If you argue that software should be free, then you should also be in favour of copying music, or movies,
Nonsense! It doesn't follow at all. Software is fundamentally different from films, music, books or other works of art. Software embodies algorthims, which is to say mathematical entities. A better analogy would be to say, 'if you argue that software should be Free (libre), then you should also be in favour of allowing car or TV owners the right to open up and examine, modify, and re-sell them. Which, of course, I do, as do you I imagine.
In the software world that would mean no Adobe would be able to make a Photoshop, simply because they would not recover their costs. How would Adobe survive in your universe? You, sir, are an idiot.
(a) no-one can be sure that Adobe would be unable to produce a Free Photoshop; (b) even if it were the case, so what? Those who pick and chose their moral and ethical stances in order to maximise the convenience of their lives have neither. In any case, I do not seek to deny Adobe the right to produce and sell software however they choose, using whatever license they like. I seek to deny them the satisfaction of selling any, by encouraging others to use Free software.
Am I an idiot? Can't exclude the possibility, but so far you haven't demonstrated why that might be... apart from arguing through assertion;p
The freedom to give up freedoms is an important freedom itself.
That's a profound point that needs to be properly addressed.
Firstly, I don't advocate that anyone's freedom to give up freedom - to use proprietary software, or move to North Korea - should be removed, so we agree on that. However, I do think that the users of your Free software have more freedoms than the users of your proprietary software. I think we agree freedom is, in general, a Good Thing. Whilst I agree you are, and should be, free to distribute your software under whatever license you like, surely it is clear that, if all your software were Free, that the sum total of freedom in the world would be greater than it is when some is non-free. Freedom is good, therefore distributing non-free software creates less good than distributing all Free software.
The analogy with the door of your house is a bad match I think, because everyone has (or should have) a right to personal privacy... that confuses the issue... although... hmmm, actually: here in the UK there are many interesting buildings, such as cathedrals, stately homes, architecturally significant old buildings etc that are either in private hands, or which cannot easily be opened to the public at all times. An excellent scheme has come into operation in the last few decades whereby all owners of such buildings (I'm not sure of the acact criteria) are compelled to open them the public for one day a year. Many people spend a lot of time organising and arrangnig schedules for themselves on this day (it's the same day for all the buildings) and tour round normally inaccessible buildings. eg my parents got up to the top of the tower of the magnificent 900 year old Gloucester Cathedral http://www.gloucestercathedral.org.uk/, and into one of the oldest purpose built libraries still standing in Europe. Hmmm, actually this is a poor analogy, too... unless you could compare with abandonware somehow.. ach forget it, it's interesting though, google will find lots of pics & info on it.)
You have confused freedom with what one does with his or her freedom. Freedom being the right to use one's time, property and effort as one wishes.
I don't think I have - I'm not saying proprietary software should be BANNED or that all programmers should be compelled to include source or whatever.
To suggest that proprietary software is evil uncovers the fanatical and unreasoned basis of your position
This word 'evil' seems to annoy a lot of people, substitute 'a bad thing' if you prefer. I don't see how suggesting proprietary sw is a Bad Thing automatically means that my position is fanatical and unreasoned... please explain? I would have thought to chain of reasoning was completely obvious, I accept people can honestly disagree with it, but if you can't see it you're ill-informed, if you can't follow it you're cognitively challenged. People have posted to this thread who understand the reasoning but don't accept it, and I respect their honest opinion whilst I don't agree with it.
You can read many docs on FSF.org and other texts by RMS explaining the reasoning, or see my (poorly worded and very incomplete) precis elsewhere in this thread.
And it's especially tragic when people of Stallman's statue adopt fanaticism instead of reasoned persuasion, especially given the many merits of open source software.
Stallman explicitly says he is not advocating open source software, but Free software. Microsoft Windows is arguably Open Source - if you pay them enough money they'll show you the source - but you have no more freedom than any other Windows user. A 'fanatic' surely means someone who holds to a particular opnion very strongly, that does not preclude the use of reason to arrive AT that opinion.
At this point the Slashdot interface is becoming a real PITA to
indicate the levels of post / counter-post:/ I've put BLOCKQUOTE
around yuor comments and marked my bits that you've quoted with >.
> It's a genuine question; of course, I believe I'm right for myself,
> just as you believe you are right... that doesn't really affect the
> nature of my reasoning though, does it! Obviously plenty of others -
> the vast majority, in fact - honestly & sincerely disagrees with me, &
> I'm just wondering what their thought processes on the issue are.
You stated in no uncertain terms that what I do on a daily basis is
unethical and that I ought to feel ashamed of myself. Your questions
and statements are phrased as a matter of fact, not a matter of
opinion.
Well, sorry if that's the case, I specifically tried to separate fact
dfrom opinions. I do think producing / supporting nonFree
software is unethical, not sure about 'no uncertain terms' though, one
reason I'm posting all this stuff is (believe it or not) a genuine
attempt to find out where intelligent, sincere people, whop obviously
*DON'T* think they're doing anything wrong, diverge from me in my
reasoning. I certainly did NOT say you should feel ashamed of
yourself. I'm not saying at ALL what you or anyone else 'should' or
'should not' do. I've made my personal decisions, most people have
made different ones. If the question is "Am I mad, or is it the rest
of the world?" I believe the answer is usally more likely to be the
former... in this case it's not 1 vs. 6 billion, though.
> Hmmmm, OK here's the first difference between us then. Firstly, I
> think you're labouring under the classic misapprehension that when I
> say 'Free software' I mean "free as in beer" not "free as in
> speech". There are plenty of ways to get paid for writing Free
> (speech) software; I have myself been paid to do so, and am now paid
> to work with Free software (administration, security consultancy to be
> specific.) I'm certainly *NOT* advocating that no-one should, or
> should be able to, charge money for their software. Or indeed for
> anyone else's software... I have actually (and entirely legally)
> charged money for Free software written by others, and of course
> hundreds of Linux distributions run businesses doing so.
Free software means (among other things) that it includes the source
code. In an ideal world, where people weren't assholes and did the
right thing, this wouldn't be a problem. But in the real world,
including the source code means that I sell one (and only one)
copy. In other words, I wouldn't get compensated for a product that I
create and distribute at a reasonable price.
Damnation, now I have to look up RedHat's actual sales figures... OK
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1553159,00.as p
says Redhat sold 160,000 copies in 2003-04. Probably many of these sales were
associated with support or consultancy contracts BUT certainly not all
- there's nothing compelling anyone to buy the software in order to
get the support or consulting. 160,000 is obviously greater than 1.
Basically you seem to be arguing that no-one could ever sell more
than a single copy of Free software, and I'm saying (a) that is
demonstrably not so, and (b) whilst it's presumably true that (all
things equal) the same software will sell fewer copies if it is
free than non-free - which I would accept - that this does not
matter unless your aim as a developer is to get all your income
from shrinkwrap / OEM sales. here are many more ways of making money
from writing software than selling it. If this were not so, all the
commercial businesses making money with Free software would be out of
business.
I think we're in violent agreement on this point at least...
I think they say "I write the code so I get to say how I f***ing want to
distribute it". The programmer has every right to distribute thier
code however they feel since they are the one who well WROTE IT.
...Of course, I don't dispute that, I'm just wondering what
they think about the Free software people's ideas about Free
vs. non-free software. Of course I do not advocate FORCING anyone to
Free (or open-source) their software. I'm certainly not disputing anyone's right to disagree with me! - just wondering where our respective chains of reasoning part company. It's just possible that I'm wrong! & so I'd like to examine other people's reasoning more closely. Others on this thread have I think helped me at least zero in on the precise point(s) where opinions diverge. I certainly don't dispute anyone else's sincerity or that they're entitled to disagree with me!
having tinkered with 'strace ls' I see what you mean! tail will be my friend... of course sod's law has now kickde in and my curent invocation of Firefox hasn't crashed for days... when it does I'll strace the next startup.
Why is there nothing wrong with proprietary software? Users of non-Free software have less freedom. Freedom is good. Less good is bad. His reasoning on software does not apply to physical goods.
OK I'll ignore the flamebait last para. What makes it wrong _in_my_opinion_ to work for MS is that it reduces the total amount of freedom in the world. Saying 'they have to feed their families' is irrelevant; you could apply it to **WHOOOPWHOOP** Godwin alert!.. er, you could apply it to, I dunno, anyone who makes money in an unethical manner. Using the proceeds of unethical behaviour to 'do good' does not make it alright.
I've answered this elsewhere in the thread. Suppose you are an axe murderer. Is your freedom to murder people part of the sum total of 'good' freedoms in the world? Obviously not. The difference between axe murdering and coding Windows (or other non-free software) is only a matter of degree - albeit a very LARGE degree.
That said, I don't think anyone should be FORCED to make their software Free. I just wondered how Windows devs (and others) think about the ethical issues.
What if a commercial binary-only shop produces better software than a free-software shop? Why is this morally inferior to the equvalent free software product? Why should other people have the "freedom" of automatic rights to something I myself have developed?
It's morally inferior because the user of that software does not have freedoms that, I think, they should be entitled to. The technical quality of the software does not come into it: see my sig. No-one has any automatic right to anything you develop, but if you distribute it to others I think you would be doing harm to the world - reducing the sum total of freedom - by restricting it's use. To do so is, of course, your right as the author / owner of the copyright.
on your webpage you say you will accept the money for a few types of jobs, including:
a Linux, BSD, Windows NT4 or 2000 system administrator;
maybe you should update your page or stop being a fucking liar.
Heh, good point, thanks for pointing that out!... the answer is (a) - needs updating - not (b) fucking liar, BTW. I've been meaning to pull that shite for ages now... I even pulled a proper local mirror for the archives a couple of months ago but it seems never got round to nuking the old stuff. It will be gone shortly.
For the record the last job I had involving dev or admin work on Windows machines ended in January 2000. Not certain exactly when the last update to that site was made, but probably in 2001 when I was desperately hunting for any job to keep the wolf from the door.
Should the time come when it's a choice between starvation and non-Free software, I'd go for the MCSE... but I very much doubt it will happen again. I've got much more *nix experience under my belt now. I'm a pentester / security geek now so my main exposure to windows is cracking it:)
> Licenses which are FSF compatible require that others can take
> your work - without compensating you - and sell it.
>
> In other words, you have ONE opportunity to sell your work, in a
> market where prices have been set based on a
> goods-sold-in-high-volume system. After you sell it once, anyone can
> also sell it, at no cost to them. Thus, you have no chance to redeem
> your cost.
>
I don't want to sound like I'm splitting hairs - but that isn't
correct. GPL-type licenses allow someone to whom I have sold my
software to redistribute it. You can argeu (in fact you DO argue) that
this amounts to the same thing but it doesn't. It probably DOES amount
to saying that it is usually possible to OBTAIN Free software for
gratis (as in beer), but that does not mean that no-one will buy it
from you. If that were the case, how would Red Hat, Mandrake, the Free
and Open BSD projects,... and all the other commercial Free software
companies make a living? Part of the answer is that much of their
income comes from consulting, support and and customisation
businesses, but at least SOME of it comes from sales of shrinkwrapped
versions of the software, perhaps with printed manuals or a free T
shirt thrown in. Now, no-one's going to get as rich as Bill Gates with
that sort of business model, but that i (I believe) partly because the
Gates model - ignoring all the well-known questionable MS business
practices for the moment - is fundamentally extorting money from the
marketplace that it has no right to. That income is the excess income
it receives that it would not get if they were selling Free
software. Just because they CAN do it (hand-pwaving aside anti-trust
issues, etc etc) does not mean that they SHOULD. I do not believe that
everything permissable by law is morally correct. (I emphasise again
that I do NOT believe in passing laws banning non-Free software or
such.)
> I find it interesting that you make a lot of money as a parasite on
> the backs of the people doing the REAL work - writing the kernel,
> writing the compilers etc - and that you advocate this as a GOOD
> THING.
>
Whilst it is true that I would not be able make living from free
software if no-one had written & released it:) surely that's a
circular argument? If the authors did not want others using their work
they would have released it under a different license. An equivalent
argument would be that you are a parasite if you drive to work along a
road paid for by other people's taxes (one built before you started
paying taxes.)
>>Talented people don't do things for free.
>>
>>(a) That's patently untrue - RMS himself is the first of a very >very very long list of people jsut in the area of Free software, >>and who paid (for example) Lord Byron to write poetry? >>
>RMS is a multimillionaire. Before that he had tenure. He is a >special case.
I have no knowledge of RMS' financial status, but he certainly doesn't have tenure - he *resigned* from MIT to work found the FSF/GNU. And what about Linus, Larry Wall, Guido van Rossum, Monty Widenius, Miguel de Icaza - of course for all these famous names I can think of there are tens of thousands if not more 'ordinary joes'. I am one myself.
As for Lord Byron, the first word in his name should give you a clue - "Lord". He was rich. He had land, title, and wealth. He didn't need to be paid to write poetry.
You are correct, but that doesn't affect my falsification of your statement that talented people don't work for free.
Of course I accept that very few people these days have an independent income. However (a) no-one is suggesting that software authors shouldn't get paid - how do you think the tens or hundreds of thousands of free software projects are supported? OPf course some are hobbies or spare time but many many developers are paid to work on (develop) Free software. Secondly, only a tiny minority of programmers work on shrink-wrap proprietary software and make a living at it. Apart from developers at the large well-known commercial companies - a few thousands or tens of thousands at most - the vast majority of programmers work in-house or as consultants where the possible Free-ness of their products would either make no difference to their income, or would actually increase it. (If your, say, dentists' appointment system is Free, it will be used by m,any more people than the few dozen you can perhaps convince to pay you for it.)
Ach, it's 6pm here and my dialup flatrate period's about to end - I'll reply to the rest of the followup comments on this thread tomorrow.)
You have yet to prove to me that working on proprietary software is a bad thing. So it works because... there's no reason from my perspective to think that it's bad.
I personally think it's wrong because (in a very small way) writing / supporting etc non-Free software reduces the amount of freedom in the world. Freedom is good, lack of freedom is bad.. quod est demonstradum;)
Payment doesn't come into it, I don't see any problem with makign money out of Free software, neither does anyone else. Indeed that's one of the rights the GPL (amongst other licenses) guarantees you. Suppose I came across some non-Free software you wrote. I then become an expert in it's use, help support it, whatever. You then decide (as is your right) to remove it from the market. I have then lost my income, purely at your whim! Of course in this scenario you're completely entitled to do this, however with Free software it can't happen - if you (eg) fell under a bus, or moved to Tibet to become a monk, I could (if I had the skills) simply pick up distribution and maintenance of the code myself (or pay another to do so.)
>I'm not selling out or rationalizing, I simply don't share your ideals.
Fair enough... and you've managed to do it without insulting anyone, too, which is nice;)
This seems to be the real point of difference and the thing I need to think about a bit more. What is it, exactly, about freedom to copy (actually, to distribute, modify and use - I think there's another one - RMS / FSF call it 'the four freedoms') that makes it fundamental. Thanks...
This is a nonsensical argument. My proprietary software doesn't harm its users, unlike abusive governments and companies.
Ah right, I reckon that's the crux of it then. I think lack of freedom regarding your software *IS* important, for the same reasons RMS outlined in his 'Freedom to Read' short story (on gnu.org or fsf.org and linked to from all over the place, if you haven't read it.) It's not just a matter of convenience, it's a fundamental right in RMS' (and my) opinion. Yuo might think it's a less important freedom than those removed by authoritarian dictator type governments. Well yes, given the choice between being tortured to death and using Windows, obviously I'd chose Windows, but that does not mean that it is not a significant freedom. Substitute, say, never being allowed to read books except those provided by the state for the 'windows' item in the list above. Obviously virtually anything is preferrable to being tortured to death. The point is once you start trying to weigh up the relative merits of one freedom against another, you're heading for 'angels dancing on pinheads' territory. They're *all* important. You (it seems to me?) just believe that freedom to use/modify/distribute/etc software (the four freedoms RMS takls about) are just not as important as not being tortured. That is not a reason to discard them in exchange for money or in order to go along with what everyone else does. Compare and contrast many things considered unimportant a few hundred years ago, eg votes for women, slavery, segregation, equal pay,.. it's the thin end of the wedge.
Compile from source isn't terribly feasible via dialup... I'll try strace (always good to play with a new tool!),.. presumably this will produce a ginormous file of which only the last few tens? hundreds? thousands?) of function calls will be relevant...?
Your arguement is based on the premise that you are right and that anyone who disagrees with you is wrong.
It's a genuine question; of course, I believe I'm right for myself, just as you believe you are right... that doesn't really affect the nature of my reasoning though, does it! Obviously plenty of others - the vast majority, in fact - honestly & sincerely disagrees with me, & I'm just wondering what their thought processes on the issue are.
1) Software is a "thing", not a freedom;
Agreed!
it is something I create with a significant investment of thought and time on my part
I'm happy to take your word for it
and I deserve to be compensated for it; it is no different than sitting down and carving a statue out of wood, or writing a book
Hmmmm, OK here's the first difference between us then. Firstly, I think you're labouring under the classic misapprehension that when I say 'Free software' I mean "free as in beer" not "free as in speech". There are plenty of ways to get paid for writing Free (speech) software; I have myself been paid to do so, and am now paid to work with Free software (administration, security consultancy to be specific.) I'm certainly *NOT* advocating that no-one should, or should be able to, charge money for their software. Or indeed for anyone else's software... I have actually (and entirely legally) charged money for Fre software written by others, and of course hundreds of Linux distributions run businesses doing so.
Secondly, I do NOT accept that anyone capable of writing software (or a book, a making a sculpture,..) 'deserves' to get paid for it - meaning an intrinsic 'right' to get paid for it. That's what market economics are for.
3) I think Stallman is an idiot and an asshole; I think if people want to create something and give it away, it is their right to do so; trying to tell me that I shouldn't be compensated for something I produce is just assinine.
(a) See above re: charging money for Free software; (b) I'm certainly NOT saying that anyone shouldn't be compensated for something they produce. I'm just wondering how they reconcile the issues I mentioned about Freedom. Judging by your response, it's done by failing to either do basic few minutes of research or to think clearly about the issues, because the winner of a McArthur Genius award & MIT graduate is an 'idiot and an asshole' for following the dictates of his conscience.
(a) That's patently untrue - RMS himself is the first of a very very very long list of people jsut in the area of Free software, and who paid (for example) Lord Byron to write poetry?
(b) There are plenty of ways to make a living (as I do) from Free software
(c) you haven't addressed my question.
There is nothing ethically wrong with selling software - it is no more unethical than selling groceries.
Of course there isn't, and neither I nor anyone else (that I know of) is saying that there IS.
Nobility has nothing (in particular) to do with it. I certainly haven't made any great sacrifices resulting from my professional or personal use of Free software. God, it means I use GNU/Linux instead of Wnidows XP, Perl instead of VB, Mozilla instead of Internet Explorer... hardly a noble sacrifice! As I said I'm also making a tidy living, though TBH I'd like to think I'd be prepared to settle for a lower standard of living rather than support non-Free software. That's not utopian, it's just doing what (I) consider to be the right thing. I recognise not many other people take this PoV though. I think they're making a mistake, but that's their/yuor choice.
Yes, the world is bigger than my computer screen, and I make moral and ethical choices in that part of my life, too. That doesn't mean I shouldn't make them WITHIN my computer use (which of course IS a very large part of my life..like the majority here on Slashdot.) I don't mug old ladies or rape women or drink drive. Not that I'm perfect in all things, of course, I just aspire towards doing what I think is the right thing. What my question was getting at, was, -- I assume most other people feel the same way, so they (you) must therefore NOT think that eg working for Microsoft is the Wrong Thing To Do. I just wonder how that works... that's all.
I personally think that adding proprietary software to the world increases, not decreases, freedom. The existence of my software in the world gives people more choice. The fact that my software is non-free doesn't change that fact, it just changes the nature of the choice.
By that logic it's OK to support totalitarian, repressive and/or undemocratic states / regiemes, because you're increasing he choice of political systems under which people can choose to live. OK, you can say people have no choice about the country they live in,.. substitute local state police organisations for states, or really ugly authoritarian private enterprises - as a hypothetical example - if you don't want to work 18 hour days for $10 per day with no rights regarding health & safety, you don't have to, so allowing / co-operating with companies that pursue such policies isn't hurting freedom.
I expect everyone has their own favourite quote from the article... here's mine:
One of the things I do when I run a project is I never use the word "I." Even if you went back through every piece of mail I wrote for Windows Server 2003, and Windows XP SP2, you'll never see the word "I" in any of those emails, unless there was a specific reason for it. I'm just a believer in that if you want to get things done, the best way to do it is as a team. As part of XP SP2, we just assembled a virtual team.
*snort*choke*
Reminds me of an exchange between a couple of sales droids at a previous emlpoyer (this is in the UK where we still sometimes can say what we think... in a non-corporate co, anywasy...)
Sales Director, to sulking sals droid: Calm down, Bearman,.. remember, there's no 'I' in 'team'! Sales droid: Nah mate, but there's a 'u' in 'cunt'...
Oh, how we laughed, especially as he was sales-droid of the year & virtually unsackable at that point.
...Microsoft developers,that I'd like to know the answer to, is this. (I'm doing my best to frame this in non-troll-like terms.) Disclaimer: I've drunk the FSF koolaid - my freedom is more important to me than pretty flashing lights, cute interfaces, or another $10,000 salary. (As a matter of fact I'm doing much better for myself, financially as well as life-style-wise, since I stopped accepting money to work with proprietary software... but that's by-the-by.)
Richard Stallman asserts that closed, proprietary - non-Free - software is an ethical wrong. That is to say, it reduces the amount of freedom in the world. By developing, supporting, selling, evangelising - etc, etc - proprietary, non-Free software, one actively HURTS one's fellow humans. I mean this in the RMS sense - I'm not talking about Windows being less secure or less stable than GNU/Linux, but being less free.
How do Microsoft (et al) developers, who are obviously intelligent, hard-working and - at the technical level, at least - well-intentioned people, reconcile this with their consciences? Do they...
reject the notion that software freedom is a real freedom?
reject the idea that that freedom is important?
Just not think about this issue?
Buy one of the classic get-outs for those co-operating with evil, such as "If I don't do it, someone else will", or "I need to feed my family / pay for my SUV / eat", or... what else?
Hope this doesn't sound like a troll. I just really want to understand why people go along with this system. I don't get it, but obviously most of the rest of the world don't care or have some other cognitive work-around. Please enlighten me someone!
*choke* I feel your pain, brother. A kid at my school had _his_very_own_TV_set_. No worries about 'inappropriate content' back in the 70s - only there channels available, and everything stopped by midnight (or thereabouts... I never found out myself.)
Also... was it just my school or did other schools have a 'bring toys in on last day of term' instant trauma-thon? Mebbe it was cos this was a small independent school (ie,fee-paying parents) - most of the kids' parents were from what would later be known as 'yuppie' parents, whilst mine were struggling to make ends meet to scrape the cash together. When I say struggling, I mean: home-baked bread (before the era of bread machines...) and our suburban back garden being largely turned over to fruit & vegetables. Chocolate was a once-a-year treat. God, we must have been so healthy!!;)
I spoke too soon suggesting deletnig ~/.mozilla had fixed it - it's still falling over at the same rate. Still using Konq with Ffopx ni the bg just to try keeping the Talkback data going to moz.org.
How can I get a stack trace? Does Tb data include that?
Except that the UK met office (and other forecasting orgs for all I know) can now provide 5 day forecasts with reasonable accuracy. (I'm not a meterologist but apparently the UK's position off western Europe makes that rather hard.)
Oh and models _do_ actually sucessfully reproduce the past climate. Still it's nice to hear from someone who actually KNOWS something about the subject.
And weather isn't the same as climate. Ask a meterologist... or climatologist.
Slashdot Mirror
(a) no-one can be sure that Adobe would be unable to produce a Free Photoshop; (b) even if it were the case, so what? Those who pick and chose their moral and ethical stances in order to maximise the convenience of their lives have neither. In any case, I do not seek to deny Adobe the right to produce and sell software however they choose, using whatever license they like. I seek to deny them the satisfaction of selling any, by encouraging others to use Free software.
Am I an idiot? Can't exclude the possibility, but so far you haven't demonstrated why that might be... apart from arguing through assertion ;p
Well, sorry if that's the case, I specifically tried to separate fact dfrom opinions. I do think producing / supporting nonFree software is unethical, not sure about 'no uncertain terms' though, one reason I'm posting all this stuff is (believe it or not) a genuine attempt to find out where intelligent, sincere people, whop obviously *DON'T* think they're doing anything wrong, diverge from me in my reasoning. I certainly did NOT say you should feel ashamed of yourself. I'm not saying at ALL what you or anyone else 'should' or 'should not' do. I've made my personal decisions, most people have made different ones. If the question is "Am I mad, or is it the rest of the world?" I believe the answer is usally more likely to be the former... in this case it's not 1 vs. 6 billion, though.
Damnation, now I have to look up RedHat's actual sales figures... OK http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1553159,00.as p says Redhat sold 160,000 copies in 2003-04. Probably many of these sales were associated with support or consultancy contracts BUT certainly not all - there's nothing compelling anyone to buy the software in order to get the support or consulting. 160,000 is obviously greater than 1.
Basically you seem to be arguing that no-one could ever sell more than a single copy of Free software, and I'm saying (a) that is demonstrably not so, and (b) whilst it's presumably true that (all things equal) the same software will sell fewer copies if it is free than non-free - which I would accept - that this does not matter unless your aim as a developer is to get all your income from shrinkwrap / OEM sales. here are many more ways of making money from writing software than selling it. If this were not so, all the commercial businesses making money with Free software would be out of business.
> thanks again
Why is there nothing wrong with proprietary software? Users of non-Free software have less freedom. Freedom is good. Less good is bad. His reasoning on software does not apply to physical goods.
OK I'll ignore the flamebait last para. What makes it wrong _in_my_opinion_ to work for MS is that it reduces the total amount of freedom in the world. Saying 'they have to feed their families' is irrelevant; you could apply it to **WHOOOPWHOOP** Godwin alert! .. er, you could apply it to, I dunno, anyone who makes money in an unethical manner. Using the proceeds of unethical behaviour to 'do good' does not make it alright.
That said, I don't think anyone should be FORCED to make their software Free. I just wondered how Windows devs (and others) think about the ethical issues.
It's morally inferior because the user of that software does not have freedoms that, I think, they should be entitled to. The technical quality of the software does not come into it: see my sig. No-one has any automatic right to anything you develop, but if you distribute it to others I think you would be doing harm to the world - reducing the sum total of freedom - by restricting it's use. To do so is, of course, your right as the author / owner of the copyright.
Thanks for the civil comment!
For the record the last job I had involving dev or admin work on Windows machines ended in January 2000. Not certain exactly when the last update to that site was made, but probably in 2001 when I was desperately hunting for any job to keep the wolf from the door. Should the time come when it's a choice between starvation and non-Free software, I'd go for the MCSE... but I very much doubt it will happen again. I've got much more *nix experience under my belt now. I'm a pentester / security geek now so my main exposure to windows is cracking it :)
> Licenses which are FSF compatible require that others can take
> your work - without compensating you - and sell it. >
> In other words, you have ONE opportunity to sell your work, in a
> market where prices have been set based on a
> goods-sold-in-high-volume system. After you sell it once, anyone can
> also sell it, at no cost to them. Thus, you have no chance to redeem
> your cost.
>
I don't want to sound like I'm splitting hairs - but that isn't correct. GPL-type licenses allow someone to whom I have sold my software to redistribute it. You can argeu (in fact you DO argue) that this amounts to the same thing but it doesn't. It probably DOES amount to saying that it is usually possible to OBTAIN Free software for gratis (as in beer), but that does not mean that no-one will buy it from you. If that were the case, how would Red Hat, Mandrake, the Free and Open BSD projects,... and all the other commercial Free software companies make a living? Part of the answer is that much of their income comes from consulting, support and and customisation businesses, but at least SOME of it comes from sales of shrinkwrapped versions of the software, perhaps with printed manuals or a free T shirt thrown in. Now, no-one's going to get as rich as Bill Gates with that sort of business model, but that i (I believe) partly because the Gates model - ignoring all the well-known questionable MS business practices for the moment - is fundamentally extorting money from the marketplace that it has no right to. That income is the excess income it receives that it would not get if they were selling Free software. Just because they CAN do it (hand-pwaving aside anti-trust issues, etc etc) does not mean that they SHOULD. I do not believe that everything permissable by law is morally correct. (I emphasise again that I do NOT believe in passing laws banning non-Free software or such.)
> I find it interesting that you make a lot of money as a parasite on
> the backs of the people doing the REAL work - writing the kernel,
> writing the compilers etc - and that you advocate this as a GOOD
> THING.
>
Whilst it is true that I would not be able make living from free software if no-one had written & released it :) surely that's a
circular argument? If the authors did not want others using their work
they would have released it under a different license. An equivalent
argument would be that you are a parasite if you drive to work along a
road paid for by other people's taxes (one built before you started
paying taxes.)
Of course I accept that very few people these days have an independent income. However (a) no-one is suggesting that software authors shouldn't get paid - how do you think the tens or hundreds of thousands of free software projects are supported? OPf course some are hobbies or spare time but many many developers are paid to work on (develop) Free software. Secondly, only a tiny minority of programmers work on shrink-wrap proprietary software and make a living at it. Apart from developers at the large well-known commercial companies - a few thousands or tens of thousands at most - the vast majority of programmers work in-house or as consultants where the possible Free-ness of their products would either make no difference to their income, or would actually increase it. (If your, say, dentists' appointment system is Free, it will be used by m,any more people than the few dozen you can perhaps convince to pay you for it.)
Ach, it's 6pm here and my dialup flatrate period's about to end - I'll reply to the rest of the followup comments on this thread tomorrow.)
Thanks for not flaming BTW :)
Payment doesn't come into it, I don't see any problem with makign money out of Free software, neither does anyone else. Indeed that's one of the rights the GPL (amongst other licenses) guarantees you. Suppose I came across some non-Free software you wrote. I then become an expert in it's use, help support it, whatever. You then decide (as is your right) to remove it from the market. I have then lost my income, purely at your whim! Of course in this scenario you're completely entitled to do this, however with Free software it can't happen - if you (eg) fell under a bus, or moved to Tibet to become a monk, I could (if I had the skills) simply pick up distribution and maintenance of the code myself (or pay another to do so.)
Fair enough... and you've managed to do it without insulting anyone, too, which is nice ;)
This seems to be the real point of difference and the thing I need to think about a bit more. What is it, exactly, about freedom to copy (actually, to distribute, modify and use - I think there's another one - RMS / FSF call it 'the four freedoms') that makes it fundamental. Thanks...
Thanks for the suggestions
It's a genuine question; of course, I believe I'm right for myself, just as you believe you are right... that doesn't really affect the nature of my reasoning though, does it! Obviously plenty of others - the vast majority, in fact - honestly & sincerely disagrees with me, & I'm just wondering what their thought processes on the issue are.
Agreed! I'm happy to take your word for it Hmmmm, OK here's the first difference between us then. Firstly, I think you're labouring under the classic misapprehension that when I say 'Free software' I mean "free as in beer" not "free as in speech". There are plenty of ways to get paid for writing Free (speech) software; I have myself been paid to do so, and am now paid to work with Free software (administration, security consultancy to be specific.) I'm certainly *NOT* advocating that no-one should, or should be able to, charge money for their software. Or indeed for anyone else's software... I have actually (and entirely legally) charged money for Fre software written by others, and of course hundreds of Linux distributions run businesses doing so.Secondly, I do NOT accept that anyone capable of writing software (or a book, a making a sculpture,..) 'deserves' to get paid for it - meaning an intrinsic 'right' to get paid for it. That's what market economics are for.
(a) See above re: charging money for Free software; (b) I'm certainly NOT saying that anyone shouldn't be compensated for something they produce. I'm just wondering how they reconcile the issues I mentioned about Freedom. Judging by your response, it's done by failing to either do basic few minutes of research or to think clearly about the issues, because the winner of a McArthur Genius award & MIT graduate is an 'idiot and an asshole' for following the dictates of his conscience. I don't know what you're saying 'nope' to, here.>
(a) That's patently untrue - RMS himself is the first of a very very very long list of people jsut in the area of Free software, and who paid (for example) Lord Byron to write poetry?
(b) There are plenty of ways to make a living (as I do) from Free software
(c) you haven't addressed my question.
Nobility has nothing (in particular) to do with it. I certainly haven't made any great sacrifices resulting from my professional or personal use of Free software. God, it means I use GNU/Linux instead of Wnidows XP, Perl instead of VB, Mozilla instead of Internet Explorer... hardly a noble sacrifice! As I said I'm also making a tidy living, though TBH I'd like to think I'd be prepared to settle for a lower standard of living rather than support non-Free software. That's not utopian, it's just doing what (I) consider to be the right thing. I recognise not many other people take this PoV though. I think they're making a mistake, but that's their/yuor choice.
Yes, the world is bigger than my computer screen, and I make moral and ethical choices in that part of my life, too. That doesn't mean I shouldn't make them WITHIN my computer use (which of course IS a very large part of my life..like the majority here on Slashdot.) I don't mug old ladies or rape women or drink drive. Not that I'm perfect in all things, of course, I just aspire towards doing what I think is the right thing. What my question was getting at, was, -- I assume most other people feel the same way, so they (you) must therefore NOT think that eg working for Microsoft is the Wrong Thing To Do. I just wonder how that works... that's all.
By that logic it's OK to support totalitarian, repressive and/or undemocratic states / regiemes, because you're increasing he choice of political systems under which people can choose to live. OK, you can say people have no choice about the country they live in,.. substitute local state police organisations for states, or really ugly authoritarian private enterprises - as a hypothetical example - if you don't want to work 18 hour days for $10 per day with no rights regarding health & safety, you don't have to, so allowing / co-operating with companies that pursue such policies isn't hurting freedom.
*snort*choke*
Reminds me of an exchange between a couple of sales droids at a previous emlpoyer (this is in the UK where we still sometimes can say what we think... in a non-corporate co, anywasy...)
Sales Director, to sulking sals droid: Calm down, Bearman,.. remember, there's no 'I' in 'team'!
Sales droid: Nah mate, but there's a 'u' in 'cunt'...
Oh, how we laughed, especially as he was sales-droid of the year & virtually unsackable at that point.
Richard Stallman asserts that closed, proprietary - non-Free - software is an ethical wrong. That is to say, it reduces the amount of freedom in the world. By developing, supporting, selling, evangelising - etc, etc - proprietary, non-Free software, one actively HURTS one's fellow humans. I mean this in the RMS sense - I'm not talking about Windows being less secure or less stable than GNU/Linux, but being less free.
How do Microsoft (et al) developers, who are obviously intelligent, hard-working and - at the technical level, at least - well-intentioned people, reconcile this with their consciences? Do they...
Hope this doesn't sound like a troll. I just really want to understand why people go along with this system. I don't get it, but obviously most of the rest of the world don't care or have some other cognitive work-around. Please enlighten me someone!
Also... was it just my school or did other schools have a 'bring toys in on last day of term' instant trauma-thon? Mebbe it was cos this was a small independent school (ie,fee-paying parents) - most of the kids' parents were from what would later be known as 'yuppie' parents, whilst mine were struggling to make ends meet to scrape the cash together. When I say struggling, I mean: home-baked bread (before the era of bread machines...) and our suburban back garden being largely turned over to fruit & vegetables. Chocolate was a once-a-year treat. God, we must have been so healthy!! ;)
How can I get a stack trace? Does Tb data include that?
Oh and models _do_ actually sucessfully reproduce the past climate. Still it's nice to hear from someone who actually KNOWS something about the subject.
And weather isn't the same as climate. Ask a meterologist... or climatologist.