🚀 go-pugleaf

On Thu, 26 Oct 2000 seajays@my-deja.com wrote:

> A good point about Free software.  However, the ideals being put
> forward simply will not work in our Western, economy driven, capitalist
> society.  Corporations will simply want to take any advantage that they
> can, and if source code was free, the larger corporations would simply
> be able to squash any competition by using any code, from anywhere.
> Even if a small company had produced something unique, any advantage
> that that gave them in competing with the 'big boys' would vanish.  And
> with it the small companies would vanish.  Far from helping creativity,
> it would actually make it impossible for smaller companies to compete.
> 
> Now of course, if you're advocating changing the entire economic system
> and eradicating capitalism, then it would be a different story - and I
> may find myself supporting the argument for open source code.  :-)

You have completely misunderstood what Open Source is about. There is
nothing to support a communist or otherwise socialist ideal in the Open
Source paradigm. Indeed Open Source/Free Software is a product of
capitalist societies.

Perhaps you'd care to review the last three years history of Red Hat Inc
and SuSE GmBH to name but two companies that are based entirely upon the
Open Source/Free Software ideals.

Most computing companies are now basing their business plans on services
and support rather than direct supply of systems and software - IBM being
a case in point. That is where the money is regardless of your choice of
licensing.

What Open Source/Free Software offers is more freedom to the user of the
software to ensure that it meets their needs.

Consider how less likely to result in the waste of millions of pounds of
tax payers the recent government computing disasters would have been had
the systems in question not been licensed in such a manner that only
competing private companies had access to the source code for the
projects.

Small companies have always had to compete at something of a disadvantage
to larger ones. Generally this is resolved by offering a more personal
service and/or servicing niche markets. There is no reason this should be
any different in the world of software production.

Jason Clifford