🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1993Jan10.062319.17213@news2.cis.umn.edu> tyrell@herring.micro.umn.edu (john drexler) writes:
>I have followed the gnu project for some time, and do like (and, I admit, use)
>the products that you have created. However, enough is enough. The PRINCIPLES 
>upon which the gnu project was formed are quite harmful to the software
>industry and software programmers in general.

No kidding.  Stallman intends to destroy the software industry as it now
constitutes itself, and replace it with something different.  In this
new industry, programmers will make a living in a service mode (solving
people's problems) rather than in a product mode (write a hit program,
then retire and collect revenues).

You believe that programmers have an indefinite right to make money as
they now do.  Stallman believes differently.  I'm not a strict GNUist;
I see a role for proprietary software in some cases, but prefer a world
in which as much software is freely distributable as possible.

>	Now YOU develop similar software for free. Which software would you 
>pick as a consumer? A: Joe Schmoe's word processor -- 129.95 or B: Richard 
>Stallman's super-duper gnu processor -- GRATIS. The choice is easy (as far
>as the consumer is concerned, and Joe Schmoe, software developer,  
>gets it directly in the teeth. 

This is the free market in action.  Joe Schmoe has been out-competed.  If
he can write a word processor that is worth $129.95 more to the end user
than Gnu Emacs is, he can sell it.  The effect of FSF at this point is
to place a floor under the level of crap that the software industry can
unload on users; you can't sell a compiler that is vastly worse than gcc
for very long anymore.  This is good for the end user.  It may be bad news
for the budding young software capitalist, but the world doesn't owe you
a living.  

>	All of the above is sad news for the future software developer. Why
>ON EARTH spend 20,000+ on a college education, if the market that you are
>going to go into is being deliberately sabatoged at every turn by some
>person who
>-- out of misguided loyalties -- is periodically dumping products onto the 
>market. I am one these folks, and sorry to say, I do not feel that I am going
>to have the security of an academic umbrella to pay the bills.

Tough.  If you were an expert in manufacturing carriages around 1890,
you'd have similar complaints against the automobile manufacturers.
And even if FSF weren't around, why are you so sure that you'd be making
a lucrative living selling your own software?  It's a lot tougher than
it used to be; most of the skills required have nothing to do with
programming, but rather have to do with marketing, business planning,
user support, and so forth.

--
Joe Buck	jbuck@ohm.berkeley.edu