Belinda is concerned

Michael Wilson mjw7739-/E1597aS9LQAvxtiuMwx3w at public.gmane.org
Wed Mar 17 02:38:41 UTC 2004


When I claim that opensource flies in the face of
capitalism, I am referring to profit driven software
companies that feel incredibly threatened by
opensource software. It is apparent by the public
stance that many companies have taken against
opensource. Obviously companies like Microsoft feel
threatened by opensource, and they should. It provides
faster, more easliy customizable business platforms,
and all for free.

Capitalist societies are profit driven and it has long
been held that profits drive technological innovation.
Yet Opensource threatens to destabilize the profit
driven business model of software companies as Linux
becomes more pervasive in business applications. I
dont think that profit driven companies are just going
to lay down and die, and I also do not think that
Opensource will be able to remain in its current
state.

It has been widely proposed that some sort of hybrid
between opensource and proprietary software will
emerge in the coming years, in what form, I do not
know. A potentially comparable arrangement would be
the pharmaceutical industry whereby companies develop
medical drugs to profit, yet also help the great good
of mankind (1).

The biggest anti-GPLers are clearly against the clause
in the license that states that any code added to a
GPLed product must distributed under the GPL as well.
>From a capitalist perspective this would be considered
theft of intellectual property, from a science
perspective this seen as promoting the greater good
(1). It is not clear who will win the debate. 

Capitalism exists to create wealth, but wealth does
not necessarily come in a monetary form. Wealth can
come from one man learning something from another, as
with Linux (2). Profit driven corporations however
would like to argue this point and claim that wealth
as it relates to capitalism is monetary, and that with
an ever growing number of corporations turning to
Linux and the GPL, profit driven software companies
are left in the dust. It will be interesting to see
the outcome of the debate in a few years time.

A capitalist-open source hybrid is being attempted by
companies like Novell, IBM, and Borland who are trying
to find out how to make a profit from Linux (3). It
will remain to be seen if their model works.

By the way, I claim to be no expert, and if I am
completely misinformed or you would like to further
debate the future of opensource then I look forward to
hearing opinions, but lets keep it friendly ;)

References:
1.
http://www.internetnews.com/bus-news/article.php/766141
2. http://www.freeos.com/articles/4133/
3.
http://www.networkingpipeline.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleId=17500484

 --- Lloyd Budd <lloyd-fEEwcc3XMu8jODpR/OX0VQ at public.gmane.org> wrote: >
Please elaborate. ?
> 
> 
> On 16-Mar-04, at 16:21, Michael Wilson wrote:
> > Opensource does fly in the face of capitalism,
> however great it is.
> 
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