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That's a really interesting way of thinking about it. I'm so far not willing to switch away from the Mac because of the app ecosystem, and it's largely because

That's a really interesting way of thinking about it. I'm so far not willing to switch away from the Mac because of the app ecosystem, and it's largely because of small, Mac-only applications with just one or two developers. (I also really do like the macOS UX, even if Big Sur gives me more nits to pick, but I'm sure I could adjust to something else.) The big issue, I guess, is that social/psychological phenomenon you're referring to. I've noticed on HN that when discussions come up about how creators -- artists, fiction writers, journalists, filmmakers, etc. -- are or should be compensated for their work, there is a very loud contingent that invariably pops up arguing, in effect, that creators shouldn't expect any compensation at all. "Nobody is owed a living," and "if they really want to create, they'll do it for free." I can't help but suspect that is also a pretty big stumbling block for funding the creation of free software: everyone philosophically appreciates the free as in speech aspect, but an awful lot of free software consumers seem to be pretty in love with the free as in beer aspect, too.

danShumway 5y ago
> but an awful lot of free software consumers seem to be pretty in love with the free as in beer aspect, too. I do think it's legitimately a shift in thinking, I think that people are not accustomed to actually thinking about why they're paying money -- both in Open Source and with proprietary apps. It's in some ways to Open Source's credit that it rejects the notion that the only way to fund software is through artificial scarcity of the finished product. There is some debate in Open Source communities about whether rejecting that kind of funding is ultimately a sustainable strategy. And I won't weigh in on that other than to really make it clear that what I'm talking about is not embracing that we need more paywalls in Open Source. I get my Open Source software free as in speech, but I also get it free as in beer. I am not paying for the software, the software is free. I'm at the point with a lot of this stuff where I won't pay the software, it feels weird to do so. What I am paying for is someone to continue developing the software, I'm paying for someone to devote a few extra minutes towards making the things I am heavily reliant on better. And I'm paying that monthly because at the start of each month, I still want however many minutes of development time my money can buy. I am not paying for Krita, I am paying for a dedicated team of developers who have thought way more than me about the architecture and UX of Krita, to make Krita's animation system support motion tweening. When you internalize what you're paying for, it becomes a lot less about "paying what you owe" or "not being a leech" (although of course there are also moral/social aspects to donations as well). It's just realizing that it wouldn't take much money to greatly increase the amount of development time these projects get, and for many of these projects, that increased development time could permanently solve some tangible problems in my life, and I want that. The current Patreon page for Tiled is a good example of this: https://www.patreon.com/bjorn https://www.patreon.com/bjorn I use Tiled for 100% of my current mapmaking, even for commercial products that I'm developing. Tiled is free (as in speech and beer), I don't pay for it. But... 222 people donating collectively $2,000 a month mean this developer now has an office where he works on Tiled for 2 days a week. And as a result, I'm observing that Tiled is getting more development and releasing new features that I care about. Tiled already does a lot of stuff that I care about, and I would like it to be what I use for mapmaking indefinitely. Forget morals or responsibility or anything, 222 people donating around $10 a month is enough to ensure that something exists that would never otherwise exist at the same level of quality and with the same software freedoms, and that it's good enough that I can realistically use it on commercial products. That is a bargain, and it didn't take much collective action to make it happen, and it could get even better in the future. There are problems in the Linux ecosystem that we could permanently solve by even just temporarily as a community dumping money onto the developers working on them, and it wouldn't be that expensive to do.

danShumway 5y ago

> but an awful lot of free software consumers seem to be pretty in love with the free as in beer aspect, too. I do think it's legitimately a shift in thinking, I think that people are not accustomed to actually thinking about why they're paying money -- both in Open Source and with proprietary apps. It's in some ways to Open Source's credit that it rejects the notion that the only way to fund software is through artificial scarcity of the finished product. There is some debate in Open Source communities about whether rejecting that kind of funding is ultimately a sustainable strategy. And I won't weigh in on that other than to really make it clear that what I'm talking about is not embracing that we need more paywalls in Open Source. I get my Open Source software free as in speech, but I also get it free as in beer. I am not paying for the software, the software is free. I'm at the point with a lot of this stuff where I won't pay the software, it feels weird to do so. What I am paying for is someone to continue developing the software, I'm paying for someone to devote a few extra minutes towards making the things I am heavily reliant on better. And I'm paying that monthly because at the start of each month, I still want however many minutes of development time my money can buy. I am not paying for Krita, I am paying for a dedicated team of developers who have thought way more than me about the architecture and UX of Krita, to make Krita's animation system support motion tweening. When you internalize what you're paying for, it becomes a lot less about "paying what you owe" or "not being a leech" (although of course there are also moral/social aspects to donations as well). It's just realizing that it wouldn't take much money to greatly increase the amount of development time these projects get, and for many of these projects, that increased development time could permanently solve some tangible problems in my life, and I want that. The current Patreon page for Tiled is a good example of this: https://www.patreon.com/bjorn https://www.patreon.com/bjorn I use Tiled for 100% of my current mapmaking, even for commercial products that I'm developing. Tiled is free (as in speech and beer), I don't pay for it. But... 222 people donating collectively $2,000 a month mean this developer now has an office where he works on Tiled for 2 days a week. And as a result, I'm observing that Tiled is getting more development and releasing new features that I care about. Tiled already does a lot of stuff that I care about, and I would like it to be what I use for mapmaking indefinitely. Forget morals or responsibility or anything, 222 people donating around $10 a month is enough to ensure that something exists that would never otherwise exist at the same level of quality and with the same software freedoms, and that it's good enough that I can realistically use it on commercial products. That is a bargain, and it didn't take much collective action to make it happen, and it could get even better in the future. There are problems in the Linux ecosystem that we could permanently solve by even just temporarily as a community dumping money onto the developers working on them, and it wouldn't be that expensive to do.