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Unfortunately many people seem to expect free software, free support, and features they want added for free, without expecting to contribute or join the communi

Unfortunately many people seem to expect free software, free support, and features they want added for free, without expecting to contribute or join the community themselves. This imbalance (imho) puts extra burden on open source devs and is where the issues happen. :/

fhy45678 8y ago
Are there any parallels in other industries where the fruit of labor is given away for free?
krapp 8y ago
The expectation to join a community or to contribute as a cost for using FOSS code is a limitation on user freedom which goes against the free software ethos. If one wants to contribute back, one is free to, but one is equally free not to. Developers are also free to support software however they choose, or fork and add whatever features upstream refuses to add themselves. If developers want to release code under a nonfree license that requires reciprocation then that's what they should do.
- sramsay 8y ago
  > The expectation to join a community or to contribute as a cost for using FOSS code is a limitation on user freedom which goes against the free software ethos. It's really hard to argue with this. But I'm not sure "freedom to be an asshole" (to state the extreme case) is the primary ethical good that is being sought -- particularly since one could easily restate the freedoms of, say, the GPL in negative terms. You are not free to redistribute the program without its source, you are not free to use the software without accepting the terms of the license, you are not free to not indemnify the authors of the software against lawsuit over fitness for a particular purpose, and so forth. But what this does imply is that however you slice it, fixing this problem involves ethical coercion. You can only try to persuade people (and companies) that it would be better to behave a certain way. You can't force them to do so.

fhy45678 8y ago

Are there any parallels in other industries where the fruit of labor is given away for free?

krapp 8y ago

The expectation to join a community or to contribute as a cost for using FOSS code is a limitation on user freedom which goes against the free software ethos. If one wants to contribute back, one is free to, but one is equally free not to. Developers are also free to support software however they choose, or fork and add whatever features upstream refuses to add themselves. If developers want to release code under a nonfree license that requires reciprocation then that's what they should do.

sramsay 8y ago
> The expectation to join a community or to contribute as a cost for using FOSS code is a limitation on user freedom which goes against the free software ethos. It's really hard to argue with this. But I'm not sure "freedom to be an asshole" (to state the extreme case) is the primary ethical good that is being sought -- particularly since one could easily restate the freedoms of, say, the GPL in negative terms. You are not free to redistribute the program without its source, you are not free to use the software without accepting the terms of the license, you are not free to not indemnify the authors of the software against lawsuit over fitness for a particular purpose, and so forth. But what this does imply is that however you slice it, fixing this problem involves ethical coercion. You can only try to persuade people (and companies) that it would be better to behave a certain way. You can't force them to do so.