Oh, my. It is free as in "freedom", you idiot, not free as in "gratis", RMS would tell you. And he would be right. You've debunked only your own misunderstanding of the problem...
I think you misunderstood the point he's trying to make. Here's the conclusion of the article:
The problem is that FOSS is part of an equation that has never been properly balanced. The other part of the equation is an economic one and one that has not been thought through. Instead ad hoc and unconvincing explanations have been floated for why FOSS makes money when in fact, as presently constituted, it so often does not and is parasitic on conventional capitalism or state money
It's a rant about the economics of FOSS, not freedom. And you know what? He's right.
There is a model that deals with this kind of problem, it's called the ransom model (not the most ideal name but it gets the point across nicely).
It was used successfully on blender, the basic idea is you build what you have to build closed source, the risk is yours. And then when you've built up a following you set your ransom price, the price that has to be met for you to open up the source.
If the product is any good I doubt it would be hard for the author to get his minimum wage and the world would be a better place.
Open source is a great thing, but I fear that it has led many to believe that they are entitled to the software (both the use and the source) they are using.
You don't need access to the source. If you don't like how the software works, you have two options: (1) Don't buy the software, or (2) write new software.
My point was that many people feel they have a right to the source code. It's not a right at all, no matter what Stallman says.
You do have a right to the source code if it's free software. Your argument is analogous to saying that the right to vote is not a right at all, because it only applies to democratic countries. There are no universal rights, yet there are rights.
I wasn't talking about just open source software several posts up the chain. I intended the comment to mean that FOSS seems to be giving people the idea that ALL software should have viewable source.
Of course you have a right to the code if it's free (as in freedom) software - that's the point!. If it isn't you don't. The parent was pointing out that many people feel that they have a right to the source of closed source software because of FOSS. Which they don't.
That's a good point. Despite being something of a FOSS zealot myself, I agree that I have no rights whatsoever to the source of closed source software. I tend to shy away from closed source software for that reason, but so what-- I shy away from horror movies, fax machines, and American cars as well.
You don't need access to the source. If you don't like how the software works, you have two options: (1) Don't buy the software, or (2) write new software.
What about option (3): fix it yourself (or hire someone who can) if it's important to you, which in practical terms means you do need the source.
My point was that many people feel they have a right to the source code. It's not a right at all, no matter what Stallman says.
That's odd. I believe the authors of the software I use on my FreeBSD server claim otherwise.
That's odd. I believe the authors of the software I use on my FreeBSD server claim otherwise.
The beliefs of the developers of FreeBSD, Torvalds, or Stallman do not have to power to null and void several decades of legislation and legal precedent. Again, my original comment was how FOSS seems to have given people the idea that every piece of software should have viewable source.
I've toyed around with the idea of open source. I use open source software. I'm typing this in Firefox running on Ubuntu. I use the GNU compilers, both C and C++. I'm simply trying to say that there is place for both open source and closed source. Given the business I'm in, I will never release open source software, and I expect the software I do write will continue to be protected under various legislation.
- not to be hacked together by a bunch of people without knowledge in the relevant field(s), said knowledge only to be gained by years of study and hard work (think enterprise resource stuff)
- software developed 'in house' (think banking, insurance)
- stuff that isn't 'sexy' and that doesn't give you bragging rights.
The point of this is that the vast majority of ALL the software in use could have been open source.
And woe to you closed source author if one day some group of attic hackers decides to compete with you.
That has happened to many software companies that thought they had found a profitable niche that nobody else was interested in.
I am working on my own trading and valuation software. The public will never see the source, just like they will never see the source from JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs, or any other firm on the Street.
pcof's point still stands. Freedom is about lowering barriers, barriers which cost money to otherwise bypass. FOSS provides off-the-shelf parts for software engineers. Even Microsoft has used FOSS code in Windows.
If Company X gains $1,000,000 savings due to investing $700,000 in developing a piece of software, they have earned $300,000. Then, they open source the software, and improvements to it by outside contributors result in them saving another $500,000.
Then, Company Y adopts the software and uses it to save $2,000,000. They improve it as well, which results in them saving another $500,000 and Company X saving another $300,000.
Total profit: $3.8m
Compare this to the alternative:
Company X gains $1,000,000 savings due to investing $700,000 in developing a piece of software, they have earned $300,000. Then, they keep the software closed. No contributions are made by outside users.
Then, Company Y writes their own version of the software for $700,000 and uses it to save $1,500,000, less because they don't have the improvements made by outside contributors. They don't have the logic from Company X to combine with theirs, so they don't improve it, and they don't save any extra money. Company X doesn't save money either, since they don't get anything back.
Total profit: $1.1m
Everyone involved made more money in the first situation than the second, despite Company X giving up their source code to be used by other companies as well. This works completely fine under existing systems and requires nobody to arbitrarily throw money at open source for no potential gain.
Open source is the free-market solution to the problem of inefficiency due to competition--everyone implementing their own versions of software and in the end generating a worse result than if they had worked together.
Another alternative is that a nimble startup creates a piece of software to solve the problem and sells it to 1000 companies at $10.000 a pop. This way the companies get their software even cheaper, and another beautiful startup is born.
With a contrived example you can prove anything :-)
Most custom-built software is too tied to internal processes to be useful outside, because a generic solution always costs more (the consensus is 3x). Most successful OS projects that have this source solve a narrow, highly technical problem.
What you've proven is that if I choose whatever numbers I want, and add and multiply them together in whatever order I choose, I can get whatever answer I please.
Also, if you read the article, he doesn't argue that source code should be closed - he argues that it should be paid for.
Let's turn his analogy around and ask, if every startup and nonprofit that ever wanted to put up a website had to either buy or build a webserver, would the web as we know it exist? More to the point would the standard protocols and encodings that we mostly take for granted have evolved? Or would we all be coding for aolserver and bitching about how to get our websites approved on different cable networks?
And the stuff about the source being paid for is a red herring, only a very few licenses prohibit the sale of software (and the GPL explicitly allows it, the only restriction is that if you sell software built with GPL components you must provide the source as well as the object code).
"Emacs was supported financially by people working at the MIT AI Lab, which means that it was funded by Uncle Sam. It was not invented by Richard Stallman contrary to popular myth, although he did grab the sources and improved them and tried successfully to claim as much credit as he could. It’s real cost in market terms was effectively many thousands of tax dollars and it was paid for as such by Joe Schmoe."
This is an interesting bit of history. Is that a correct description of the history? How many other now "open source" projects began with that kind of initial taxpayer subsidy?
Please go find a copy of Hackers by Steven Levy at the local library and read it. Yes, all of the core stuff done in the 60s through the 80s that most of us rely upon as the fundamental underpinnings of our craft were developed either at universities as (D)ARPA projects, or by a small handful of corporations like Ma Bell, DEC, Xerox, etc. By the mid to late 80s you could also add some government funded work out of European universities and labs (like this little thing called the world wide web that was created at CERN...)
But what kind of point is that? If it was really paid for by the taxpayers, it should be free (free as in free beer and free as in free speech) because it was funded by taxpayers. How is arguing that it should not be free any kind of solution to this (imagined) problem?
So firstly, it's free as in freedom. We don't mean free as in cost.
But secondly, if someone pays for some software to be developed and it solves their problem and then they give it away then it's truly free as in cost too. They paid money equivalent to the value they got from it, everyone else rides for free.
Free NEVER refers to value. Free refers to price. Also, free does not refer to cost - everything has a cost, even if only the opportunity cost of the time used making or acquiring the free software (or anything else free). Actually, the time acquiring and learning to use the software is why I still use MS software for a lot of things that aren't worth my time fiddling with.
This isn't true. It's just exaggerating to make a point.
As a counterexample, http://pysolar.org. I wrote the code for free, because I wanted the experience. You can have it for $0 under the GPL. That's free software.
The truth is more like: "Free software is often subsidized by governments or companies." But so what? So is proprietary software. With that revision, I don't see more than a poorly written rant.
What about the opportunity cost? You paid for this code with your time, which otherwise, if you felt like it, you presumably could have used to earn money. If your time is worthless, then indeed the code costs nothing; is it? That's the point the author's making.
If he otherwise would have used the time to smoke dope and watch TV then arguably that tranche of time had 0 financial value associated with it. This assumes that he's equally recuperated by coding and so the coding doesn't impact the hours in which he is gainfully employed.
Presumably you think that having a crap at a free public toilet is not free because it takes you time to do it.
The key is "if you felt like it". He didn't, not because he felt his time is worthless but because he wrote it for himself and if it helps anyone else, well that's just making him happy for having helped someone.
It's not arguing that it didn't cost anything. It's arguing that it's his choice whether he wants to cover his costs or give it away for free.
If someone was forced to license their software under the GPL, then the author would have a point. But he doesn't.
You're confusing the cost to you with the cost to me.
You're correct that there was an opportunity cost for me to write the code. I spent a few hundred hours on it, when I might have been programming for money. Fair enough.
But when we talk about whether software is free, the question is either how much is costs to use it (i.e. is it free as in beer?) or what license it uses (i.e is it free as in freedom?).
In this case, the cost to you is $0-- free as in beer-- and the license is the GPL-- free as in freedom. (Perhaps we can omit the GPL vs. BSD argument here.)
A better counter-argument might talk about the opportunity cost for you to use free software.
I'm not confusing anything, I'm explaining to you what the original author meant by software not ever been free. Someone always bears the cost; if the user pays nothing whatsoever, the developer pays with his/her time, which they could have used otherwise to program for money. Yes, this isn't what's usually meant by the code not being free, but that is the author's entire point. He's arguing that the usual way to talk about it - the one you recap in your sentence starting "But when we talk about whether software is free, the question is..." - is deceptively incomplete.
The author has a point - one I don't sympathize with much, by the way - and he's explaining it clearly. His reward? An alarming number of commentators here on YC smugly calling him an idiot and repeating with tedious condescention the standard talking points on freedom, gratis, etc., advertising nothing much beyond their lack of reading comprehension and a healthy knee-jerk reflex.
My apologies if I seemed smug, tedious, condescending, knee-jerky, or whatever. I'm not intentionally repeating anything I read somewhere else. I'm just thinking about my own experience with free software, and then writing what I think.
I do genuinely think that there are two different costs for software-- the cost to the programmer and the cost to the user. The two costs have no relation to one another.
I agree that you and the original author are both talking about the cost to the programmer when you say that "free software" is not really free, in that the programmer bears an opportunity cost, as you described earlier. That's true. You, the original author, and I all agree on that point.
Where we disagree, I think, is about whether that cost is important. I think that proprietary and free software have roughly the same cost to the programmer, i.e. it takes just as long, just as much effort, to write code, regardless of whether you're getting paid. Since the cost to the programmer is the same for both, it's not a distinguishing feature of free software.
If he just means that there is a cost to create all software, it's an obvious conclusion. I don't think I've ever heard anyone claim otherwise, i.e. that free software is created without time and effort by programmers. That's why I don't find the original argument compelling.
The author has a point, and I think the "free as in freedom" comments are clearly missing that point. But I wouldn't say it is explained very clearly. It's framed as an attack on what appears to be a straw man. Finding a frame of reference to interpret the tirade is hard[1], and the point about the costs of work must be extracted from the rest.
[1] Hard to do well. It's pretty easy to make vague assumptions and proceed from there.
You're right, and thanks for checking my ire. I probably exaggerated the merits of the tirade because I was so annoyed by all the smug comments that so clearly missed the not-so-sophisticated point about the cost of work. I still think it's an interesting rant, even if it could have been better structured and less ranty.
He seems to be suggesting that the only economic model for software development is to sell it as a product. That might make sense if your business is selling software. The rest of us are in the business of designing websites, running universities and large enterprises, selling widgets etc. In other words, our business is making other kinds of stuff or just in providing services. In the course of running that business we need to use software. If there's free stuff (especially stuff that can be freely customized to fit my business) then great. If we improve it, we might give it back to the community and everyone benefits. Well, everyone, except that poor sap who's trying to sell the commercial software that doesn't benefit from the stream of incremental improvements that come from the community. Or maybe they've still got a better solution than the FOSS product. That's excellent and if they make money, more power to them! But there's nothing broken or wrong with the FOSS model and the writer doesn't offer much evidence to support his argument other than an anecdote about how Ubuntu from four years ago (!) didn't work for him. Sheesh.
This article is difficult to understand because it is written as a flamebait rather than an objective critique.
Here is what I understand so far. His primary point is that for a FOSS project it is not easy to have it economically self-sustainable. I believe he is almost correct on this point and counter arguments exist elsewhere in this thread and on the internet. As for whether FOSS is useful or not or how to solve the problem described, he gives no suggestion. However, he does take many cheap shots at RMS and FOSS supporters.
Anyhow, my counterpoint, which I mentioned elsewhere in the thread, is the contribution of FOSS is beyond direct monetary compensation. For organizations FOSS provides cheap, commoditized off-the-shelf parts for internal software projects. For consumers, FOSS allows independence from software producers and system lock-ins. These benefits are real in economic terms and can not simply be waved away.
Further, the funding of a lot of free software has already taken place because a company needed to scratch its own itch. After that, the question is, "Does keeping this software closed source provide us a significant competitive advantage?" If the answer is "no," then there's really no point in not sharing the source. Anyone that thinks shrink-wrap sales of their pet Lisp dialect are going to make up the cornerstone of a viable business model is freaking deluded; these things are dime a dozen, and the market is next to non-existent.
Pretty much all of the open source stuff that comes out of Google comes out for this reason; they're not in the software sales biz, so if they develop something neat that helps them get things done but is not core to their business, they give it away. Economically speaking it's neutral to positive for them (helps PR quite a bit, and gets programmers invested in the Google ecosystem), and positive for everyone else.
My immediate response to the article: no shit, software takes time to write, even the most hardcore FOSS advocate wouldn't claim otherwise. But once those costs are funded (which they will be if you need the functionality yourself), if there's no money to be made by keeping the results a secret then you should be indifferent to opening it up. Yes, this means that FOSS is driven more by big companies than by basement programmers, because they generate a lot more code, but nobody ever claimed otherwise, except when constructing strawmen to knock down.
I was going to bring up the obvious point that most of the Internet runs on FOSS software (convenient not to mention Apache in a rant like this, arguably the producers of the most successful FOSS in existence), but upon checking, I can't call him out for hypocrisy - check out any non-existent url (for instance, http://www.lambdassociates.org/doesnotexist), at least he's actually drinking the Microsoft Kool-aid as he rails against the poor quality of open source.
I am reminded of the saying in the military: Freedom isn't free. (I think Heinlein said it was paid for with the blood of patriots.) The article says his time is worth something, and that is a big part of his point: To get all this "free" stuff, you have to have some intelligent, capable person giving away skills and knowledge they could be making money for.
I spent a lot of time giving away information. The information was valued but I wasn't making a cent. (In fact, I was paying for the privilege because of web hosting costs and domain names.) I've seen a number of websites that started with giving stuff away and when they became popular enough they turned into commercial ventures and you could no longer get free stuff from them. The websites basically became advertisements for the skills and products they were offering. I also know some very idealistic webmasters who basically are resentful of the time and energy they have spent on their projects and the fact that they aren't making much money, aren't getting the kind of recognition they crave, etc. At some point I decided I did not want that to be me -- and could no longer afford to follow in the footsteps of people like that.
I still want to give information away for free but these days I also want to figure out how to make money at it. Since I am mainly looking to give information away, I think some of the traditional ways of monetizing that should work, such as advertising. I haven't (yet) spent any time pondering how one would make money from open source software. But it seems to me this is an issue that needs a good solution. As I see it, code is basically information and that's always been a tricky thing to effectively commodify.
But you are manufacturing a problem. If you don't think free software works for you, don't write it. Not everyone's a capitalist fanatic and feel like they must be "paid" for (in money) for everything they do. Like you say, plenty of people do volunteer work without any expectation of return apart from feeling like they've helped someone. How can you argue that this "needs a good solution"?
I did volunteer work for about 25 years. I've spent a lot of time in that realm and thought a lot about it. I don't mean to imply that what is currently being done must stop. But I agree with the author that his time has value, so if other people expect him to keep giving it away for free, it's basically a parasitic expectation. If he wants to give it away for free, that's his choice. But if he isn't independently wealthy, time put into a FOSS project competes for time he could spend making money or with family and friends, etc. Good projects generally require substantial time and effort. It is common for volunteer situations to result in shoddy work, people you can't count on because they feel no real obligation since they aren't being paid, and similar problems.
I was diagnosed late in life with a serious medical condition. Prior to my diagnosis, I was too ill to pursue a paid career. Many of the idealistic, talented and intelligent people I have known who routinely give away their work for free are also handicapped in some way. (Actually, I can't think of anyone who gives away substantial amounts of their time and skill on a regular basis who isn't seriously handicapped in some manner.) If you are handicapped, doing volunteer work has the easy terms that work for you. Moderating a forum, running a website part-time, and so on are things you can do when you feel up to it and no one can force you to be more consistent. And the quality of the work is generally consistent with the fact that you are unreliable, impaired, etc.
So while I still value some of the free resources made available by other people like me, now that I am well enough to work a full time job, I am somewhat less of a bleeding heart. I still think some things need to be "free" -- in terms of rights and also in terms of financial access -- but I think many of these resources would be of better quality than is currently available if the people running them were compensated in some manner. Non-profits don't operate without budgets. They still need money. That money is typically raised from the community based on the idea that the organization is offering something of value. They aren't "beggars". They are just doing work that has human value more than commercial value and therefore needs to be monetized without directly selling services.
Compared to your situation I feel less sympathy for Mr. Tarver since much of his work took place in a university environment and while he claims to have spent 20 years developing the ideas behind Qi, he obviously didn't profit from those efforts in the way that he may have wanted.
But I doubt he would have been as critical of government support for projects had his own efforts been more successful since presumably the university partially supported his research (or at least didn't take the kind of hostile attitude he would have encountered at many corporations).
I think this particular situation shows that there is a difference between having expertise and having an ability to capitalize that expertise. Perhaps had he spent a little more time networking to find people who would be willing to support his ideas, things would have worked out better for him.
I was inducted into Mu Alpha Theta (a college level math honor society) in 11th grade, the earliest you can be inducted. We did volunteer work tutoring math once or twice a week. I've spent a lot of time in online communities for folks with really smart kids -- the parents are typically also smart and it is an environment where many people come to terms with their own social and emotional problems through trying to do right by their kids. So I've thought a lot about this as well: Smart people are given a lot of messages to the effect that they have a moral obligation to give away what they know for the benefit of all humankind and if, instead, they use it to make big bucks, then they are evil incarnate. This mindset can be extremely hard to escape (at least for some people).
Universities are rife with such "idealism", a form of idealism that I increasingly think is misplaced. To try to put it in a nutshell: One requirement for sainthood is that you be persecuted. We seem to think that good people must suffer horribly as a means to prove their goodness. I'm increasingly disenchanted with the idea that one has to martyr oneself to be a good person, whether that means dying for the cause or just not getting paid adequately for your work. I think all that teaches people is that there are only two kinds of people: victims and victimizers and in order to be good you must be a victim because the other choice is intolerable. I have concluded that trying to be "good" by being a willing victim forces others into the role of victimizer even if they don't want to be there. So I believe that if one wants to genuinely do good in the world, one must pursue a paradigm of symbiotic exchange rather than letting people parasitically use you up and playing the role of martyr/victim.
Symbiotic exchange sounds rather like Capitalism. I don't think that means every thing one does has to be in pursuit of the almighty dollar. I haven't been here long, but I'm impressed with the quality of HN so far. I am struck by the fact that it was initially created as a means for people at Y-Combinator to get to know potential applicants -- ie although it's offered as a "free" service, it ultimately is part of their business strategy. It looks to me like this is why HN is a better run forum than many I have participated in which were all-volunteer. HN can't afford to cater to personal peccadilloes and personality quirks of a volunteer staff. It has to meet a certain professional standard. And to the degree that at least some of the members want to apply to Y-Combinator, the participants have motivation as well to remain professional and polite. It is not a good place to indulge in habits that promote flame-wars and the like because the purpose is not merely social. Not everyone here will have such a goal, but it still impacts group culture. An influential minority can go a long way towards shaping community behavior. For some members, there is potentially millions of dollars at stake (if they can get VC from Y-Combinator and launch a highly successful business). It's strong motivation to behave better than what you see in many online forums where everything is idealistically given away "free" and flame-wars and other problems are the rule, not the exception.
> could no longer afford to follow in the footsteps of people like that
The late Erik Naggum had something to say about this:
"I no longer share code with other people by default. My experience and problem-solving abilities have become the bread and butter of my life, not just "fun" until something rewarding comes along. Like many older fans of Free Software and Open Source, I have discovered that it is really only free in the sense that the time you spend on it is worthless. When people refuse to help pay for the roof over your head and your meals when you help them do their well-paying jobs, sooner or later you get seriously pissed."
Of course large, important projects require a certain amount of funding to succeed. I'm not sure where this is really disputed, I don't see the actual argument the author is railing against. Fedora Linux may not generate revenue directly, but it is an important component to the development of RHEL, which is the core component of Red Hat's highly successful business model.
There are many, many, many organizations of all types all over the world that use different economic models to fund various different interests. I sing in a choir. We're a non-profit organization and raise money in a variety of ways to pay for music, a professional director, various instrument ensembles, venues to perform in, and people to record the concerts. The choir itself is auditioned, but all volunteer. We spend a few hours per week for fun because it enriches our lives, and as a result people get to come enjoy our concerts. Last spring we performed Mendelssohn's Elijah at Sanders Theater in Harvard Square. Unlikely to happen, but in theory the recording of that concert could become popular, and for a trivial cost via file sharing networks that performance could be listened to by 1 million people all over the world. Demand for those digital copies on that scale might average $0.001/per copy. Not worth it to try and charge for it anyway.
But we aren't a business. There are a few people associated with the choir who are compensated for their work. They are highly trained and skilled and put in more than the typical 3 hours per week. The rest of us are not paid and in fact pay dues. Is it really that different from the way an OSS project might work? 2-3 key maintainers and a hundred other contributors averaging 3-ish hours per week?
There are many valid ways to fund software projects. Some of those projects turn out to be extremely successful and popular, and in many cases the Open Source nature of the product actually adds real value to end-users. Sure, there is some bad software, but I've used lots of bad software in my life, both free and not-free. The fact that people might be working without the compensation they might deserve in a perfectly balanced economic world is not really a big concern. That's life. It doesn't just apply to software, and the reverse is also true. It is most assuredly the case that some large companies are paying some programmers far more than they theoretically deserve for the software that company sells.
I suppose the author is one of the people that argue that everything should be paid for by a direct transaction. If I walk to the corner store to get a beer, I should pay for the use of the sidewalk because "someone paid to put it there".
There are things that are better for everyone if the cost is borne by everyone. You could argue that because Linux or Emacs are free (as in beer), there's some sort of circumvention of capitalism going on that robs the economy. But how about the fact that thousands of people now can learn how to run a unix system and write program that would otherwise never have paid to do so? I believe there is a net benefit to society there, just like with publicly funded streets and publicly funded research. It induces activity which otherwise would not happen.
Only the most fundamentalist capitalists would argue that common investments are never good, and this strikes me like the same kind of rant. And I'm sorry, but that doesn't convince me one bit.
Here is my take on FOSS, I hope you find it interesting:
* FOSS is great at very small number of things: C compiler (gcc), Operating system (Linux), programming languages (zillions), Apache, MySQL, and a few others.
* FOSS is OK at a certain number of larger areas - relatively simple games (BzTank), office applications (Open Office)
* FOSS is absolutely horrible at new product development. Anyone with a brain and a decent idea that SOME people MIGHT pay for can see that FOSS is inferior to all of these:
* web-based subscription model
* web-based advertising model
* closed source shrinkwrap model
* closed-source consulting model
The only reason you would choose FOSS over these is you don't believe anyone would pay anything for what you want to make (but they might donate after using it). At this point, if you still choose to develop, then
A) It is a hobby, and the only thing tying you to the project is your interest
B) You can choose between freeware/shareware and FOSS
The game Dwarf Fortress is a good example of freeware. The creators want to retain artistic control over their creation, so they release as closed source software.
In conclusion, if you release source code, then:
* others may improve the product, which benefits you because you are using it
* you may lose artistic control due to fork pressure
If you don't release source code, then:
* you have to do all of the development yourself or through people you hire
* you retain total control over the product
57 comments
[ 4.2 ms ] story [ 76.0 ms ] threadThe problem is that FOSS is part of an equation that has never been properly balanced. The other part of the equation is an economic one and one that has not been thought through. Instead ad hoc and unconvincing explanations have been floated for why FOSS makes money when in fact, as presently constituted, it so often does not and is parasitic on conventional capitalism or state money
It's a rant about the economics of FOSS, not freedom. And you know what? He's right.
It was used successfully on blender, the basic idea is you build what you have to build closed source, the risk is yours. And then when you've built up a following you set your ransom price, the price that has to be met for you to open up the source.
If the product is any good I doubt it would be hard for the author to get his minimum wage and the world would be a better place.
Free software, so many choices :)
It's not free as in beer though.
My point was that many people feel they have a right to the source code. It's not a right at all, no matter what Stallman says.
Of course you have a right to the code if it's free (as in freedom) software - that's the point!. If it isn't you don't. The parent was pointing out that many people feel that they have a right to the source of closed source software because of FOSS. Which they don't.
What about option (3): fix it yourself (or hire someone who can) if it's important to you, which in practical terms means you do need the source.
My point was that many people feel they have a right to the source code. It's not a right at all, no matter what Stallman says.
That's odd. I believe the authors of the software I use on my FreeBSD server claim otherwise.
The beliefs of the developers of FreeBSD, Torvalds, or Stallman do not have to power to null and void several decades of legislation and legal precedent. Again, my original comment was how FOSS seems to have given people the idea that every piece of software should have viewable source.
I've toyed around with the idea of open source. I use open source software. I'm typing this in Firefox running on Ubuntu. I use the GNU compilers, both C and C++. I'm simply trying to say that there is place for both open source and closed source. Given the business I'm in, I will never release open source software, and I expect the software I do write will continue to be protected under various legislation.
- limited audience
- not to be hacked together by a bunch of people without knowledge in the relevant field(s), said knowledge only to be gained by years of study and hard work (think enterprise resource stuff)
- software developed 'in house' (think banking, insurance)
- stuff that isn't 'sexy' and that doesn't give you bragging rights.
The point of this is that the vast majority of ALL the software in use could have been open source.
And woe to you closed source author if one day some group of attic hackers decides to compete with you.
That has happened to many software companies that thought they had found a profitable niche that nobody else was interested in.
If Company X gains $1,000,000 savings due to investing $700,000 in developing a piece of software, they have earned $300,000. Then, they open source the software, and improvements to it by outside contributors result in them saving another $500,000.
Then, Company Y adopts the software and uses it to save $2,000,000. They improve it as well, which results in them saving another $500,000 and Company X saving another $300,000.
Total profit: $3.8m
Compare this to the alternative:
Company X gains $1,000,000 savings due to investing $700,000 in developing a piece of software, they have earned $300,000. Then, they keep the software closed. No contributions are made by outside users.
Then, Company Y writes their own version of the software for $700,000 and uses it to save $1,500,000, less because they don't have the improvements made by outside contributors. They don't have the logic from Company X to combine with theirs, so they don't improve it, and they don't save any extra money. Company X doesn't save money either, since they don't get anything back.
Total profit: $1.1m
Everyone involved made more money in the first situation than the second, despite Company X giving up their source code to be used by other companies as well. This works completely fine under existing systems and requires nobody to arbitrarily throw money at open source for no potential gain.
Open source is the free-market solution to the problem of inefficiency due to competition--everyone implementing their own versions of software and in the end generating a worse result than if they had worked together.
With a contrived example you can prove anything :-)
Also, if you read the article, he doesn't argue that source code should be closed - he argues that it should be paid for.
And the stuff about the source being paid for is a red herring, only a very few licenses prohibit the sale of software (and the GPL explicitly allows it, the only restriction is that if you sell software built with GPL components you must provide the source as well as the object code).
This is an interesting bit of history. Is that a correct description of the history? How many other now "open source" projects began with that kind of initial taxpayer subsidy?
1- http://www.jwz.org/doc/emacs-timeline.html
So firstly, it's free as in freedom. We don't mean free as in cost.
But secondly, if someone pays for some software to be developed and it solves their problem and then they give it away then it's truly free as in cost too. They paid money equivalent to the value they got from it, everyone else rides for free.
And thirdly: ass clown.
This isn't true. It's just exaggerating to make a point.
As a counterexample, http://pysolar.org. I wrote the code for free, because I wanted the experience. You can have it for $0 under the GPL. That's free software.
The truth is more like: "Free software is often subsidized by governments or companies." But so what? So is proprietary software. With that revision, I don't see more than a poorly written rant.
Presumably you think that having a crap at a free public toilet is not free because it takes you time to do it.
It's not arguing that it didn't cost anything. It's arguing that it's his choice whether he wants to cover his costs or give it away for free.
If someone was forced to license their software under the GPL, then the author would have a point. But he doesn't.
You're correct that there was an opportunity cost for me to write the code. I spent a few hundred hours on it, when I might have been programming for money. Fair enough.
But when we talk about whether software is free, the question is either how much is costs to use it (i.e. is it free as in beer?) or what license it uses (i.e is it free as in freedom?).
In this case, the cost to you is $0-- free as in beer-- and the license is the GPL-- free as in freedom. (Perhaps we can omit the GPL vs. BSD argument here.)
A better counter-argument might talk about the opportunity cost for you to use free software.
The author has a point - one I don't sympathize with much, by the way - and he's explaining it clearly. His reward? An alarming number of commentators here on YC smugly calling him an idiot and repeating with tedious condescention the standard talking points on freedom, gratis, etc., advertising nothing much beyond their lack of reading comprehension and a healthy knee-jerk reflex.
I do genuinely think that there are two different costs for software-- the cost to the programmer and the cost to the user. The two costs have no relation to one another.
I agree that you and the original author are both talking about the cost to the programmer when you say that "free software" is not really free, in that the programmer bears an opportunity cost, as you described earlier. That's true. You, the original author, and I all agree on that point.
Where we disagree, I think, is about whether that cost is important. I think that proprietary and free software have roughly the same cost to the programmer, i.e. it takes just as long, just as much effort, to write code, regardless of whether you're getting paid. Since the cost to the programmer is the same for both, it's not a distinguishing feature of free software.
If he just means that there is a cost to create all software, it's an obvious conclusion. I don't think I've ever heard anyone claim otherwise, i.e. that free software is created without time and effort by programmers. That's why I don't find the original argument compelling.
[1] Hard to do well. It's pretty easy to make vague assumptions and proceed from there.
Here is what I understand so far. His primary point is that for a FOSS project it is not easy to have it economically self-sustainable. I believe he is almost correct on this point and counter arguments exist elsewhere in this thread and on the internet. As for whether FOSS is useful or not or how to solve the problem described, he gives no suggestion. However, he does take many cheap shots at RMS and FOSS supporters.
Anyhow, my counterpoint, which I mentioned elsewhere in the thread, is the contribution of FOSS is beyond direct monetary compensation. For organizations FOSS provides cheap, commoditized off-the-shelf parts for internal software projects. For consumers, FOSS allows independence from software producers and system lock-ins. These benefits are real in economic terms and can not simply be waved away.
Pretty much all of the open source stuff that comes out of Google comes out for this reason; they're not in the software sales biz, so if they develop something neat that helps them get things done but is not core to their business, they give it away. Economically speaking it's neutral to positive for them (helps PR quite a bit, and gets programmers invested in the Google ecosystem), and positive for everyone else.
My immediate response to the article: no shit, software takes time to write, even the most hardcore FOSS advocate wouldn't claim otherwise. But once those costs are funded (which they will be if you need the functionality yourself), if there's no money to be made by keeping the results a secret then you should be indifferent to opening it up. Yes, this means that FOSS is driven more by big companies than by basement programmers, because they generate a lot more code, but nobody ever claimed otherwise, except when constructing strawmen to knock down.
I was going to bring up the obvious point that most of the Internet runs on FOSS software (convenient not to mention Apache in a rant like this, arguably the producers of the most successful FOSS in existence), but upon checking, I can't call him out for hypocrisy - check out any non-existent url (for instance, http://www.lambdassociates.org/doesnotexist), at least he's actually drinking the Microsoft Kool-aid as he rails against the poor quality of open source.
I spent a lot of time giving away information. The information was valued but I wasn't making a cent. (In fact, I was paying for the privilege because of web hosting costs and domain names.) I've seen a number of websites that started with giving stuff away and when they became popular enough they turned into commercial ventures and you could no longer get free stuff from them. The websites basically became advertisements for the skills and products they were offering. I also know some very idealistic webmasters who basically are resentful of the time and energy they have spent on their projects and the fact that they aren't making much money, aren't getting the kind of recognition they crave, etc. At some point I decided I did not want that to be me -- and could no longer afford to follow in the footsteps of people like that.
I still want to give information away for free but these days I also want to figure out how to make money at it. Since I am mainly looking to give information away, I think some of the traditional ways of monetizing that should work, such as advertising. I haven't (yet) spent any time pondering how one would make money from open source software. But it seems to me this is an issue that needs a good solution. As I see it, code is basically information and that's always been a tricky thing to effectively commodify.
I was diagnosed late in life with a serious medical condition. Prior to my diagnosis, I was too ill to pursue a paid career. Many of the idealistic, talented and intelligent people I have known who routinely give away their work for free are also handicapped in some way. (Actually, I can't think of anyone who gives away substantial amounts of their time and skill on a regular basis who isn't seriously handicapped in some manner.) If you are handicapped, doing volunteer work has the easy terms that work for you. Moderating a forum, running a website part-time, and so on are things you can do when you feel up to it and no one can force you to be more consistent. And the quality of the work is generally consistent with the fact that you are unreliable, impaired, etc.
So while I still value some of the free resources made available by other people like me, now that I am well enough to work a full time job, I am somewhat less of a bleeding heart. I still think some things need to be "free" -- in terms of rights and also in terms of financial access -- but I think many of these resources would be of better quality than is currently available if the people running them were compensated in some manner. Non-profits don't operate without budgets. They still need money. That money is typically raised from the community based on the idea that the organization is offering something of value. They aren't "beggars". They are just doing work that has human value more than commercial value and therefore needs to be monetized without directly selling services.
But I doubt he would have been as critical of government support for projects had his own efforts been more successful since presumably the university partially supported his research (or at least didn't take the kind of hostile attitude he would have encountered at many corporations).
I think this particular situation shows that there is a difference between having expertise and having an ability to capitalize that expertise. Perhaps had he spent a little more time networking to find people who would be willing to support his ideas, things would have worked out better for him.
Universities are rife with such "idealism", a form of idealism that I increasingly think is misplaced. To try to put it in a nutshell: One requirement for sainthood is that you be persecuted. We seem to think that good people must suffer horribly as a means to prove their goodness. I'm increasingly disenchanted with the idea that one has to martyr oneself to be a good person, whether that means dying for the cause or just not getting paid adequately for your work. I think all that teaches people is that there are only two kinds of people: victims and victimizers and in order to be good you must be a victim because the other choice is intolerable. I have concluded that trying to be "good" by being a willing victim forces others into the role of victimizer even if they don't want to be there. So I believe that if one wants to genuinely do good in the world, one must pursue a paradigm of symbiotic exchange rather than letting people parasitically use you up and playing the role of martyr/victim.
Symbiotic exchange sounds rather like Capitalism. I don't think that means every thing one does has to be in pursuit of the almighty dollar. I haven't been here long, but I'm impressed with the quality of HN so far. I am struck by the fact that it was initially created as a means for people at Y-Combinator to get to know potential applicants -- ie although it's offered as a "free" service, it ultimately is part of their business strategy. It looks to me like this is why HN is a better run forum than many I have participated in which were all-volunteer. HN can't afford to cater to personal peccadilloes and personality quirks of a volunteer staff. It has to meet a certain professional standard. And to the degree that at least some of the members want to apply to Y-Combinator, the participants have motivation as well to remain professional and polite. It is not a good place to indulge in habits that promote flame-wars and the like because the purpose is not merely social. Not everyone here will have such a goal, but it still impacts group culture. An influential minority can go a long way towards shaping community behavior. For some members, there is potentially millions of dollars at stake (if they can get VC from Y-Combinator and launch a highly successful business). It's strong motivation to behave better than what you see in many online forums where everything is idealistically given away "free" and flame-wars and other problems are the rule, not the exception.
The late Erik Naggum had something to say about this:
"I no longer share code with other people by default. My experience and problem-solving abilities have become the bread and butter of my life, not just "fun" until something rewarding comes along. Like many older fans of Free Software and Open Source, I have discovered that it is really only free in the sense that the time you spend on it is worthless. When people refuse to help pay for the roof over your head and your meals when you help them do their well-paying jobs, sooner or later you get seriously pissed."
(http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/e239591cbc...)
There are many, many, many organizations of all types all over the world that use different economic models to fund various different interests. I sing in a choir. We're a non-profit organization and raise money in a variety of ways to pay for music, a professional director, various instrument ensembles, venues to perform in, and people to record the concerts. The choir itself is auditioned, but all volunteer. We spend a few hours per week for fun because it enriches our lives, and as a result people get to come enjoy our concerts. Last spring we performed Mendelssohn's Elijah at Sanders Theater in Harvard Square. Unlikely to happen, but in theory the recording of that concert could become popular, and for a trivial cost via file sharing networks that performance could be listened to by 1 million people all over the world. Demand for those digital copies on that scale might average $0.001/per copy. Not worth it to try and charge for it anyway.
But we aren't a business. There are a few people associated with the choir who are compensated for their work. They are highly trained and skilled and put in more than the typical 3 hours per week. The rest of us are not paid and in fact pay dues. Is it really that different from the way an OSS project might work? 2-3 key maintainers and a hundred other contributors averaging 3-ish hours per week?
According to their website, WCVB-TV supports 484 non-profit organizations in the Boston area. http://cf.thebostonchannel.com/bos/sh/charity/front_charity....
There are many valid ways to fund software projects. Some of those projects turn out to be extremely successful and popular, and in many cases the Open Source nature of the product actually adds real value to end-users. Sure, there is some bad software, but I've used lots of bad software in my life, both free and not-free. The fact that people might be working without the compensation they might deserve in a perfectly balanced economic world is not really a big concern. That's life. It doesn't just apply to software, and the reverse is also true. It is most assuredly the case that some large companies are paying some programmers far more than they theoretically deserve for the software that company sells.
There are things that are better for everyone if the cost is borne by everyone. You could argue that because Linux or Emacs are free (as in beer), there's some sort of circumvention of capitalism going on that robs the economy. But how about the fact that thousands of people now can learn how to run a unix system and write program that would otherwise never have paid to do so? I believe there is a net benefit to society there, just like with publicly funded streets and publicly funded research. It induces activity which otherwise would not happen.
Only the most fundamentalist capitalists would argue that common investments are never good, and this strikes me like the same kind of rant. And I'm sorry, but that doesn't convince me one bit.
* FOSS is great at very small number of things: C compiler (gcc), Operating system (Linux), programming languages (zillions), Apache, MySQL, and a few others.
* FOSS is OK at a certain number of larger areas - relatively simple games (BzTank), office applications (Open Office)
* FOSS is absolutely horrible at new product development. Anyone with a brain and a decent idea that SOME people MIGHT pay for can see that FOSS is inferior to all of these:
The only reason you would choose FOSS over these is you don't believe anyone would pay anything for what you want to make (but they might donate after using it). At this point, if you still choose to develop, then The game Dwarf Fortress is a good example of freeware. The creators want to retain artistic control over their creation, so they release as closed source software.In conclusion, if you release source code, then:
If you don't release source code, then: Now you know!