🚀 go-pugleaf

Miles O'Neal writes about the GPL:
 > [...] there are some problems with your "limitations" upon what I can
 > do.
 > 
 > 1) If I release good, quality software, that meets a real need, that doesn't
 > need lots of support (I *said* quality*), with good documentation, then
 > why on earth would people buy it if they could get it free?

Forget it.  Even quality software needs support.  Ask the authors of C
news.  Ask the authors of your favorite piece of software.  You cannot
possibly anticipate everything that the users will want, even if your
code is completely bug free.  And when you start adding things that the
users want, you will inevitably introduce bugs.  There will be a market
for software maintenance, believe it.

 > 2) A lot of other people, such as 103% of all the MIS-heads in the world,
 > are going to lump it in with all that "public domain bulletin board stuff"-
 > useless garbage and probably full of viruses, or at least nasty bugs (their
 > perceptions, not mine). They would summarily have someone on their staff
 > shot who even LET the stuff in the door.

And the guarantees you get with commercial software are any better?  No
warranty, no guarantee that the software will do anything at all or let
alone be fit for the advertised purpose, nothing.

By the way, if you're using this same virus-ridden, buggy free software
that your MIS customers loathe to develop your product, how can you
guarantee that the software you deliver doesn't suffer from the same
maladies?  If they knew you were using such software in your operations,
would they still want to buy your product?

 > This does NOT appear to give me a good chance at making any decent living
 > (ie, lower middle class income or above) off the software.

Software isn't the only thing that a computer professional is capable of
producing!  For a given task, the right hardware must be chosen, and
installed.  The right software must be chosen and installed.  Users must
be educated as to how to use the software.  Software must be maintained.
Software must be maintained.  Software must be maintained.  (The
repetition is intentional.)  Hardware must be monitored and maintained.
As needs change, the above cycle repeats.

What I want to know is why you would want more of a free lunch.  You can
get GNU software for the cost of making a copy, and yet you don't seem
to want to give anything back.  The beauty of sharing is that if
everyone shares, EVERYONE gets more than they give.  If I write a neat
program and post it to the net, and N others do the same, I get N neat
programs despite the fact I only wrote one.  And so does everyone else.

And this is a Bad Thing?  To me, a bad thing is taking, and taking, and
taking without giving anything in return.  So the GPL forces your hand a
little... ah well, there are alternatives to using FSF code.

In my mind, the whole point of the FSF is to encourage software sharing,
The idea to make software freely distributible so that more people can
receive the benefits of the software itself, rather than money made from
the sale of the software.  Software is the end, not the means.  A very
different point of view than that of a software vendor.

kyle jones   <kjones@talos.uu.net>   ...!uunet!talos!kjones