I could be wrong, but I believe the Ansible is a standard sci-fi concept for ftl communications, and did not originate from Orson Card. I don't remember who first came up with it (maybe Ursula LeGuin?), but it's been used many times since.
Forcing companies to license their patents is a great idea, but it has one big flaw - how do you know what a fair price for the license is? If you dictate it governmentally, it could horribly off-mark, resulting either in much higher consumer costs, or a bankrupt company.
I've been considering the idea of instituting a patent tax. Registering a patent under this idea doesn't prevent anyone from using that technology. However, every product sold that falls under a patent will have an additional "patent tax", the proceeds of which go directly to the patent holder.
This would allow the market forces to determine the value of the product, as well as the value of the patent.
Also, the tax percentage could vary for different patents. It could be determined, within reason, by the patent holder. Consider: If Amazon patented 1-click under this system, no one would use it, because using the 1-click would mean their book would cost more. Thus we instantly see that the 1-click ordering is really of little value to the consumer (who votes most honestly and realistically with his pocketbook), and Amazon would probably have chosen not to patent such a thing under a patent tax system.
Actually, there are already places where you can store your pet's DNA samples so that at some point in the future when cloning is cheaper and legal, you will be able to create a new clone of your pet after he/she has died.
How much is taken through taxes is not really relevant. If you took everything I made, and in return the world was a Utopia to live in, I doubt I'd complain. However, the real issue is, our centralized governments are horribly inefficient and corrupt. Ideally, the money would pass straight through the system and on to its intended target. If the system were perfectly efficient, 50% probably wouldn't seem bad, compared to what you received in return. In practice, it gets used up in political battles, pork, national paranoia, and outright stealing. So, why should anyone support higher taxes, and thus greater inefficiency?
So, I'm agreeing and disagreeing (of course - what else?!). I think, however, that there is the possibility, in this day and age, to run things fairly, lock out corruption and stealing, and get very close to an ideal level of efficiency. However, it involves a drastic separation between policy makers and control of the money, and heavy reliance on computers, which people are generally not comfortable with.
Believing that an "American" corporation's interests are the same as your interests, or the interests of American taxpayers is even more naive and delusional than believing that the American government's interests are the same as the interests of the American taxpayers.
Sorry, you're right - you didn't say they were environmentalist. What I was reacting to was that you compare environmentalism to centralized totalitarianism, and argue that thus, environmentalism will create worse problems than it solves. I don't think that's a reasonable argument all by itself.
Would you argue that our environment in the US would be better if we hadn't initiated various environmental protections? Do you argue that, on the whole, we'd be better off without them?
Actually, your argument bears a striking resemblance to a linear trend argument as well. Something like - Bad predictions have never fully come true, therefore they never will. However, when you're looking at the potentials of technologies, it's hard to argue that there isn't some danger. Nuclear weapons pose a danger. Self replicating nano-robots pose a danger too. We're all familiar with the experiments about bacteria in an environment of plentiful food and no predators, right? It grows exponentially. Think about nano-robots, that consume some basic ingredient of the earth, and have no predator. That seems pretty worrisome. You can say it's unlikely all you want, but right now, we don't know one way or the other. It may turn out that regulations need to be passed requiring that all such nano-machines be programmed with a preset reproductive limit. Who knows? The point is, the potential is there to destroy the earth. A warning is deserved.
And your just fooling yourself if you think nano-technology will never get that far.
The implication of your post is that the Soviet Union and China were run with severe environmentalist agendas. That's bizarre. Those countries weren't even remotely environmentalist. The US has one of the strictest sets of environmental regulations, yet our economy is certainly stronger than most of those without such regulation.
I wasn't advocating doing nothing, I was pointing out a serious problem. What to do about it is open to question.
But, if you're interested in my $.02:
1) donate money to groups like EFF and FSF. 2) attract media attention. Probably needs both a disruptive and a reasoning element. Peaceful disruptive actions to attract the cameras, a reasoning spokesperson to explain it all. 3) Oh, and you've gotta have a definite agenda - can't be a hodge-podge of ideas. 4) A plan for the future - I see education as the only way of saving the future. If people don't learn how to reason for themselves, we'll become more and more enslaved to whatever image the media chooses to dominate our minds with. So, in my view, we need private education (100% free vouchers, for example) and as much money as ya'll can bear to spend on it. I would prefer education be supported for all ages, not just teenagers.
I feel the need to point out something that really terrifies me.
What can we, as a group, as a rising political force...
I don't think we are a rising political force. Not in comparison to the elderly. Think about it - the demographics of this country are such that the number of people age X is growing faster than the number of people age Y, where X > Y.
In addition, older people vote more, so an rise in the number of 50 year-olds has greater voting power than an equivalent rise in the number of 30-year-olds.
We (younger, working people) are losing power, daily, as people live longer and longer, and the birthrate goes down. Power is more and more in the hands of those who no longer work, but instead are dependent for their financial well-being on the performance of the stock market, and thus, on the health of public corporations.
So, there's no way you're going to convince them that your freedom is more important than their financial security, and I doubt there's any way this balance of power is going to tip back the other way. It's going to get worse and worse, actually.
Yeah, companies like Dell is the most logical explanation for why AMD is doing this so soon. Dell will have to explain why they can't supply a 1GHZ machine while Gateway can. There may be a very good explanation (the AMD 1GHZ processors are crippled compared to what will be out later this year), but how many consumers will understand that?
This puts pressure on Dell and others who haven't gone for supporting AMD products.
I can easily imagine the value of ever-increasing processor speeds. If 500MHZ was enough, why would people ever buy computers with 2, 4, or 8 processors? The big huge database server is never going to be too fast. Any web server doing a lot of dynamic content is never going to be too fast.
Even at home, I've written a program to do some simple stock market analysis. Since I get info on more than 12,000 stocks, and I have data going back 10 years, it takes hours to compute. It used to take 12 hours for it to work on a 486 I used way back when. Now, I have an AMD Athlon 600, and it takes 4 hours, and I've added a whole lot more computation in to the program since because I can.
But, I do agree about one aspect - games. I used to play Doom. I played Quake 1 a little, too. But not anymore. Why? Because who needs the headache of keeping up with Video cards, memory, and processors just to play games? I've always preferred non-realtime strategy games anyway (although there are no great ones out there), so I just decided no more games. It's not even close to worth it.
Well, you raise a good point about the problem of co-source - that being a competitive advantage to those who wait. Although, one could argue, those companies that agressively fund software that benefits them will gain some advantage that way. The overall cost to a company in this situation would probably be very much less than in a proprietary model. That assumes other companies are kicking in to pay for it as well. A big if, as you suggest.
Regarding the question of why should developers give up their rights to their creations - it's not a question of choice. You do what you have to do to compete. If a business model shows up that's will to work for 10% of the price you charge, you are forced to get down to that level, or stop competing. If open source creates a truly viable alternative to Windows, for so little cost, how long can Windows survive? It will catch up to them eventually. (note, I'm not saying Linux is at that point yet - I use Linux now, and I can barely stand it. I'm just betting on its future).
Co-source won't work in all situations. But those areas where it does, current companies whose revenue comes from competing sources should experience serious difficulties. Unfortunately for our little debate (which I've enjoyed enormously!), we won't really know the answers for another 5 years or so.
Well, compare the proprietary licensing model to the co-source model. Do you disagree that the licensing model is a less direct relationship to the costs of developer time than the co-source model?
Imagine Microsoft being a huge faction of developers accepting bids on co-source to create their software. Would the combined costs there come anywhere near the price being paid now (I realize Microsoft, being a monopoly is a bad example, but substitute Corel, if you like, or Borland).
Not that I think Co-source can succeed in its current implementation, but I think something like that could work pretty well. At least, for those brave enough to take that plunge.
You're suggesting the the true underlying economic cost to develop software is the time spent by the developers. Absolutely. Further, let's suggest the time spent developing Linux is, or will be, the same or greater than the time spent developing Windows or Solaris. Therefore, the underlying, true productivity costs are roughly equivalent. The question is, are you avoiding unnecessary steps with one model vs. the other?
With most proprietary software, you pay a per license fee, which means that the underlying cost (time to develop said software) has a strange relationship to the actual monetary value paid for the software. The economic cost is paid once. The monetary cost is paid repeatedly. This suggests an inefficiency that could potentially be avoided.
The Linux business model seems to be to not pay for the software, but rather, pay for ongoing support. Both cases avoid the problem of finding the funds to pay for the underlying economic cost (developer time), by using a weakly related activity to generate money. It seems to me that in one case, the cost is overpaid (license fees), whereas the other is probably too early to say. If it turns out it is underpaid, then maybe the Linux companies are doomed to failure (or that another model will come into play, personally, I think this is likely).
But, I stick by my suggestion that we are heading toward a more efficient valuation of the costs of software, which will have the effect of saving money overall.
Oh, and in regard to the hardware thing - this situation may simply be forced upon companies (ie all companies would choose to make a killing off proprietary software, given the choice, but they may not have the choice), in which case, there means of competing is reduced to hardware superiority, and better marketing.
Apparently, Linux isn't making anyone much money (if their stats are true). Only $32 million/year. That's paltry, especially for an OS that has 25% of the server market. RedHat may be able to make a decent business, but a market valuation of over 5 billion is not supportable if this is indicative of how much money there is in Linux OS sales.
I'm not saying this is a bad thing (well, just for owners of Red Hat stock, or VA stock). It indicates that hardware is what you sell. Software is what you support and contribute to (in order to make your hardware more appealing).
It also suggests there's a lot of savings to be had for the economy by switching to open-source where feasible. And that simply translates to greater productivity, which is what economic growth is all about.
Have you given thought to adapting your writings to the feedback that slashdot is implicitly giving you? In other words, have you thought about writing your editorials with the explicit purpose of doing nothing but starting a discussion on some topic? Not pretending to be knowledgable, or to hold some particular view as good/bad, or asserting questionable "facts", or with any sense of righteous indignation, etc, etc. Would you simplify your writings to this level and be something slashdot might appreciate more?
Now I'm going to ramble to explain my question....
I think what many people object to about your writings on/. is that it appears that you simply are a reader of slashdot yourself, and that maybe once a week, you sit down and write an editorial that was inspired by having read a slashdot article of particular interest. For instance, with all the DeCSS stuff here on slashdot, it was very predictable that you were going to write an editorial about the MPAA and DeCSS, and that your comments were going to be a Katz summary of what had already been said on Slashdot.
This annoys many because a)it gives you a greater voice than anyone else on slashdot and b)most feel you don't qualify for the position of slashdot summarizer because you're not a technical person (not that there's anything wrong with that!)
a) is the main point here, so let me go on - you don't research stories like a normal journalist. You write your impression and your opinion. There are times in many a slashdotter's life when they wish they could write up their opinion and submit it to slashdot, and get it automatically posted as a top-level article. But they can't. You can. Therefore, though in reality you're little more than an over-eager slashdot reader, you have this inside track that allows you to vent your views and get it published.
But, you're not informative, nor particularly insightful (ie you don't seem to offer anything more than that other slashdot reader who got worked up, wrote up an opinion piece, and submitted it to slashdot). You stir up trouble, which is probably the point. After all, I, unlike many outspoken slashdotters, enjoy you're articles - because of the discussion they provoke (and I don't mean the trolls!). Some of the best discussion are definitely provoked by your articles.
However, your article itself is of limited value in terms of insight offered, wit, or new facts uncovered. Your value is in soliciting the great varieties of opinions that exist in the/. community to come out and play. Yet, the way you write indicates you view your articles as having a grander place on slashdot than simply this. This gives offense and makes you a target of trolling, more so than you would be.
So, are you willing to change for the sake of the slashdot community?
One thing I always prefer, is diversity, for exactly the objections you have. It seems you don't really object to any of these methods except to say none of them do the total job. I will always argue that multiple funding methods are needed - that's usually the best way to deal with a broad problem space.
But, like I said before, the patent system discourages alternate funding systems, so I would like to see it go.
I agree with most of your post - particularly where you talk about the economic benefits of an open knowledge system versus the patent system. If you examine all the economic costs involved, I think it becomes clear that patents are not efficient. Problem is, many of the patent costs are hidden, whereas we're talking about making those costs very apparent. I think that's a good thing to, but it means it's harder to sell it to people.
I do disagree with one point, however - that of your "award" system. I don't like award systems. They inherently favor small, cheap solutions to problems, whether or not that's the best way. Who would undertake to build a brand new operating system based on an award system? Who would risk drug development based on the possibility of getting an award, but having to foot the bill in the meantime?
I think the reason you chose an award system, and this public body, are to create a valid way of determining who is deserving of funding. But, as I said in another post, I prefer a more dynamic way of determining who gets funded. Let the people decide individually. You can still have a public body that generates a list of valid projects if you like, to protect against fraud. But, the point is, projects get funded up front, and money is free to switch projects when people choose to do so.
My scope started out at the level of getting rid of all patent protection. My original post was a simple complaint when someone suggested the only reason people will invent/innovate is for economic rewards based on patent protection. I suggested that actually, people would be happy to invent/innovate for merely a salary.
I was suggesting patent law serves the purpose of a funding model, but is actually an incentive model (subtle difference, but important). That distinction leads me to suggest that if we could come up with a realfunding model, we could do away with patents. That is why I talked about bio-tech - because it is an example of an industry that really would go away if patent law disappeared (without a replacement). I was trying to take on the most difficult area. Open-source software is much easier - it's here, despite patent law.
You also point out that currently we are doing pretty good having both open and closed source. That's great, I agree. The more various funding models we can have, the better. But the patent model discourages competing models, unfortunately. A company can make much more money through the government protected monopoly than almost any other way. The playing field is not level with that incentive out there.
Open-source software gets around this because the cost of development is very small. It would still be improved by the addition of a funding solution, though. I personally like Co-Source's funding model. I think that method gets at your objection that open-source has limited output in many areas. Developers there are asked to develop solutions, and are paid for the work they do, not for the output. ie, the output is forever free, there is simply a one-time charge for the work to produce it.
In my opinion, a co-source model needs to be combined with a tech support model using similar means. Consumers of open-source ought to be able to make an open request for tech support, deliverable by whatever person(s) or agency out there willing to take on the job. I've even described a business model based on the idea of making all the developers "out there" potential employees, paid on a per-job or per-service basis. The customers of the fantasy business would pay a subscription cost, which would give them any number of "points" to spend, asking questions, requesting software or service. Developers in the forum that answered the questions, or developed the software, or who actually visited the customer to solve the problem would be the recipients of real money, based on the number of points the customer assigned to the request.
Example: Customer has a problem mass installing linux on all their employee desktops. They send in a question to the business' website asking for help/suggestions/code for doing this. They assign 100 points to the successfull completion of this request. A develop "somewhere" reads this request, gets more info from the client, and writes a brief script to solve their problem. The customer is happy and grants the developer the 100 points. The business pays out money to the developer based on the points they've accumulated.
...what would happen? Well, firstly, everyone could start selling all the still-protected drugs really cheaply, since virtually all the costs come from research and clinical trial costs. So, you could buy a box of Viagra for $5, or whatever. I just wanted to point that out first.
Second, all the bio-tech start-ups and research departments shut right down. No company on earth could afford to spend that kind of money unless a government supported monopoly was the reward.
Third, there will be a lot of scientists out of work who would very much like to still be working.
Those scientists still want to do research for reasonable salaries (say $60-200k). Some would do it for less, of course, but I doubt many would reject these salaries (cause i don't believe there are many scientists out there doing it for the stock options and the getting rich part).
So, what those scientists need, is spending money. A software tax is an interesting idea. The basic plan is fund it with public money. This would be fine. I personally wouldn't like delegating the choice of what which research projects to fund, but this would be an improvement over the current patent system.
The typical argument against public (tax) funding is that it's inefficient and will cost a lot. Here's where I bring up point 1: do you have any idea how much we'll save in health costs? I don't, but I bet it's a handsome amount. Health insurance costs would come down, significantly. Medicare and Medicaid would cost less to administer. In the public funding system, our money would go directly to research, bypassing patent and court costs. Strikes me as more efficient. And, all scientific findings would be public domain (even those no one would have wanted to patent before). Another bonus.
There are other ways to fund as well. Charities get money - scientific foundations could be formed which receive donations. That way, people could choose which projects they fund. Probably not enough people are educated enough to go straight to this, but some sort of hybrid could probably be worked out. ie, whatever you donated to a foundation could be subtracted from your research tax.
Socialist, you say? Maybe so. Do you think there's no place for socialistic concepts? The biggest argument against socialism is that the government can never allocate resources as efficiently as the market. I happen to agree very strongly with this argument, so I would prefer a more chaotic system than having our legislators "legislate" where the funding goes. I would prefer that each individual gets to "vote" for their favorite research foundation. That way, the allocation of research funding could change very quickly to meet the demands of the people. Currently, Michael J. Fox has to go before congress to try and work out increases for Parkinson research. With my way, he could go directly to the people and it would happen immediately, according to the people's desires.
But, I don't think any other funding model could work or be put into place so long as Patents are around. Patents make any other source of funding something only a fool would choose to do since you'll be paying for those government supported monopolies either way. Get rid of patents, then we'll be open to other possibilities.
I just wanted to pick on one little bit of your post (which otherwise was quite good:-)
If we did not have laws protecting IP then there would be no incentive to create works and/or new products.
This is simply untrue. There are usually at least two motivations to invent something - one is economic, and the other is the joy/satisfaction of doing the thing itself. Thousands of open-source coders should have clue'd us in to that by now. For scientific research, this is even more true. The problem is, how do we fund research, not how can we profit from it. Given money, there will be more than enough people who will do research regardless of whether they can sell a product as a result. Patent law is unnecessary - what's necessary is a new funding model.
Slashdot Mirror
I could be wrong, but I believe the Ansible is a standard sci-fi concept for ftl communications, and did not originate from Orson Card. I don't remember who first came up with it (maybe Ursula LeGuin?), but it's been used many times since.
But then again, I could be wrong.
Forcing companies to license their patents is a great idea, but it has one big flaw - how do you know what a fair price for the license is? If you dictate it governmentally, it could horribly off-mark, resulting either in much higher consumer costs, or a bankrupt company.
I've been considering the idea of instituting a patent tax. Registering a patent under this idea doesn't prevent anyone from using that technology. However, every product sold that falls under a patent will have an additional "patent tax", the proceeds of which go directly to the patent holder.
This would allow the market forces to determine the value of the product, as well as the value of the patent.
Also, the tax percentage could vary for different patents. It could be determined, within reason, by the patent holder. Consider: If Amazon patented 1-click under this system, no one would use it, because using the 1-click would mean their book would cost more. Thus we instantly see that the 1-click ordering is really of little value to the consumer (who votes most honestly and realistically with his pocketbook), and Amazon would probably have chosen not to patent such a thing under a patent tax system.
Actually, there are already places where you can store your pet's DNA samples so that at some point in the future when cloning is cheaper and legal, you will be able to create a new clone of your pet after he/she has died.
How much is taken through taxes is not really relevant. If you took everything I made, and in return the world was a Utopia to live in, I doubt I'd complain. However, the real issue is, our centralized governments are horribly inefficient and corrupt. Ideally, the money would pass straight through the system and on to its intended target. If the system were perfectly efficient, 50% probably wouldn't seem bad, compared to what you received in return. In practice, it gets used up in political battles, pork, national paranoia, and outright stealing. So, why should anyone support higher taxes, and thus greater inefficiency?
So, I'm agreeing and disagreeing (of course - what else?!). I think, however, that there is the possibility, in this day and age, to run things fairly, lock out corruption and stealing, and get very close to an ideal level of efficiency. However, it involves a drastic separation between policy makers and control of the money, and heavy reliance on computers, which people are generally not comfortable with.
Believing that an "American" corporation's interests are the same as your interests, or the interests of American taxpayers is even more naive and delusional than believing that the American government's interests are the same as the interests of the American taxpayers.
Sorry, you're right - you didn't say they were environmentalist. What I was reacting to was that you compare environmentalism to centralized totalitarianism, and argue that thus, environmentalism will create worse problems than it solves. I don't think that's a reasonable argument all by itself.
Would you argue that our environment in the US would be better if we hadn't initiated various environmental protections? Do you argue that, on the whole, we'd be better off without them?
Actually, your argument bears a striking resemblance to a linear trend argument as well. Something like - Bad predictions have never fully come true, therefore they never will. However, when you're looking at the potentials of technologies, it's hard to argue that there isn't some danger. Nuclear weapons pose a danger. Self replicating nano-robots pose a danger too. We're all familiar with the experiments about bacteria in an environment of plentiful food and no predators, right? It grows exponentially. Think about nano-robots, that consume some basic ingredient of the earth, and have no predator. That seems pretty worrisome. You can say it's unlikely all you want, but right now, we don't know one way or the other. It may turn out that regulations need to be passed requiring that all such nano-machines be programmed with a preset reproductive limit. Who knows? The point is, the potential is there to destroy the earth. A warning is deserved.
And your just fooling yourself if you think nano-technology will never get that far.
The implication of your post is that the Soviet Union and China were run with severe environmentalist agendas. That's bizarre. Those countries weren't even remotely environmentalist. The US has one of the strictest sets of environmental regulations, yet our economy is certainly stronger than most of those without such regulation.
I wasn't advocating doing nothing, I was pointing out a serious problem. What to do about it is open to question.
But, if you're interested in my $.02:
1) donate money to groups like EFF and FSF.
2) attract media attention. Probably needs both a disruptive and a reasoning element. Peaceful disruptive actions to attract the cameras, a reasoning spokesperson to explain it all.
3) Oh, and you've gotta have a definite agenda - can't be a hodge-podge of ideas.
4) A plan for the future - I see education as the only way of saving the future. If people don't learn how to reason for themselves, we'll become more and more enslaved to whatever image the media chooses to dominate our minds with. So, in my view, we need private education (100% free vouchers, for example) and as much money as ya'll can bear to spend on it. I would prefer education be supported for all ages, not just teenagers.
I feel the need to point out something that really terrifies me.
...
What can we, as a group, as a rising political force
I don't think we are a rising political force. Not in comparison to the elderly. Think about it - the demographics of this country are such that the number of people age X is growing faster than the number of people age Y, where X > Y.
In addition, older people vote more, so an rise in the number of 50 year-olds has greater voting power than an equivalent rise in the number of 30-year-olds.
We (younger, working people) are losing power, daily, as people live longer and longer, and the birthrate goes down. Power is more and more in the hands of those who no longer work, but instead are dependent for their financial well-being on the performance of the stock market, and thus, on the health of public corporations.
So, there's no way you're going to convince them that your freedom is more important than their financial security, and I doubt there's any way this balance of power is going to tip back the other way. It's going to get worse and worse, actually.
Yeah, companies like Dell is the most logical explanation for why AMD is doing this so soon. Dell will have to explain why they can't supply a 1GHZ machine while Gateway can. There may be a very good explanation (the AMD 1GHZ processors are crippled compared to what will be out later this year), but how many consumers will understand that?
This puts pressure on Dell and others who haven't gone for supporting AMD products.
I can easily imagine the value of ever-increasing processor speeds. If 500MHZ was enough, why would people ever buy computers with 2, 4, or 8 processors? The big huge database server is never going to be too fast. Any web server doing a lot of dynamic content is never going to be too fast.
Even at home, I've written a program to do some simple stock market analysis. Since I get info on more than 12,000 stocks, and I have data going back 10 years, it takes hours to compute. It used to take 12 hours for it to work on a 486 I used way back when. Now, I have an AMD Athlon 600, and it takes 4 hours, and I've added a whole lot more computation in to the program since because I can.
But, I do agree about one aspect - games. I used to play Doom. I played Quake 1 a little, too. But not anymore. Why? Because who needs the headache of keeping up with Video cards, memory, and processors just to play games? I've always preferred non-realtime strategy games anyway (although there are no great ones out there), so I just decided no more games. It's not even close to worth it.
Well, you raise a good point about the problem of co-source - that being a competitive advantage to those who wait. Although, one could argue, those companies that agressively fund software that benefits them will gain some advantage that way. The overall cost to a company in this situation would probably be very much less than in a proprietary model. That assumes other companies are kicking in to pay for it as well. A big if, as you suggest.
Regarding the question of why should developers give up their rights to their creations - it's not a question of choice. You do what you have to do to compete. If a business model shows up that's will to work for 10% of the price you charge, you are forced to get down to that level, or stop competing. If open source creates a truly viable alternative to Windows, for so little cost, how long can Windows survive? It will catch up to them eventually. (note, I'm not saying Linux is at that point yet - I use Linux now, and I can barely stand it. I'm just betting on its future).
Co-source won't work in all situations. But those areas where it does, current companies whose revenue comes from competing sources should experience serious difficulties. Unfortunately for our little debate (which I've enjoyed enormously!), we won't really know the answers for another 5 years or so.
Well, compare the proprietary licensing model to the co-source model. Do you disagree that the licensing model is a less direct relationship to the costs of developer time than the co-source model?
Imagine Microsoft being a huge faction of developers accepting bids on co-source to create their software. Would the combined costs there come anywhere near the price being paid now (I realize Microsoft, being a monopoly is a bad example, but substitute Corel, if you like, or Borland).
Not that I think Co-source can succeed in its current implementation, but I think something like that could work pretty well. At least, for those brave enough to take that plunge.
You're suggesting the the true underlying economic cost to develop software is the time spent by the developers. Absolutely. Further, let's suggest the time spent developing Linux is, or will be, the same or greater than the time spent developing Windows or Solaris. Therefore, the underlying, true productivity costs are roughly equivalent. The question is, are you avoiding unnecessary steps with one model vs. the other?
With most proprietary software, you pay a per license fee, which means that the underlying cost (time to develop said software) has a strange relationship to the actual monetary value paid for the software. The economic cost is paid once. The monetary cost is paid repeatedly. This suggests an inefficiency that could potentially be avoided.
The Linux business model seems to be to not pay for the software, but rather, pay for ongoing support. Both cases avoid the problem of finding the funds to pay for the underlying economic cost (developer time), by using a weakly related activity to generate money. It seems to me that in one case, the cost is overpaid (license fees), whereas the other is probably too early to say. If it turns out it is underpaid, then maybe the Linux companies are doomed to failure (or that another model will come into play, personally, I think this is likely).
But, I stick by my suggestion that we are heading toward a more efficient valuation of the costs of software, which will have the effect of saving money overall.
Oh, and in regard to the hardware thing - this situation may simply be forced upon companies (ie all companies would choose to make a killing off proprietary software, given the choice, but they may not have the choice), in which case, there means of competing is reduced to hardware superiority, and better marketing.
Apparently, Linux isn't making anyone much money (if their stats are true). Only $32 million/year. That's paltry, especially for an OS that has 25% of the server market. RedHat may be able to make a decent business, but a market valuation of over 5 billion is not supportable if this is indicative of how much money there is in Linux OS sales.
I'm not saying this is a bad thing (well, just for owners of Red Hat stock, or VA stock). It indicates that hardware is what you sell. Software is what you support and contribute to (in order to make your hardware more appealing).
It also suggests there's a lot of savings to be had for the economy by switching to open-source where feasible. And that simply translates to greater productivity, which is what economic growth is all about.
What's your Karma?
Have you given thought to adapting your writings to the feedback that slashdot is implicitly giving you? In other words, have you thought about writing your editorials with the explicit purpose of doing nothing but starting a discussion on some topic? Not pretending to be knowledgable, or to hold some particular view as good/bad, or asserting questionable "facts", or with any sense of righteous indignation, etc, etc. Would you simplify your writings to this level and be something slashdot might appreciate more?
/. is that it appears that you simply are a reader of slashdot yourself, and that maybe once a week, you sit down and write an editorial that was inspired by having read a slashdot article of particular interest. For instance, with all the DeCSS stuff here on slashdot, it was very predictable that you were going to write an editorial about the MPAA and DeCSS, and that your comments were going to be a Katz summary of what had already been said on Slashdot.
/. community to come out and play. Yet, the way you write indicates you view your articles as having a grander place on slashdot than simply this. This gives offense and makes you a target of trolling, more so than you would be.
Now I'm going to ramble to explain my question....
I think what many people object to about your writings on
This annoys many because a)it gives you a greater voice than anyone else on slashdot and b)most feel you don't qualify for the position of slashdot summarizer because you're not a technical person (not that there's anything wrong with that!)
a) is the main point here, so let me go on - you don't research stories like a normal journalist. You write your impression and your opinion. There are times in many a slashdotter's life when they wish they could write up their opinion and submit it to slashdot, and get it automatically posted as a top-level article. But they can't. You can. Therefore, though in reality you're little more than an over-eager slashdot reader, you have this inside track that allows you to vent your views and get it published.
But, you're not informative, nor particularly insightful (ie you don't seem to offer anything more than that other slashdot reader who got worked up, wrote up an opinion piece, and submitted it to slashdot). You stir up trouble, which is probably the point. After all, I, unlike many outspoken slashdotters, enjoy you're articles - because of the discussion they provoke (and I don't mean the trolls!). Some of the best discussion are definitely provoked by your articles.
However, your article itself is of limited value in terms of insight offered, wit, or new facts uncovered. Your value is in soliciting the great varieties of opinions that exist in the
So, are you willing to change for the sake of the slashdot community?
Hi John.
My name is speek.
There's something I've been wondering about for a while now.
I'm going to ask that question here; now.
Here it comes.
Why do you always write in one-sentence paragraphs?
I have one other question, as well.
Can you take a joke?
:-)
Maybe you could have two simultaneous camera feeds to achieve the same effect.
One thing I always prefer, is diversity, for exactly the objections you have. It seems you don't really object to any of these methods except to say none of them do the total job. I will always argue that multiple funding methods are needed - that's usually the best way to deal with a broad problem space.
But, like I said before, the patent system discourages alternate funding systems, so I would like to see it go.
I agree with most of your post - particularly where you talk about the economic benefits of an open knowledge system versus the patent system. If you examine all the economic costs involved, I think it becomes clear that patents are not efficient. Problem is, many of the patent costs are hidden, whereas we're talking about making those costs very apparent. I think that's a good thing to, but it means it's harder to sell it to people.
I do disagree with one point, however - that of your "award" system. I don't like award systems. They inherently favor small, cheap solutions to problems, whether or not that's the best way. Who would undertake to build a brand new operating system based on an award system? Who would risk drug development based on the possibility of getting an award, but having to foot the bill in the meantime?
I think the reason you chose an award system, and this public body, are to create a valid way of determining who is deserving of funding. But, as I said in another post, I prefer a more dynamic way of determining who gets funded. Let the people decide individually. You can still have a public body that generates a list of valid projects if you like, to protect against fraud. But, the point is, projects get funded up front, and money is free to switch projects when people choose to do so.
My scope started out at the level of getting rid of all patent protection. My original post was a simple complaint when someone suggested the only reason people will invent/innovate is for economic rewards based on patent protection. I suggested that actually, people would be happy to invent/innovate for merely a salary.
I was suggesting patent law serves the purpose of a funding model, but is actually an incentive model (subtle difference, but important). That distinction leads me to suggest that if we could come up with a realfunding model, we could do away with patents. That is why I talked about bio-tech - because it is an example of an industry that really would go away if patent law disappeared (without a replacement). I was trying to take on the most difficult area. Open-source software is much easier - it's here, despite patent law.
You also point out that currently we are doing pretty good having both open and closed source. That's great, I agree. The more various funding models we can have, the better. But the patent model discourages competing models, unfortunately. A company can make much more money through the government protected monopoly than almost any other way. The playing field is not level with that incentive out there.
Open-source software gets around this because the cost of development is very small. It would still be improved by the addition of a funding solution, though. I personally like Co-Source's funding model. I think that method gets at your objection that open-source has limited output in many areas. Developers there are asked to develop solutions, and are paid for the work they do, not for the output. ie, the output is forever free, there is simply a one-time charge for the work to produce it.
In my opinion, a co-source model needs to be combined with a tech support model using similar means. Consumers of open-source ought to be able to make an open request for tech support, deliverable by whatever person(s) or agency out there willing to take on the job. I've even described a business model based on the idea of making all the developers "out there" potential employees, paid on a per-job or per-service basis. The customers of the fantasy business would pay a subscription cost, which would give them any number of "points" to spend, asking questions, requesting software or service. Developers in the forum that answered the questions, or developed the software, or who actually visited the customer to solve the problem would be the recipients of real money, based on the number of points the customer assigned to the request.
Example:
Customer has a problem mass installing linux on all their employee desktops. They send in a question to the business' website asking for help/suggestions/code for doing this. They assign 100 points to the successfull completion of this request. A develop "somewhere" reads this request, gets more info from the client, and writes a brief script to solve their problem. The customer is happy and grants the developer the 100 points. The business pays out money to the developer based on the points they've accumulated.
...what would happen? Well, firstly, everyone could start selling all the still-protected drugs really cheaply, since virtually all the costs come from research and clinical trial costs. So, you could buy a box of Viagra for $5, or whatever. I just wanted to point that out first.
Second, all the bio-tech start-ups and research departments shut right down. No company on earth could afford to spend that kind of money unless a government supported monopoly was the reward.
Third, there will be a lot of scientists out of work who would very much like to still be working.
Those scientists still want to do research for reasonable salaries (say $60-200k). Some would do it for less, of course, but I doubt many would reject these salaries (cause i don't believe there are many scientists out there doing it for the stock options and the getting rich part).
So, what those scientists need, is spending money. A software tax is an interesting idea. The basic plan is fund it with public money. This would be fine. I personally wouldn't like delegating the choice of what which research projects to fund, but this would be an improvement over the current patent system.
The typical argument against public (tax) funding is that it's inefficient and will cost a lot. Here's where I bring up point 1: do you have any idea how much we'll save in health costs? I don't, but I bet it's a handsome amount. Health insurance costs would come down, significantly. Medicare and Medicaid would cost less to administer. In the public funding system, our money would go directly to research, bypassing patent and court costs. Strikes me as more efficient. And, all scientific findings would be public domain (even those no one would have wanted to patent before). Another bonus.
There are other ways to fund as well. Charities get money - scientific foundations could be formed which receive donations. That way, people could choose which projects they fund. Probably not enough people are educated enough to go straight to this, but some sort of hybrid could probably be worked out. ie, whatever you donated to a foundation could be subtracted from your research tax.
Socialist, you say? Maybe so. Do you think there's no place for socialistic concepts? The biggest argument against socialism is that the government can never allocate resources as efficiently as the market. I happen to agree very strongly with this argument, so I would prefer a more chaotic system than having our legislators "legislate" where the funding goes. I would prefer that each individual gets to "vote" for their favorite research foundation. That way, the allocation of research funding could change very quickly to meet the demands of the people. Currently, Michael J. Fox has to go before congress to try and work out increases for Parkinson research. With my way, he could go directly to the people and it would happen immediately, according to the people's desires.
But, I don't think any other funding model could work or be put into place so long as Patents are around. Patents make any other source of funding something only a fool would choose to do since you'll be paying for those government supported monopolies either way. Get rid of patents, then we'll be open to other possibilities.
I just wanted to pick on one little bit of your post (which otherwise was quite good :-)
If we did not have laws protecting IP then there would be no incentive to create works and/or new products.
This is simply untrue. There are usually at least two motivations to invent something - one is economic, and the other is the joy/satisfaction of doing the thing itself. Thousands of open-source coders should have clue'd us in to that by now. For scientific research, this is even more true. The problem is, how do we fund research, not how can we profit from it. Given money, there will be more than enough people who will do research regardless of whether they can sell a product as a result. Patent law is unnecessary - what's necessary is a new funding model.