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Iritscen wrote:

I won't revisit each point that I think was missed, but I will respond to StaticAge's response to #10.  You indicate that if jobs are being taken by people working for free, that's the market's problem.  If I was picking up immigrants to work on my construction jobs (if I were in construction), and paying them nothing, let alone below minimum wage (and for some reason that was okay with them), I don't think most people would just say, "So what if it's taking others' work? Tough, it's the market, find another job, you people who want to work for money."

Thats apples and oranges to what the situation you were describing was.

If I am a carpenter and I set my wages at $100 an hour and everybody else is willing to work for $8 an hour, when I dont get hired, it isnt their fault- the problem is that the market will not bear my excessive price and there is no demand for my services.

Or if I decided I was going to make a job for myself; I want to be a professional Opinion Giver, where I offer my point of view for everything, and you need to pay me decent wages for this- is it really unfair to me if you ignore me and listen to all the other millions of people who offer you their opinion free of charge? No! The fact is that there simply is no market for the position I want to be in.

If there are less jobs for any trade because there are too many workers, what happens is wages go down because people are willing to take less money so they can work, and people who cant get a job have to move on. Thats just the way it works, it has nothing to do with making sure everyone gets to do what they want to or owing anyone a living.

Chickenhawk wrote:

FOSS can also spur innovation and competition. Take web browsers in general. It was the success of Firefox and other browsers that got Microsoft to improve Internet Explorer, which it previously allowed to stagnate

"improve"?

Hehe. Well, IE7 did get tabbed browsing, improved (albeit still imperfect) alpha-transparent PNG support, and, in Vista, improved security (sandboxing of some sort, I think). IE is planned to finally get standards-compliant rendering with version 8. Even disregarding IE, the browsers have some great competition amongst each other, and as a result we have some very good browsers to choose from.

Last edited by Macskeeball (2008-11-23 7:39 pm)

resedit wrote:

If people volunteered to work in your fields in free, there's nothing illegal about that.

Perhaps I muddied my point by mentioning minimum wage.  My point was that people complain about that because they feel it's unfair that illegals are actually getting paid below minimum at times, at other times getting paid a salary that your average, established American simply cannot live off of.  I was proposing that it could be considered even more unfair to work for free when someone else needs to use their skills to make money at a level that supports them.  Of course, from a certain standpoint (a compassion-less one), one can always say, "There's other kinds of jobs out there, and many don't require degrees or years of training, so just switch to another career."

StaticAge wrote:

If there are less jobs for any trade because there are too many workers, what happens is wages go down because people are willing to take less money so they can work, and people who cant get a job have to move on. Thats just the way it works, it has nothing to do with making sure everyone gets to do what they want to or owing anyone a living.

I still think there's a fundamental difference between taking some pay (which implies that you are living off that pay, at least in conjunction with another job), and taking no pay.  That being said, resedit's point about some programmers getting paid to develop FOSS is a good one.  I am not aware of the extent to which that's done, although I guess I knew that Sun was paying for OO.o to be developed.  Let's face it, though, that could be considered a fluke owing to the fact that Sun might just want to stick it to M$ (who doesn't?).

zeitgeist wrote:

If a big name company (like, for example, Microsoft)

Hold on there, though.  Corporations don't have to be as big as MS, some "corporations" are quite small.  Both big and little guys could be considered equally affected by FOSS alternatives to their software.  I don't give two hoots about MS, but there's some guys out there trying to build a company on software, and I'd hate to be them if a FOSS version of their project comes along and cuts them off at the knees.

Also, a point I meant to respond to last time -- someone said that a handy script shouldn't be tariffed.  I was proposing that FOSS that competes with commercial software be tariffed, which generally implies stuff at least a level above a handy script that some guy might write and then release on the Net.

Macskeeball wrote:

Frankly, I don't see how it's possible in the first place for a government to restrict FOSS in an Internet age

That's not really the point, though.  Besides, I could say the same thing about (illegal) file sharing.  It may not ever be totally defeatable, but the gov't can stil fight it, by prosecuting individuals here and there hoping to set an example.  Not a pretty thought, but there it is.

My point was that people complain about that because they feel it's unfair that illegals are actually getting paid below minimum at times

Note the adjective "illegals"

No employer should pay below minimum for paid employment.
If a legal worker is willing to work for minimum, he should be allowed to.
The problem with illegal immigrants is that there are then far too many people willing to work for lower wages, resulting in many citizens who can't find work.
It is particularly bad in construction, where now many places will not hire you if you do not speak Spanish. Their construction crews are all Spanish speaking and English speakers can't effectively communicate.

They generally speak Spanish because they are illegal immigrants, most Latins born in the US (even from immigrant parents) speak English, and often, speak it better than they speak Spanish. Legal immigrants almost always seek to learn English as soon as they are here, and often before they are here.

Don't let's get on that subject, resedit, I would gladly start agreeing with you and then begin ranting about the overuse of Spanish by companies in the U.S. that is only adding to the problem of their not learning ESL.

Back on the subject, I still think FOSS is an interesting situation that doesn't exist in other fields than programming, as far as my (possibly feverish) mind can think right now (no really, might be coming down with something).  If someone could point out some analogous things in other occupations, I'd appreciate it.  It's like an artist being told, "Sorry, no need to buy your work, this other guy's about as good and does it for free, and he can hand-paint infinite copies of each of his works, so the supply meets all the demand.  Try back after he's dead."

It seems like FOSS continues to pop up in more and more places, by which I mean, it provides more and more services for free that used to be the domain of shareware and commercialware.  Of course, companies have that whole "tech support" advantage, at least if they're doing their job right.  Perhaps it's the small guy who suffers the most in this situation because he can't offer better support than the FOSS developers.

Iritscen wrote:

Back on the subject, I still think FOSS is an interesting situation that doesn't exist in other fields than programming, as far as my (possibly feverish) mind can think right now (no really, might be coming down with something).  If someone could point out some analogous things in other occupations, I'd appreciate it.  It's like an artist being told, "Sorry, no need to buy your work, this other guy's about as good and does it for free, and he can hand-paint infinite copies of each of his works, so the supply meets all the demand.  Try back after he's dead."

Its similar (though not quite the same, as I pay $37 annually in memberships) to how academic journals work. While I can't take another researcher's ideas as my own, I can build on their ideas to further my own research. All that is asked is that I cite them, which is very similar to how FOSS works.

radarman wrote:

I don't get the desire to stop people from giving away something they have worked on. It makes no sense, unless there is a anti-consumer ulterior motive. Dumping, or selling a product for less than it costs to manufacture is illegal, so I suppose there is some precedent.

I've felt a bit funny tonight thinking about big companies paying for free software... now I remember why.  Because it's exactly what you mentioned: "dumping".  I'm not proposing anything anti-consumer by suggesting software should cost something; I'm suggesting (only suggesting) the current presence of an anti-capitalist motive.  The big companies have the money to be able to afford to make such software and give it away, but they only do it because they do have something to gain from it: market share.  Or name recognition.  Something that serves their interests.  It's a suspicious situation depending on how you view it; try not to think purely from the consumer's standpoint when there are larger issues involved.  I know it's convenient for all of us to not have to pay for stuff, so that tends to cloud our judgment sometimes as to looking squarely at who's paying for that free stuff.

Chickenhawk wrote:

While I can't take another researcher's ideas as my own, I can build on their ideas to further my own research.

Okay, good point.  I get the impression once again that FOSS is at its most useful and beneficial when it serves as a building block rather than an end product in and of itself.

Speaking of FLOSS as a building block, I imagine it must be great for new developers. It gives them an existing codebase to apply their new skills to, or if they start a project from scratch, they get to learn from others' improvements on their code. Either way, they gain experience.

The GPL also has a viral nature, meaning that if you use GPL code and then distribute your code, you have to distribute your code under the GPL as well. Now, think then what that means for companies who want to use GPLed code to get the benefit of the building block. It means what they release has to be GPL as well, which makes it FLOSS.

Iritscen wrote:

I still think there's a fundamental difference between taking some pay (which implies that you are living off that pay, at least in conjunction with another job), and taking no pay...

I suppose so- it means you either have a job, or you dont.

If some company made some huge ridiculous product no one wants to pay for but would rather get for free its not the case that the market owes that stupid company any money for making an unpopular product. It doesnt matter what made it unpopular, its just supply and demand. All the people who make the dumb product no one wants to pay for have to simply find new jobs, no one owes it to them to ensure that they get a lucrative career out of making stuff no one wants to pay for.

Iritscen wrote:

I'm not proposing anything anti-consumer by suggesting software should cost something; I'm suggesting (only suggesting) the current presence of an anti-capitalist motive.  The big companies have the money to be able to afford to make such software and give it away, but they only do it because they do have something to gain from it: market share.  Or name recognition.  Something that serves their interests.  It's a suspicious situation depending on how you view it; try not to think purely from the consumer's standpoint when there are larger issues involved.  I know it's convenient for all of us to not have to pay for stuff, so that tends to cloud our judgment sometimes as to looking squarely at who's paying for that free stuff.

What? Why cry about capitalism? Yeah, some things are non-capitalist, theres nothing wrong with that.

On the other hand, what you are describing is a purely capitalist strategy, which you seem to be upset over because it serves the company's own interests... as opposed to whose? Either you want capitalism or you dont, but remember that capitalism does not care about who wins or who loses and the bottom line is that the people win at the expense of the people at the bottom. Thats just the way its set up.

So you dont like the way some get ahead at others expense? Well, blame it on capitalism.

You dont like anti-capitalism? Oh well, capitalism cant solve everything. Thank goodness.

Well, I hope I wasn't confusing anybody by using that term "anti-capitalism".  Wikipedia reminds me that "anti-capitalism" refers to schools of thought that are not capitalist.  I just meant, anti-capitalistic practices.  Like what Microsoft gets in trouble for from time to time.  That's what I was insinuating.

And yes, it still comes down to a question of what's fair, to some degree.  Capitalism is indeed not built on the principle of being fair to everyone all the time, you are quite right.  I do think that there are always negative societal effects of unfair business practices though, so I'm not arguing solely for the sake of the shareware programmer and the smaller corporation, but for the society that is given free cake when there are benefits for all to having to pay for the cake.

Iritscen wrote:

I'm not arguing solely for the sake of the shareware programmer and the smaller corporation, but for the society that is given free cake when there are benefits for all to having to pay for the cake.

You have yet to prove your point.

Imagine soemone wants to start a business with Pay Toilets. But what if no one wants to pay for using a toilet, and everytime they set up a Pay Toilet, wouldnt you know, people are letting strangers use their own personal toilets to avoid the Pay Toilets. Everyone thinks the Pay Toilets are a bad idea and they protest it by refusing to use it.

Your argument seems to be like so:

But Pay Toilets have workers who need to be paid, and every time people let others use the toilet for free they are hurting Pay Toilets- where are the Pay Toilet manufactures to go? And Pay Toilets come with all kinds of awesome features, like warranties, and documentation, they are so clean, and smell nice- they are obviously superior to non-pay toilets. Therefore it is obvious that free toilets are harmful to the economy.

Do you see the flaws in this line of thinking?

Also note that with GPL code, you may contact the owner of that code and arrange for an alternate license.
When you release software as GPL it is still your code and you can sell (or give) others the right to use it under a different license.