4 ms·

Maybe folks have answers to these concerns, but every time I’ve seen that Stallmanesque messaging over the past 20/25 years or so, I have the same doubts. (And

Maybe folks have answers to these concerns, but every time I’ve seen that Stallmanesque messaging over the past 20/25 years or so, I have the same doubts. (And I have a full time job making FOSS at a university all day.) From a US perspective, I’d more likely agree if we were even sorta good at handling displaced or obsoleted workers. Abolishing software patents without making a bunch of other changes would be a giant hit to the American economy and kill many productive worker’s livelihoods with no follow-up. It’s wrong to do to folks driving truck and it’s wrong to do to commercial software developers and all the other folks who make their living in that industry. Beyond that, lots of technically boring, unsexy software is super important to the world, and the open source alternatives prove that folks just don’t want to work on those problems for free, especially when there are demanding/intricate/fussy interface requirements. The number of instances in which FOSS properly catered to non-technical users with advanced use cases while delivering fantastic usability is pretty low from what I gather. For example, with the art software I work with professionally, Blender’s comparatively recent changes got them there to some extent, but anyone who thinks gimp is a usable replacement for photoshop hasn’t used either enough to make that judgement. People might even get mad you intimating there’s something to fix. Big corps like IBM won’t pay people to write FOSS all day unless there’s a financial incentive. I can picture all enterprise software now being so complicated and convoluted to install that procuring expensive services is the only way to use it. Or maybe requiring custom hardware to perform necessary parts of a process. Maybe even abandoning software altogether and making things mechanical again? Not that computing is perfectly green, but how would that work out for the environment? I’d love to get pushback on any of this if folks have thoughts. Personally I’d love to see a world where intellectual property just wasn’t a thing… but we don’t live in that world and intellectual property laws are not the biggest barrier to achieving it. It just seems like a super naive demand that assumes software operates in a vacuum and that parity between commercial and open source offerings is even possible in our economic system. (Downvotes aren’t counterarguments)

zzo38computer 5y ago
> prove that folks just don’t want to work on those problems for free Well, some people do want to work on such problems for free, even if not everyone does. > Maybe even abandoning software altogether and making things mechanical again? There are some advantages to such a thing, since computers are overused for many things. However, a computer is still useful for many things; mechanical isn't better for everything. > Not that computing is perfectly green, but how would that work out for the environment? That I don't know, but should probably be considered too. However, often companies put too much extra stuff in computer programs that is used even if you do not want it, which also wastes energy. > Personally I’d love to see a world where intellectual property just wasn’t a thing… I agree to abolish copyright/patents (although trademarks can be useful, but still there are things that should not be sued for trademark infringement, so it still needs to be fixed due to this). But, there are also ways to go part way toward abolishing copyrights and patents; Question Copyright had some ideas. Another idea would be limiting their scope so that if it has freedom then it can be ignored, or to be ignored for practical works, to limit durations, other changes, etc. Another idea would be that if you declare yourself exempt then you can neither claim copyright or patents on anything but neither can be sued or arrested for it, either. However, I think it would be much better to abolish copyright and patent laws entirely.
- chefandy 5y ago
  “Well, some people do want to work on such problems for free, even if not everyone does.“ It’s not whether anyone does, it’s whether enough people do. In FOSS I don’t see evidence of any large project getting significant usability work for free. Firefox, likely the most popular user-facing FOSS application, it’s essentially adware via a nonprofit. Blender’s foundation has significant support from corporations. There are people working on those problems for FOSS but they’re likely paid, and that’s just not feasible for most FOSS. Also, freeness in our society can have unintended consequences— the way news organizations are forced to operate because they can’t easily be directly compensated for their work (because people expect it to be free) is a huge problem. I can’t imagine software being any different in today’s context. Beyond that, most FOSS is entirely developer-managed and project decisions reflect that bias. To this day, many folks think the only problem with git’s interface is its users unwillingness to read the documentation. Literally zero people who aren’t software developers— including the copywriters, project managers, designers, support people, etc. who end up also having to use it— would agree. There are certainly usability advantages with many hardware applications over software replacements but being able to use generic logic hardware to control things is a pretty huge advantage. Most folks don’t realize how resource-intensive manufacturing is. I haven’t run the numbers, but I’ll bet a few extra PCBs would equal a whole lot of software bloat. Hardware is also vastly less flexible, and as a result would probably be significantly less efficient to create. I haven’t run any numbers though. I often advocate for drastically scaling back copyrights— especially in media and software. Their current state is absurd. Forgive my hyperbole to emphasize the dichotomy: Abolishing software patents, however, seems like fighting America’s imperialist behaviors by demanding an immediate disarmament of the country, entirely. I’d love that if our world was in a state that could facilitate that without immediately being overtaken by China… that wouldn’t be better for anybody.

zzo38computer 5y ago

> prove that folks just don’t want to work on those problems for free Well, some people do want to work on such problems for free, even if not everyone does. > Maybe even abandoning software altogether and making things mechanical again? There are some advantages to such a thing, since computers are overused for many things. However, a computer is still useful for many things; mechanical isn't better for everything. > Not that computing is perfectly green, but how would that work out for the environment? That I don't know, but should probably be considered too. However, often companies put too much extra stuff in computer programs that is used even if you do not want it, which also wastes energy. > Personally I’d love to see a world where intellectual property just wasn’t a thing… I agree to abolish copyright/patents (although trademarks can be useful, but still there are things that should not be sued for trademark infringement, so it still needs to be fixed due to this). But, there are also ways to go part way toward abolishing copyrights and patents; Question Copyright had some ideas. Another idea would be limiting their scope so that if it has freedom then it can be ignored, or to be ignored for practical works, to limit durations, other changes, etc. Another idea would be that if you declare yourself exempt then you can neither claim copyright or patents on anything but neither can be sued or arrested for it, either. However, I think it would be much better to abolish copyright and patent laws entirely.

chefandy 5y ago
“Well, some people do want to work on such problems for free, even if not everyone does.“ It’s not whether anyone does, it’s whether enough people do. In FOSS I don’t see evidence of any large project getting significant usability work for free. Firefox, likely the most popular user-facing FOSS application, it’s essentially adware via a nonprofit. Blender’s foundation has significant support from corporations. There are people working on those problems for FOSS but they’re likely paid, and that’s just not feasible for most FOSS. Also, freeness in our society can have unintended consequences— the way news organizations are forced to operate because they can’t easily be directly compensated for their work (because people expect it to be free) is a huge problem. I can’t imagine software being any different in today’s context. Beyond that, most FOSS is entirely developer-managed and project decisions reflect that bias. To this day, many folks think the only problem with git’s interface is its users unwillingness to read the documentation. Literally zero people who aren’t software developers— including the copywriters, project managers, designers, support people, etc. who end up also having to use it— would agree. There are certainly usability advantages with many hardware applications over software replacements but being able to use generic logic hardware to control things is a pretty huge advantage. Most folks don’t realize how resource-intensive manufacturing is. I haven’t run the numbers, but I’ll bet a few extra PCBs would equal a whole lot of software bloat. Hardware is also vastly less flexible, and as a result would probably be significantly less efficient to create. I haven’t run any numbers though. I often advocate for drastically scaling back copyrights— especially in media and software. Their current state is absurd. Forgive my hyperbole to emphasize the dichotomy: Abolishing software patents, however, seems like fighting America’s imperialist behaviors by demanding an immediate disarmament of the country, entirely. I’d love that if our world was in a state that could facilitate that without immediately being overtaken by China… that wouldn’t be better for anybody.