__/ [ BearItAll ] on Monday 19 March 2007 09:13 \__
> Roy Schestowitz wrote:
>
>> Free Software Versus Open Source Software
>>
>> ,----[ Quote ]
>> | Overall, the two ideas are remarkably similar. The branding is
>> | slightly different, as is the focus. Free Software advocates
>> | believe that freedom equates to value, while Open Source
>> | advocates believe that freedom leads to value. Both, however,
>> | agree that software freedom is very important.
>> `----
>>
>
> There are developers who have free time and equipment on which to develop
> whilst having an alternative means of income. Then they are others who
> would starve to death if they spent a year developing a utility and not
> getting any money back to feed their hungry siblings.
>
> Do we really only want ideas and innovation from those who are wealthy
> enough to give it for free? I don't think so, there is absolutely nothing
> wrong with developers being OpenSource and commercial at the same time.
>
> Big businesses, and we already owe the likes of IBM and Sun a great deal,
> they have wages to pay, there is nothing wrong in my view if they put out
> only on the commercial side of the fence or even if their free versions are
> sometimes only meant as advertising for the commercial versions. But they
> don't do that, they put out fully capable software on the free side, true
> it is in the hope that they will make their money from the commercial side,
> how can we grumble at that.
>
> We do not have a right to free software, niether do we have a right to
> demand developers give up their social life in order to feed us with
> utilities, applications and games. In the end someone somewhere pays for
> every bit nibble and byte on your PC.
>
> Because of this I don't like the distinction between free OpenSource and
> commercial Opensource, it isn't free it is only that someone else has paid
> for it.
I agree entirely. Some businesses choose to cash in on support (e.g. Red Hat)
while others give a fully-functional package for free and offer some addons
that enhance the functionality of the basic package, which is easy to
distribute owing to cost. At the end of the day, more people have more
software. There are fewer barriers. Creative Commons leads to similar
scenarios where there is a wealth of information and higher
volume/requirement for skills and support. Finally, as for developers being
paid, it is easier to get sponsored when your projects becomes popular
(usually owing to zero cost at deployment stage).
Companies can then pay for someone to develop something they require and they
don't mind if it's being shared among others. They get attribution and they
get exactly the software that they want. HTMLArea is a fine example of this.
Free software developed through sponsorships from companies who had their
requirements and wishes materialise. WordPress has a similar impact and look
at its effect on free speech on the Web.
--
~~ Best wishes
Roy S. Schestowitz | Apache: commercial software's days are numbered
http://Schestowitz.com | RHAT GNU/Linux ¦ PGP-Key: 0x74572E8E
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