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I wish these guys worked on sounding less crazy. I agree with their point here: software does stuff we don't like and dot-gov has a responsibility to review thi

I wish these guys worked on sounding less crazy. I agree with their point here: software does stuff we don't like and dot-gov has a responsibility to review third-party code. Linking that to an 'all software must be FOSS' argument starts to get nutty. I make money by selling software. Does that make me a pariah to the FSF? I've never been sure. I still want to donate money to preserve their unique voice, so maybe the answer is that you have to be a little crazy to do their job.

schoen 11y ago
> I make money by selling software. Does that make me a pariah to the FSF? I've never been sure. FSF encourages people to make money by selling software, but their view is that it is unethical to arrange for a user of software not to enjoy the four freedoms with respect to that software. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Free_Software_Definition#The_definition_and_the_Four_Freedoms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Free_Software_Definition#T... If you've arranged for users of your software not to have those four freedoms, FSF finds what you do objectionable and wants you to stop doing it (I don't think "pariah" would be fair).
- krapp 11y ago
  In other words, you can sell software as long as your license allows the user to make as many copies as they like, and give them away for free if they want. I can understand why so many people consider free software to be anti-capitalist in principle.
  - lucb1e 11y ago
    Sounds crazy right? I guess that's why we see so few examples of it being done in practice. However Factorio is a recent example that comes close: I rarely play games but Factorio seems nice. I tried the demo but wasn't sure if I thought it worth 20 euros. I then pirated it from a friend to try out further and a few days later decided to buy the game. I can give people as many copies as I like and yet they sold enough copies to make millions (on a team of 20 people iirc). I also bought the game a second time to gift it to someone.
    - schoen 11y ago
      Do you just mean that Factorio has no DRM, or do the developers explicitly allow you to share it with friends after you purchase it? When the free software movement started, software DRM was an almost entirely unknown issue, and so the focus was on the legal permission to share copies with friends (not the absence of technical means that deter this).
      - lucb1e 11y ago
        No DRM, which of course is a long way from free software, but what I meant to compare is the business model, which is close: you can give it to anyone for free with no chance of being caught.
        Nevermark 11y ago
        If you are legally required to buy a license then most (sane) businesses will pay for the software if they want to use it, whether it has DRM or not, to avoid legal liability. So DRM free success is not evidence of any kind that freeing the software from legal copying restrictions would be successful at all.
        lucb1e 11y ago
        True, that's a good point as well.
  - selestify 11y ago
    Is it not anti-capitalist in principle? It's all about sharing what you have and not keeping things from others. Quite the opposite of DRM and intellectual property.
  - dmm 11y ago
    The 13th amendment to the US constitution outlawed slavery, the buying, selling, and ownership of human beings. Is that anti-capitalist?
    - EliRivers 11y ago
      I suppose it is, yes. Capitalism is the private ownership of the means of production, and given that people can make things, outlawing the ownership of people is anti-capitalist.
      - dmm 11y ago
        In that case it must sometimes be necessary to accept anti-capitalist things to preserve important freedoms.
        Nevermark 11y ago
        Capitalism means free enterprise. People are agents who can sell their services or property or not as they see fit. Unless someone agreed to sell themselves into slavery, slavery is not capitalist. Capitalism doesn't mean money rules, although abuse of a capitalist system often involves money being used to corrupt capitalism. Paying politicians, judges, controlling the media, and other forms of corruption or fraud are often labeled "Capitalist" by anti-capitalists, but those things are not capitalist but abuses. An example of a genuine critique of capitalism (or the limits of it), is to point out that each of us has benefited from our governments social investment in us, such as education, and we should therefore all contribute to educating the next generation. This is not a capitalist arrangement in the sense that individuals are being both given education and required to pay for the next generation without express agreement with each individual. But recognizing the usefulness of some non-capitalist arrangements is not the same as being anti-capitalist. Most people who say they want capitalism to overrule all other concerns are actually people who want their money to overrule other concerns and are deceptively using the name "capitalism" to hide their parasitic agenda.
      - AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
        I think you need to check your premise. People are not a means of production. The means of production are the things that support a producer's ability to produce. Owning a human being means owning the fruits of that person's productive labor, which would imply a non-private ownership of the means of that person's productive achievement.

schoen 11y ago

> I make money by selling software. Does that make me a pariah to the FSF? I've never been sure. FSF encourages people to make money by selling software, but their view is that it is unethical to arrange for a user of software not to enjoy the four freedoms with respect to that software. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Free_Software_Definition#The_definition_and_the_Four_Freedoms https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Free_Software_Definition#T... If you've arranged for users of your software not to have those four freedoms, FSF finds what you do objectionable and wants you to stop doing it (I don't think "pariah" would be fair).

krapp 11y ago
In other words, you can sell software as long as your license allows the user to make as many copies as they like, and give them away for free if they want. I can understand why so many people consider free software to be anti-capitalist in principle.
- lucb1e 11y ago
  Sounds crazy right? I guess that's why we see so few examples of it being done in practice. However Factorio is a recent example that comes close: I rarely play games but Factorio seems nice. I tried the demo but wasn't sure if I thought it worth 20 euros. I then pirated it from a friend to try out further and a few days later decided to buy the game. I can give people as many copies as I like and yet they sold enough copies to make millions (on a team of 20 people iirc). I also bought the game a second time to gift it to someone.
  - schoen 11y ago
    Do you just mean that Factorio has no DRM, or do the developers explicitly allow you to share it with friends after you purchase it? When the free software movement started, software DRM was an almost entirely unknown issue, and so the focus was on the legal permission to share copies with friends (not the absence of technical means that deter this).
    - lucb1e 11y ago
      No DRM, which of course is a long way from free software, but what I meant to compare is the business model, which is close: you can give it to anyone for free with no chance of being caught.
      - Nevermark 11y ago
        If you are legally required to buy a license then most (sane) businesses will pay for the software if they want to use it, whether it has DRM or not, to avoid legal liability. So DRM free success is not evidence of any kind that freeing the software from legal copying restrictions would be successful at all.
        lucb1e 11y ago
        True, that's a good point as well.
- selestify 11y ago
  Is it not anti-capitalist in principle? It's all about sharing what you have and not keeping things from others. Quite the opposite of DRM and intellectual property.
- dmm 11y ago
  The 13th amendment to the US constitution outlawed slavery, the buying, selling, and ownership of human beings. Is that anti-capitalist?
  - EliRivers 11y ago
    I suppose it is, yes. Capitalism is the private ownership of the means of production, and given that people can make things, outlawing the ownership of people is anti-capitalist.
    - dmm 11y ago
      In that case it must sometimes be necessary to accept anti-capitalist things to preserve important freedoms.
      - Nevermark 11y ago
        Capitalism means free enterprise. People are agents who can sell their services or property or not as they see fit. Unless someone agreed to sell themselves into slavery, slavery is not capitalist. Capitalism doesn't mean money rules, although abuse of a capitalist system often involves money being used to corrupt capitalism. Paying politicians, judges, controlling the media, and other forms of corruption or fraud are often labeled "Capitalist" by anti-capitalists, but those things are not capitalist but abuses. An example of a genuine critique of capitalism (or the limits of it), is to point out that each of us has benefited from our governments social investment in us, such as education, and we should therefore all contribute to educating the next generation. This is not a capitalist arrangement in the sense that individuals are being both given education and required to pay for the next generation without express agreement with each individual. But recognizing the usefulness of some non-capitalist arrangements is not the same as being anti-capitalist. Most people who say they want capitalism to overrule all other concerns are actually people who want their money to overrule other concerns and are deceptively using the name "capitalism" to hide their parasitic agenda.
    - AndrewUnmuted 11y ago
      I think you need to check your premise. People are not a means of production. The means of production are the things that support a producer's ability to produce. Owning a human being means owning the fruits of that person's productive labor, which would imply a non-private ownership of the means of that person's productive achievement.