Re: [tlug] Tux is now in Tokyo ! who wants to get it ?

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Joshua B. writes:

 > > and that general population is quite clearly unwilling to pay the
 > > cost of open source[sic] in many many markets.
 > 
 > I would like to distinguish what the "general population" is willing
 > to do if a free and fair market exists from what a "general
 > population" which is subject to the coersion of government supported
 > monopolies.  People still like free stuff.  I absolutely depend on it.

We know what the general population will do, because a workably free
and fair market does exist in software.  By and large, they choose the
monopolist (see also YouTubeViewers vs. WMG, infra).  And in software,
the government support is hardly creating a true monopoly in software,
merely a monopoly of a particular collection of words on paper.  The
product itself is generally straightforward to mimic.  This is no more
monopolistic than any market with substantial costs of product
development compared to manufacturing and distribution.

 > I simply want to stand up for the grass roots aspects of the free
 > software movement.

I'm sorry, but until it starts costing money, I see the vast majority
of the grass roots of the free software movement being as interested
in freedom as the grass roots of the free multimedia movement are.
Have you noticed how people on YouTube prefer to complain about the
Warner Media Group's aggressive enforcement of copyright rather than
support the huge number of indies who produce art that ranges from
nausea-inducing to as good as anything WMG distributes?  There are a
lot more posts about supporting Heart or the Marshall Tucker Band for
induction into the Rock 'n' Roll Hall of Fame than there are about
supporting indies!

I.e., they want software at price zero far more than they want source.
If it was really about source, Stallman would be pushing for a
requirement to publish copyrighted software in source form along with
a list of related patents as a precondition to being able to sue
people for infringement.  No, it's all about canceling property
rights, and thus allowing anyone to appropriate the fruits of earlier
development effort.[1]  Note that his ultimate goal is a world without
copyright or patent, not a world in which source is open.  (At least
that is what he has always claimed.)


Footnotes: 
[1]  Note that I do not pretend that the property rights involved are
"natural".  There is some sense to the argument for "creator's
rights", but I personally don't think they go much beyond the
inalienable "author's rights" that many jurisdictions provide for.  I
certainly think that the economic prohibition of any copying is
artificial.  But so is software itself; nothing wrong with being
unnatural here!