

Re:Authorship of software is different

[lennier]

Free software _is_ about freedom, and about the balance between users and programmers.

I'd say the word 'balance' is a misconception. Free software is about users BEING programmers. In the Free Software vision the two are overlapping rather than competing classes, and that's why it works.

This is why I find software systems which prevent users from being first-class programmers (like the iPad) abhorrent, because it creates a false division of classes - which of course will lead to competition between the two and a need to 'balance' the needs of one against the needs of the other.

But in reality - or in a system that works - they're the same people.

Re:Authorship of software is different

[orasio]

Free software _is_ about freedom, and about the balance between users and programmers.

I'd say the word 'balance' is a misconception. Free software is about users BEING programmers. ...

But in reality - or in a system that works - they're the same people.

I don't think so. I should have said "distributors" instead of programmers, because I was referring to the producer - consumer relationship between programmers and users.
Free software does differentiate them, and defends the right of the user to have more power in that relationship.

Users are not necessarily programmers, they have the _power_ of the programmer, but they can use it themselves, ask for help, or pay someone to use it for them. You are right in that they are not a different class, but users don't need to be programmers.

The key is that the GPL removes power from the programmer/distributor and gives it to the user. After selling a GPL'ed program, the programmer keeps his expertise, but loses the tactic advantage of being the only guy who has the source code . Of course, that could be perceived as a bad thing by some developers, but it's fair for the user.

Google?

[Lazy Jones]

And as companies like Red Hat and Google have grown in size and profitability, so have the credibility and clout of free software. ...

Erm, Red Hat and SuSE, or Red Hat and Canonical Inc, or even Red Hat and Geeknet Inc., yes. But Red Hat and Google of all things? Google does not provide or support or grow from providing Open Source software any more than e.g. Microsoft does. They run a close-source search engine, a closed-source mail hosting service and sell ads for a living.

Re:Google?

[mattbee]

...and what's more, very likely have masses of cutting-edge private patches to the Linux kernel for enabling their distributed computing infrastructure. Of course they give back in lots ways (money and less valuable code), but only because they have taken such a great deal to start with.

Re:Google?

[miffo.swe]

Imagine for a second Google had built their infrastructure on Windows or Unix. How would the cost of operations scale? Investments in deploying an extra 5000 servers with licenses? No go?

Open source was what made Google possible. The only real alternative had been them coding their own ecosystem from scratch.

Google proves open source, if used right, can be very beneficial to a company on the intertubes. Same goes for most other large services. Cost prohibits anything else being used than open source because closed source only scales one way, costs rise with the size of the deployment.

Re:Google?

[HuguesT]

They also use and support free software. Google has made a ton of money *from* free software. They have shown it is possible to grow from a garage operation to one of the most influential company on the planet using Linux. They have shown free software can be relied on to deliver stuff people want and that you don't necessarily have to hand out bushels of money to Sun, HP, Microsoft, Apple et al to make money in the IT industry.

Re:Google?

[LordLucless]

Why do people see free, and read open source? Google has provided heaps of free software - google maps, office, calendar, etc. Just because they're webapps and proprietary does not exclude them from the free as in beer moniker. And the article is obviously about the beer-free, not the speech-free - all it talks about is money, and the making thereof. Leave the OS/Proprietary baggage at the door.

Re:Google?

[Anonymous Coward]

Android? ChromeOS? Chrome? ...

Re:Google?

[abdulwahid]

I think they confused it here because the top line here mentions Stallman and Emacs where 'free' means freedom.

Re:Google?

[LordLucless]

Yeah, but it mentions him in the context of selling something for $150.

Re:Google?

[Lazy Jones]

They also use and support free software. Google has made a ton of money *from* free software. They have shown it is possible to grow from a garage operation to one of the most influential company on the planet using Linux.

The same is true for most, if not all big websites, e.g. Facebook. So? How does that make Google akin to Red Hat, which lives and breathes Linux and Free Software and has been instrumental in furthering Free Software goals, rather than simply profiting from Free Software and giving back a small fraction of the benefits? I simply don't see how you can name these 2 companies in a sentence that implies their contribution and significance for Free Software is comparable. It certainly isn't. Linux wouldn't be the same without Red Hat, SuSE etc. but it could do without Google easily.

that was enough for me to live on

[Anonymous Coward]

"I was getting some eight to ten orders a month and that was enough for me to live on."

not everyone likes living in a 360 sq ft apartment in a s#1t neighbourhood

-paul

Re:that was enough for me to live on

[AbbeyRoad]

so true

-paul

Motivations for paying for free in the real world

[Anonymous Coward]

I found that people have a hard time understanding why they should pay/support something that is free until they have issues impacting production. Once they do they are all for contributing to a project or shelling out for support.

I am not sure how that really pans out in a world of music or films.

What are they going to get in return for supporting musicians/film artists in a world where the content to be consumed is free? The concert experience is worth paying for and maybe a t-shirt or so but is that a model to support large industries? And then is the question of maybe large industries are not needed for music (with the technology of today maybe all we need are indies) but films? With home theater setups and free content models what is the driver to get a person into a seat at a mega-plex?

Ridiculous

[Anonymous Coward]

It's ridiculous to assert that the primary creators of value in the sofware business -- those who actually write the software -- should do so for free, while the hangers-on who sell it, support it, and package it should get paid.

It's grossly inefficient to insist that a programmer who wants to make money has to do it by doing something else on the side. Doesn't he really create the most value by spending his time writing software?

And it's just plain stupid to think you can call for free software without implying both of these things.

Re:Ridiculous

[YttriumOxide]

It's ridiculous to assert that the primary creators of value in the sofware business -- those who actually write the software -- should do so for free, while the hangers-on who sell it, support it, and package it should get paid.

Yes, that is a ridiculous assertion, which is why noone asserts it... If my employer wants to package, sell and support my software, they can damn well pay me for it. Doesn't have the slightly bit to do with whether it's free software or not though.

Keep Preaching to the Choir

[Paeva]

I think Slashdot needs more articles about how the RIAA could still stay in business but really please the tech geek crowd by loosening up a bit. Sure, they won't make nearly as much as they're making right now, but I'm sure they'd like to get invited to some of our l33t geek parties, right?

Re:Keep Preaching to the Choir

[mhajicek]

I can't remember the last time I paid any RIAA company for music. Supply is up, so relative demand is down; that means it's time to change if they want to stay in business. "I will bend like a reed in the wind."

Re:Keep Preaching to the Choir

[tepples]

I assume you were in a grocery store in the past month. Some of the money likely went toward licensing a background music stream to play over the speaker system.

Lesson learned

[AnonymousClown]

Google has made a ton of money *from* free software.

That's right FOSS developers, all the work you released for free was used to make billions for a couple of guys. And they of course took all that money they made off of the back of the FOSS community and ....kept it.

And they're paying back to the FOSS community by adding some minor code and ....well really nothing.

So, the lesson I get from Google is exploit the free software and the free labor of others, make a billion, and keep it all to myself.

Re:Lesson learned

[YttriumOxide]

all the work you released for free was used to make billions for a couple of guys

Releasing it for free (no cost) is the choice of the developer. No-one is FORCED to release open source software, for free or otherwise. Under the terms of the GPL, IF I take a piece of GPL software and decide to release it further (generally after modifying it, but not necessarily!), then I must do so under the same terms as the original (e.g. the GPL). Nowhere does it say I have to release it further, and nowhere does it say I can't charge for it.

- I can take GPL software, modify it, and use it myself without ever giving it or my changes to anyone else. I can't see any reason right now why I might do such a thing, but I can if I want.
- I can take GPL software, modify it and sell the results (my CUSTOMERS may then give it out freely if they wish, so this would probably be a bad business model without some other offering such as support or a fancy printed manual, but I COULD do so...)
- I could even do the above WITHOUT modifying it should I desire to.

Other licences are even more permissive, not containing the "must be under the same licence" clause, and these are the ones that tend to cause some big companies to take a lot of code and never share it further. That said though, some still do, and we thank them for it.

The fact that Google has made billions does not mean they made billions "off the free labor of others". They certainly made money using a shared human resource (free software), but every piece of GPL software they've modified and want to distribute further enriches the rest of us "off their backs".

Re:Lesson learned

[Anonymous Coward]

That's right pen producers, all the pens you sold for a couple of cents were used to sign high profile contracts and make billions for a couple of guys. And they of course took all that money they made off of the back of the pen makers and ....kept it.

And they're paying back to the pen community by ordering a few more pens and ....well really nothing.

So, the lesson I get from [insert big company here] is exploit the pen makers software and the low-priced labor of others, make a billion, and keep it all to myself.

Clearly, it's really a shame that the profit of a pen producer doesn't rise proportionally to the income generated by the contracts which were signed with their pens.

Lesson: the value of a tool and the value of what another person does with that tool needn't be proportional.

data != tangable objects

[jisou]

in my opinion the main reason why there is such an issue is because the media industry is basically trying to sell abstract ideas. take the example of a video game. is the code itself copyrighted or just the end result? if its the code then how much change needs to be made for you to get around those pesky copyright laws.of coarse the industry is going to want to tell you to sell it. its what they do. they'd market air if they had the opportunity. personally i think free and open source software is going to not only turn our current economy on its head, but also possibly improve it. the thing is the more we try to bottle are thoughts and sell them the more we hinder the growth of humanity. i for one think that we would be way more advanced if it wasn't for i need to sell information. many great ideas have been cut short because it wasn't "profitable" enough. i really hope that the digital age will help change the perception of compensation. just to be clear I'm not advising that we stop right now and burn all of our money. as Russia proved that idealistic society where everyone is equal is impossible as long as human greed still exists. i just hope that with the digital age instead of shallow pieces of paper we barter information with each other.

false dichotomy

[circletimessquare]

the differences you cite aren't really differences. everything is a means to an end, including music and movies: pleasure. "You install it because you want to do something with it" applies to linux. it also applies to "iron man" and beyonce

put it this way: a hammer is not a screwdriver. but in terms of how they are acquired: bought in a store or ripped off from woodshop class, they are the same

Re:false dichotomy

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, regarding a Beyonce video, I could use it over and over.

Business model: Didn't Stallman say...

[MacAndrew]

... that he was changing for the making of the tapes, as opposed to the software himself. I recall reading this on his site maybe ten years ago. This seemed weird to me, to charge for the menial task rather than the inspired one, and of course the costs of software distribution have now all but evaporated. Besides, what if the coder just can't be bothered with that stuff? It's not what they are valued for perhaps even as a genius (who doesn't eat much).

See: http://beust.com/stallman.html ("RMS was beginning to be successful with Emacs by that time, shipping more and more tapes. These tapes were sold $150 but, he insisted on that point, it was only the price of s&h. The software on it was both free from a pecuniary point of view, but more importantly, free of any intellectual rights. Fearing that these terms might change, RMS felt that he had to quit the MIT if he wanted to be sure that his subsequent works would belong to him completely. The Free Software Foundation was created and took over the distribution of tapes. RMS could now focus on his quest.")

So ... transient idealism?

It is interesting to now read the 1993 Wired view of Stallman's work: http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/1.01/stallman.html

I respect the guy as much as anyone; amanzing contributions (I hadn't heard the EMACS angle, my ignorance). But his business model ... well, I'd still like to know more. The voluntary payment model seemed predominant now, and frankly that's a tax on the nice, people who feel a moral obligation and not necessarily the people profiting most ... and likely ignoring GNU obligations as well.

Somebody swallowed the Techdirt gobbledygook

[Anonymous Coward]

For example, like free software, digital music has zero marginal costs. As basic economics teaches us, this means that the price of such goods will tend to zero.

No, it doesn't. Economics represents market dynamics using both a supply AND a demand curve, in fact many supply vs. demand charts for a given industry because of market segmentation (Armani vs. Calvin Klein vs. Kohl's brand suits) and unique products (such as movies and music albums and tracks). For example, diamonds are very expensive, even though it might not cost much for DeBeers to pull them out of the earth, because of the steady demand for them. Just slinging around some academic buzzwords does not imply a mastery, or even grasp of the basic material.

If FOSS Developers want money, MARKET IT!

[sonnejw0]

That's the free software developer's fault. They developed and released free software with the intention of it being free, not with the stipulation that if it is ever worth something that they should get a cut.

If those free software developers wanted to go through the process of patenting/copyrighting the software, investing millions in PUBLICIZING IT LIKE GOOGLE/ETC. do with it, and generally provide the support of a large corporation, then maybe they would get a cut of the software.

Software isn't just the code, it's the marketing and more importantly the support from the company AFTER SALE. Free software only works because there is no financial investment from the creators after the point of sale. They get the ability to put it on their resume and hope to get recognized so they can move on up. That's the difference between an IT person and a Business person. Don't blame the business person for taking the IT person's FREE SOFTWARE and providing the billion dollar industry of SUPPORT and MARKETING to back it up.

FLOSS, movies, and Godwin's law.

[Ukab the Great]

As a discussion comparing Free Software and the movie industry grows longer, the probability of someone introducing a Free Porn movement where Richard Stallman is an actor approaches one. When this happens, the thread should immediately be killed.

foss is the future business model of all media

[circletimessquare]

and it isn't really that revolutionary: its the same business model as broadcast television or radio

content is free, and money is made via ancillary revenue streams. you give your music or movies away for free on the internet and you make cash from the people who show up at concert gigs (because they like your music: your mp3 files are merely advertising) or in the cinema house (the internet, like television and the vcr before it, despite all the panic, is not going to kill the cinema house)

furthermore, this "radical" future is not the death of capitalism, it is the ultimate expression of capitalism: the marketplace, the internet, is a great equalizer. quality and quality alone becomes the dominant determinant about who triumphs and who has to keep their day job. the only people who suffer are the old media companies from the previous, now dead, era of vinyl and cellulose: they aren't needed anymore

and don't believe their lies: when such dying distributors whine about capitalism, they actually are talking about corporatism. corporatism is a greater enemy of capitalism than communism or socialism ever can be, and this is also historically true: oligopolies and monopolies using their size and influence over legislators to warp and destroy the free market to their advantage. so if you are interested in a free market, a marketplace of competing equals, you are interested in strong government regulations which curtail the influence of the dominant players

but this simple truth is unfortunately contrary to so much libertarian and tea party rhetoric

on the topic of foss, and also on many other topical issues, too many people confuse the idea of capitalism and corporatism

too many people unfortunately buy the self-serving rhetoric and the propaganda and the alligator tears of the 800 pound gorillas in the room who say they are on the side of capitalism, but who are not interested in true capitalism at all, they are in corporatism. they are interested in destroying the free market to their advantage by doing away with regulations or flat out rewriting the regulations to grandfather themselves into dominant positions in the marketplace

are you a libertarian? are you a free market fundamentalist? are you a tea party member? then recognize this: your greatest enemy is not the government, it is large corporations. they will destroy the free market UNLESS the government is strong enough to check their power so the little guys can compete equally. the government is the enemy ONLY to the extent that large corporations have corrupted it. so fight to CHANGE the government, not destroy it, for that is far worse in the name of YOUR ideals. IN THE NAME OF THE FREE MARKET, you want and need a strong regulatory government. this really is 100% the truth. a truly free market functions only amongst equals. and since in a marketplace no one stays equal very long, you must have strong regulations to make sure the larger players don't take advantage of the smaller players. there's simply no way around that

so in the name of true capitalism, defy the mpaa and riaa. monopolies and oligopolies are the greatest threat to capitalism, ever

Re:foss is the future business model of all media

[tick-tock-atona]

Thankyou!
I was starting to think I was the only one who saw this :-)

Re:foss is the future business model of all media

[Anonymous Coward]

wow what delusional drivel. You are going to feel like a right ignorant dork when you ahve to grow up and get a job.

Fascinating

[JakartaDean]

(Subject is tying in to the weekend's Leonard Nimoy theme.)

What a fantastic approach! I haven't thought it through, as I hadn't seen things this way before, but the approach of bringing artists back to the audience really is fascinating. Compare Bruce Springsteen's relationship with his audience in 1980 to Brittney Spears' 20 years later. I know which I want.

Record companies, are you listening?

Is authorship of software really that different?

[Errol backfiring]

You don't sample a Britney Spears song to make a longer, better Britney Spears song; you sample it for reference.

Is that so? I read about take-down notices of parodies, covers/enhancements every day here.

Equally, I can just download Emacs and enjoy it without patching or contributing anything.

I actually tried to read to RTFA

[outsider007]

In general I won't mind paying a buck or two if it means the page will load.

Article misses the point

[biscuitlover]

I read the article hoping that it would provide some interesting ideas about how independent musicians can better adapt their business to the challenges of the internet (I record for a number of small independents), but was rather disappointed.

TFA basically makes two suggestions:

1: Make all your money from live shows instead.
This argument has been made many times before on many different websites, but fails to account for anyone who doesn't fit easily into the typical 'rock band' style setup. What about composers? Dance music producers? Orchestras? People who for whatever reason can't gig regularly? It also assumes that you'll easily get gigs in the first place - something that is much more difficult without having music already released, so you're back to square one.

2. Get people to payfor your album in advance, then tailor it to their needs and maybe get them involved/credit them if they donate enough
I shouldn't need to point out why this will only work in the tiniest number of cases. Realistically, who's going to pay for music that hasn't been made yet, when so many people don't even want to pay for music that has? How many people here would 'fund' an album that might turn out to be shit? The evidence supplied by the article for this is also irrelevant for the vast majority of musicians who are trying to make a name for themselves.

Most musicians - if they're in it for the right reasons - should tell you that they're not in it for the money. This is the right attitude to have, but try telling anyone who enjoys their job that they shouldn't get paid for it and see how far you get. Musicians need better solutions if than this if they're going to survive the huge drop in profits from recorded music that is affecting most (not all) people in the industry, and has been for years now.

Re:Article misses the point

[migla]

The best solution for the digital age would be to make sure that people with a passion for arts could pursue their passion: Socialism.

Everyone should be given basic income, so that anyone caring more about expressing themselves creatively than about making more money by taking a boring job, could do so.

Re:Article misses the point

[x0ll0b]

I write as a composer (not in it for the money, mostly) and a programmer (in it for the money, mostly)

If you are a coder, you can make FOSS by contributing half an hour here or there, and get your main income from support, consulting, bespoke work, whatever.

If you are a composer/performer/etc then you can give away your music and get your main income from teaching, commissions, instrument repair, royalties, and yes gigs, etc etc.

Or you could even make your income from programming like I do, and (sorry to include a plug) give away your music... - programming pays a lot better than teaching, instrument repair, etc etc, and certainly pays better than commissions which usually work out, on an hourly rate, as a great deal less than minimum wage. I can make in a day of programming what it would take me a week to earn in teaching, and it's a lot less hassle - and I can make in a week of programming what it would take a year of royalties to earn (at my level in the music business, at any rate) - so this means I can spend a little bit of time doing some programming and then have a lot of time free to do what I really want, i.e. music, and not have to worry about the crappy copyright model for my income.

Re:Article misses the point

[cdrguru]

Nice, but you do need to consider that not everyone is perfectly dual-talented as you are.

For many, there is a real decision between being a good-enough musician and being a good-enough something else. Good enough means not "making lots of money" but good enough to be satisfied with the results. I would say that for most people to not suck at music it takes a lot of time, time that has to be spent on it rather than doing something else to make money.

Once you have made that committment, you are pretty much locked out of the dual-career path. There just isn't time. So now you need to get some money based on what you are in fact spending all of your time doing - music.

I suppose it is much simpler if you are really, really talented and do not have to spend all your time on music to be happy with the results. Note that I am not saying there is any motivation here other than personal satisfaction - most people that I know of involved with music are either doing it as a part-time hobby and don't really care about the music or are deeply committed to being the best they can be - which then starts taking more and more of their lives.

What we are going to lose with the new "its all free" philosophy is the possibility for deeply committed people to get any money from their efforts. A few can get paid to play in bars, but most of the bar scene doesn't really pay. A very, very few can attract 50,000 screaming fans to a football stadium today, but without serious promotion that just isn't going to happen for anyone anymore.

I guess people will still be paying $200 a ticket to see the Rolling Stones and The Who.

Re:Article misses the point

[cdrguru]

I suggest doing some research on something called Social Credit. It's been tried before and it didn't work out very well.

The problem is that people need competition and incentives. When they do not have them, they pretty much lie down and do nothing. The Soviet Union was an incentive-free environment for most and it pretty much proved that. Social Credit didn't seem to do any better.

For a very, very pro Social Credit rant, I suggest reading We The Living by Robert Heinlein.

Re:Article misses the point

[CRCulver]

That already exists in most developed countries. The surge in the new music scene in Finland, for example, to the point where this tiny country stands large on the European and international scene, is due in large part to the Finnish government generously providing grants for composers to do nothing but write music full-time. Nearly all decent non-Hollywood films were produced with some level of state support. That's true not only for Europe, but to a surprising degree even for the United States (watch the credits on Jarmusch films, for example, and note the acknowledgements for help given by local and state governments).

Re:I own the most scarce of commodities

[Antiocheian]

That's a reply to the frosty pisser ?

Fear

[b4upoo]

Yes, Open Source and free software do cross more lines than many people suspect. They also cross lines that the wrong people suspect. Oddly the same issue exists with Christianity in some areas. Communism vs. capitalism is a dangerous and non productive battle. Many powerful people do not separate communism from socialism in their thoughts. If Open Source is perceived as socialist then there is actually a certain danger attached. In South America there has been an ongoing slaughter of religious leaders as the powerful perceive Christianity as a danger to their wealth. Perhaps many people who support Open Source consider it more of a social justice action than having anything to do with socialism. But at the end of the day you can bet your last penny that governments take an intense and covert interest in Open Source to continuously assess whether or not it is a threat. And you can bet that big companies such as Microsoft push governments to restrict Open Source.
            For my two cents I would like to see computing move further beyond the constraints of businesses and governments. I do not want every aspect of my existence welded to the almighty dollar or the rule of law.

Making money from Free video games?

[tepples]

you give your music or movies away for free on the internet and you make cash from the people who show up at concert gigs (because they like your music: your mp3 files are merely advertising) or in the cinema house (the internet, like television and the vcr before it, despite all the panic, is not going to kill the cinema house)

Then how does one make money from single-player or couch-multiplayer video games? What is the video game equivalent to a live concert or an exhibition at a cinema house? Sure, there used to be video arcades, but arcades have pretty much died in Latin-alphabet markets. And even for movies, how do you make sure revenue from the cinema house goes to you and not to someone who copied your movie and is passing it around to other cinema houses?

What about composers?

[Errol backfiring]

Ehm, just pay them for the job? Why must they be paid every time the work is copied?

danger mouse is the future

[circletimessquare]

he ignored ip law and was very successful for doing that: he succeeded on merit alone

you point out he then formed gnarls barkley and went on to even more success. this is the old model, where success is determined by getting the fickle attention of a distributor who then hypes you. danger mouse's novelty is only the unorthodox way in which he garnished attention. his story is a hybrid of the old and new model of music distribution. its a temporary phase

the future is the first part of danger mouse's story, and the second part, the amplification by old school distributors, is still going to continue (pop music will never die), but how you make money will be concert venues only. there's still plenty of money there, no need to (mpossibly) control the internet to make money off of media files. in fact, it is superior to give otu the files for free: they are just advertising for your concert gigs: what consumer wants to buy advertising?

"Discarding it for nothing is short sighted at best, and at worst exploitive of artists."

this is absolutely hilarious because the pre-internet model of music distribution is one giant litany of artist explotation. no barrier between consumer and artist, ie, distribution via the internet, is the most artist-empowering reveletation possible

you, like many people, are confusing the death of the middle man with the death of the artist, for some erroneous reason

there's a million ways to make $ via ancillary

[circletimessquare]

you're just lacking imagination

off the top of my head: in game advertisements, $ for premium or personalized content, subscriptions to online access arenas, etc

in the early 90s, id gave away its first free levels. id made millions because they hooked people on their content, then they charged for more premium content. from this ancient era of videogames, you can see free files is a superior approach, and in fact, not a very revolutionary one

the idea of giving away your product for free for great market share and capitalizing in alternative ways is a story as old as capitalism itself. trying to control that which you cannot control, the internet, emanwhile, is a loser's game, an act of insecurity that simply hurts your bottom line in the new world of media distribution

look: when lots of people consume your media, you have gained power. this power can be capitalized on in all sorts of ways. that's the beginning and the end of all you need to know about the future of media

it is to your advantage to give your media away, to maximize the mindshare, the eyeballs you have control over now. if you charge for your media meanwhile, you simply lessen the amount of copies of your media that is out there, and therefore the ancillary ways in which you can profit

welcome to the new world (not really that new)

Then who pays the composer?

[tepples]

So you recommend that composers get paid up front for their work just like the majority of other knowledge workers. But who pays the composer, and out of what revenue?

Re:Then who pays the composer?

[CRCulver]

In most developed countries, state arts ministries support composers out of public revenue.

Oh, I'm sure there will be cries of "taxation is theft" and so forth from the crowd here, but public approval of such subsidy is quite high in most countries. I've never seen a single French political party want to shut down IRCAM, and in Finland where I presently live, even if people don't personally like art music, they nonetheless believe strongly that its creation should be supported from their taxes.

Re:Then who pays the composer?

[Draek]

Whoever needs the music composed, and out of whatever revenue they plan on getting from that music. McD needs new jingle for their ads, they pay me and I make them one, they use it to sell more burgers and therefore recoup the money, we all win.

Sure, it only applies to a few cases, but the reality is that, in a world post-internet most musicians will be of the "love for the arts" variety rather than the "I couldn't get into law school and wanna make money fast" one regardless.

I have money

[Anonymous Coward]

and I have bugs I want fixed. Give us bounties in Launchpad and Brainstorm and donate buttons in the Software Center and this problem is over.

Concerto

[tepples]

What about composers?

Other Slashdot users have told me that composers should learn to play an instrument and give concerts as the soloist. That's why there was a form of music called a "concerto", which was somewhere between a sonata and a symphony but written for a soloist and a backing band. The backing band's part might be arranged for a piano, four-piece chamber music band, or an orchestra, depending on what size of gig the composer-soloist wanted to play.

Dance music producers?

The synthesizers and samplers used to make dance music also work in real time. Find some keyboardists, DJs, or whatever.

The article didn't say anything about the movie or video game industry. Unlike music, movies don't have live performances. They have exhibitions in a cinema house, but almost no movies are adapted into stage plays. Non-MMO video games are similar; arcades are dead in most of the world.

Fading Edge Between Software and Data

[artgeeq]

Nessus provides and interesting example. The software itself is free, but you can buy knowledge modules.

So, Suppose a particular free package supports knowledge modules. These could be simple tables, scripts, whatever. A package like Nessus could even support its own programming language, perhaps even to the extent of LISP on Emacs. One can purchase them, and when purchasing them, they can buy a susbcription for updates. (For that matter, one could even purchase anti-virus signatures that destroy computers, but that is another story.)

So, the software is free, but the data isn't. Would scripts that run within a particular package constitute software that, by imnplication, would be free, or data that one would pay for?

Red Hat v. Google

[fandingo]

A comparison between Google and Red Hat doesn't make much sense. Red Hat makes the vast majority of its product completely open source; whereas, Google is very serious about keeping its core products closed. By that I mean, Red Hat open sources the things that make it money, but Google open sources tools that it uses for services that make it money. RHEL is fairly expensive and is a big money maker for Red Hat, and it's not just the sort of "buy support" money either. Google releases several products, Android being the most prominent, that are open source (although small parts of Android are not); however Google doesn't make money directly from Android licenses from end users or device manufacturers.
Don't get me wrong, both companies are very important to open source. Red Hat directly open sources most of its products, which benefit the Linux community tremendously, and Google open sources some platforms (like Android, Chrome OS, Chrome, etc.) and some tools that are important. I just don't think that the two are comparable. Lumping them in the same open source group is not appropriate, and I think this is important when examining financial profitability.
Google's profitability from open source is cake icing for them. There's probably not a whole lot that they expect from open source. Take Android for example. No matter the OS, device manufacturers would have access to the source code, so it's not an issue to them. And I doubt they would get many submissions from the manufacturers anyways unless they were obligated, which they are not under the Android license (some BSD-style license); there are probably not a ton of submissions from the "community" either. Kernel submissions would be the most like IMO, and Google is working to merge Android with the Linux kernel (forked around 2.6.18 I believe). Basically, Google doesn't benefit a significant amount from open source. It doesn't really affect their bottom line, which is largely the ad business.
Red Hat, on the other hand, has to make money directly from open source. Projects like CentOS and OEL (Oracle Enterprise Linux) are direct threats to Red Hat's profitability. That's not to say they are bad or anything, but they certainly do have an effect on Red Hat's ability to make money. Red Hat is far more dependent on open source, and if you look at contributions, open source development (mostly Linux, but also OS independent projects like Gnome) is very dependent on Red Hat.

In the end, both companies, and all the others that support open source, are great. However, it's unfair to categorize companies that release open source products that depend of those products for their revenue and those that get revenue largely from other areas.

Yes, I lack imagination

[tepples]

You're right; I lack imagination. That's why I have other Slashdot users like you to help. Thanks for volunteering; now I need a bit of clarification:

id made millions because they hooked people on their content, then they charged for more premium content.

And then watch as the premium content gets distributed far and wide without any revenue to you, especially if lawmakers ever recognize the assertion in your signature that copyright is incoherent.

As for advertisements, how well do they work in video games not set in a highly-developed country in modern-day Earth without looking incoherent in the setting? For example, how well would advertisements work in the Super Mario franchise? And how does a smaller developer find advertisers willing to advertise in a game made by a smaller developer? Small businesses tend to offer their services regionally and therefore advertise regionally, but video games are distributed globally.

subscriptions to online access arenas

If it's free software, people can set up their own arenas in a private server. And a lot of people will just choose to play single-player or couch multiplayer: one large monitor shared among players and four gamepads.

Re:Yes, I lack imagination

[O('_')O_Bush]

"And then watch as the premium content gets distributed far and wide without any revenue to you, especially if lawmakers ever recognize the assertion in your signature that copyright is incoherent.

If it's free software, people can set up their own arenas in a private server. And a lot of people will just choose to play single-player or couch multiplayer: one large monitor shared among players and four gamepads. "

You're trying to poke holes based on old videogame models and ignoring a lot of the newer technologies that many games use so that their content is valid and runs through proprietary servers.

Look at how newer games like Bad Company 2 and Modern Warfare, even though they have large singleplayer/couch multiplayer modes, are mostly played online through a tracking service.

Either of those could have had their singleplayer multiplayer/online modes given away for free, then sold their ranked server/online unlock item modes as a subscription or expansion (similar to how BF2 sold unlocks through expansions). That's easy to do for consoles like the PS3 and XBOX 360, and good luck subverting Steam to get that content on the PC.

All it takes is a little bit of imagination and tweaking modern videogame distribution models to see how this would work.

I mean, let's take a look at the major game types and see how free games have made money in the past or how they could potentially make money:

FPS: Gunz Online is a good example of how a totally free game can generate cash through selling addtional weapons, items, and outfits. Not everyone pays extra for items, but the people that do end up spending quite a lot of money.

Another model would be to release a medium sized game and then release pay-for expansions linked to an online account.

RTS: This one is easy, since the majority of new RTS's (Starcraft 2 plz?) are played over the internet. Release the singleplayer and multiplayer modes for free and pay extra for an official online ranking service/tracker or more expansions.

MMORPGs: Already gave an example of how this works. Other models use ideas like in Gunz, where a player pays for expanded banks, unique items, tokens to access extra dungeons, etc.

Adventure/Platformers (Mario!): This one isn't as good for examples because they're almost all singleplayer games. However, we can look to the Nintendo E-Reader (moderate success in the U.S., huge success in Japan) for how people would be willing to pay for extra/unique items and outfits (hammer bros. suit :} ) in platformers. I'd gladly pay for extra outfits or minigames in Twilight Princess, or additional boss fights in God of War.

Racing/Simulation games: Pay cash to unlock more vehicles/customization sold via an online store.

Strategy (Gunbound/Wormz): Again, sell items/armor/outfits via an online store.

it would be a more interesting argument

[circletimessquare]

if you could actually control the internet

since you can't, get used to what i am talking about

because i am not trying to sell you some fantastical alternative way of doing things that only works if i convince everyone to do things my way

i'm simply describing the matter-of-fact future you need to adapt to, or die

Re:it would be a more interesting argument

[kz45]

"i'm simply describing the matter-of-fact future you need to adapt to, or die"

It's funny. The FSF doesn't seem to be following this. If you use GNU licensed code in proprietary software, they can and will take you to court, similar to the RIAA/MPAA. Some companies have even been forced to hire "compliance officers".

It seems when the tables are turned, you see the true colors of most Free software supporters. Rather than fighting for the freedom of all, you are fighting for the freedom for your own political ideology.

freedom gratis

[krischik]

It is easier for those who speak a language where free(dom) and gratis are distinct words. Perhaps why open source is more successful in europe.

Huge error in logic.

[Hurricane78]

[...] the conundrum of how to make money from goods that are freely available. In particular, they offer the music and film industries an example [...]

Except that information, by the laws of physics, can not be a good. A physical container for it can be a good. The creation of it can be a service. But information lacks an essential property to be able to be a good: It can not be owned. This is, because it can be copied without loss. Asking who owned it, is as absurd as asking who the real you is, when you got cloned by a perfect teleporter. Or what came before time itself. That our language is able to create such questions, does not mean that they make any sense.

If one actually accepts that fact, it is easy to come up with a realistic business model. Because there is only one event, where one can demand (not ask, but demand) money in exchange for the service. (Ignoring the anachronistic sale in physical containers here.)
And that is, when you first pass it on. Obvious. The rest follows from there. (Which, for very expensive services [like e.g. movie making] usually results in your clients / target group taking the place of the investor that you have to pitch it to, and who will buy the service from you.)

Re:Huge error in logic.

[cdrguru]

Unfortunately, what you are describing was actively practiced for hundreds of years - patronage.

While it resulted in some really nice music, it also pretty much locked most of Europe into the same artistic expression for those hundreds of years. You didn't write an opera that was too contreversial, because the patron wouldn't like it and that resulted in the artist starving... See Mozart for an example.

Patronage is the surest way to kill off creativity and lock us into rereleases of 1970s music forever. Like many things, first you need to look at all the other times something has been tried before you can hold a valid opinion on why it might or might not be a good thing. Sure, just because something has failed 100 times does not necessarily mean that the 101st time it might not work - as long as you change the conditions. With art you are talking about changing the fundamental characteristics of what it means to be human, and we haven't changed that in a long, long time. So expecting patronage to work this time is somewhere between disingenuous and simply uninformed.

Initial investment

[krischik]

That is called initial investment. Then the developer tries to sell the software to get money in for continued investment. Which is basically the way closed source software works as well.

The problem really is that free has a double meaning in english. It might be the short form of freedom and might mean gratis. And free software is freedom software and not gratis software.

Martin

Age old business model...

[AthleteMusicianNerd]

Gillette had the idea to give away the razor to sell the blades in 1900. I would consider this a marketing expense, and I do not see software as less valuable than a physical product. In many cases I would see it as more valuable. Word processor or typewriter...Digital Audio Workstation or 4-track....etc...

I don't see DRM as killing music or software. Giving away music may be a valuable marketing tool for some artists, but it can also devalue your music. It's human nature to want what you can't have and vice versa. If Metallica just gave away their music, they would have been out $1 billion at about 100 Million Albums at about $10 per. Maybe it's a good idea for lessor known artists, but when I think about bands that just handed me their CD (this is in the old days), it ended up on a shelf rather than the CD player.

In the case of software, I see DRM as quite necessary. It takes a lot of time and energy to develop good software. People deserve compensation for their efforts.

Truckin...

[Registered Coward v2]

The Dead used the free model long before free software. You could record, copy, and trade their concerts - they even encouraged it. They made their money from concerts, memorabilia sales, and (gasp) records. It simply was uncool to bootleg Dead records; caus ethey were cool about letting you trade their concert tapes. It's about the music, man.

Re:Truckin...

[kz45]

"The Dead used the free model long before free software. You could record, copy, and trade their concerts - they even encouraged it. They made their money from concerts, memorabilia sales, and (gasp) records. It simply was uncool to bootleg Dead records; caus ethey were cool about letting you trade their concert tapes. It's about the music, man."

This will work for less than 1% of artists. The rest will starve.

Re:Truckin...

[Registered Coward v2]

"The Dead used the free model long before free software. You could record, copy, and trade their concerts - they even encouraged it. They made their money from concerts, memorabilia sales, and (gasp) records. It simply was uncool to bootleg Dead records; caus ethey were cool about letting you trade their concert tapes. It's about the music, man."

This will work for less than 1% of artists. The rest will starve.

Then the market has spoken. Or do you believe the current method is superior? it essentially reduces music to marketing and relies on tight controls to allow one hit to pat for many failures.

As a side note, I think you'd find more who make a livable income off their music but fewer meg-bands.

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i'm in the 95th earning percentile

[circletimessquare]

i live in midtown manhattan

how's the basement twatstain?

Bottled Water should be the inspiration!

[commport1]

C'Mon Guys, Look at the success story of Bottled Water. It's 99.9% the same as the stuff everyone gets for (almost) free out of the tap, except it comes well packaged and advertised. It's all down to the marketing and packaging of the product.

Oh boy - Finlands isolation

[Anonymous Coward]

Later, it became a development methodology too, largely at the hands of Linus, whose geographical isolation in Finland forced him to develop ways

Isolated? They make it sound like he was living in the wilderness, not in what was then the most technologically advanced and computerised part of the world, spending more per capita than any other on research in Computer Science (Scandinavia). Finland may have been a bit behind the other Scandindinavian countries in 1991 (but Nokia was closing the gap fast), but was still a lot more technologically advanced than USA.

The Scandinavian countries had from the early 1980's until the middle of the 1990's more home computers, workstations and computer servers per capita than any other part of the world. And also the highest average level of education of any countries in the world, mostly in engineering and medicine.

He was less then three hours away by sea and/or road (or a local rate phone call) from companies like Nokia (mobile phone maker since the 1980's), Ericson (worlds first automated telephone systems and the worlds first mobile (cell)phone system (used in some Swedish cities since the 1940's)), Norsk Regnecentralen (SImula and a increadible amount of other innovations ), Dansk Regnecentral (largest contributor in the creation of Algol 60), Norsk Data (once producers of the worlds fastest computers), SAAB (air systems), Bofors (missile systems) and a lot of other high tec, highly computer intensive companies, and lots and lots and lots of universities and colleges in Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark, most of them teaching Computer Science (or rather Datalogy) since the 1960's and connected together with a computer network since the early 1980's. Places all using languages close to Linux Torvalds native Swedish dialect (the difference between dialects in Swedish, Danish and Norweigian is at worse less than between Brittish English and American English).

Although not fond of pleasentries and small talk (especially not Finns, go see a Aki Kaurismäki movie, they are spot on), Scandinavians is very cooperative minded and don't hesitate to involve the rest of the world in anything they do (unlike USAians who seem to like to isolate themselves), it is part of the Scandinavian mentality. That is propably a large part of why Linus choosed to develop Linux with developers all over the world using Internet, Open Licenses and the (more international) English language, not geographical isolation.

And

[mahadiga]

I'm a lawyer and employee of a law firm. When representing a case in court all related documents will bear my name.
But if I'm a programmer and employed in a closed source software company, code written by me will NOT bear my name.

RedDoucheNozzle: Do you have a CSC degree?

[Anonymous Coward]

Do you have a degree in computer science or computer information systems? No, of course not: You're yet another dime-a-dozen slashdot wannabe computer expert (not, not minus those degrees slacker. You're no expert by any means and nothing but another slacking waste of sperm wasting everyone's time with your "pseudo-expert" so called advice, you wannabe. ROTFLMAO!).

RedDoucheNozzle: Do you have a BIO degree?

[Anonymous Coward]

Answer the subject line's question. Do you have a degree in computer science or computer information systems? No, of course not: You're yet another dime-a-dozen slashdot wannabe computer expert (not, not minus those degrees slacker. You're no expert by any means, though you certainly play one, courtesy of google university online, lol, and wikipedia college too, rotflmao!)