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Let us talk when things like Google search and Watson are built from scratch for free. If sharing the source code for Google does no harm, why have they not do

Let us talk when things like Google search and Watson are built from scratch for free. If sharing the source code for Google does no harm, why have they not done it? Another radical example: Github. Why is the source for Github not open or free? Why are they not sharing that with us? Surely a company so invested in open (and to a large extent free) software must know better right?

teddyh 13y ago
I would argue that some free software projects can be compared to Google search and Watson. Sharing the source to Google would be better for society, but a bit bad for Google, and since Google decides, they are deciding not to. The same goes for Github. It’s the collective action problem.
- cscurmudgeon 13y ago
  You have good intentions that are not realistic. Your model would work if everyone is selfless, honest and moral. Everyone has to be a perfect moral machine. More concretely: free software always mimics commercial software badly after someone takes risk building it. No free software is comparable to Google or Watson in both technical capability and market results. They need 100s to 1000s of PhDs working full time. These PhDs have already slaved off in academia for years. If software should not be treated as property, nothing else should be!
  - teddyh 13y ago
    I think you are projecting; what is my "model"? Why would it fail? > free software always mimics commercial software badly One could argue against this, but let’s assume that it is true. Does this have anything to do with the necessity of allowing software makers to forbid the sharing of software? Are you arguing that it is impossible to make money with software which is not forbidden to share, when lots of people are doing it today? Let’s say the world stopped allowing ideas and other non-rivalrous goods to be considered property. Would the world still need software? Yes. Would the world still need people to write software? Yes. Would the world be willing to pay people to write software they need? Obviously yes.
    - cscurmudgeon 13y ago
      >One could argue against this, but let’s assume that it is true. Hmm. It is true. Which free software are people using to search more than Google search? Which free software won Jeopardy? > Are you arguing that it is impossible to make money with software which is not forbidden to share, when lots of people are doing it today? I never said that. But forcing people to give up their software would result in a bleak Soviet like future for all of us. >Let’s say the world stopped allowing ideas and other non-rivalrous goods to be considered property. Then why should anything else be considered property? Are you not denying my right to enjoy land that you claim to own?
      - teddyh 13y ago
        > forcing people to give up their software Well, I never said anything about any such thing, so I’m not sure which strawman you are arguing with. If you think I implied it, please show it, and be more explicit in your reasoning. > Then why should anything else be considered property? Because those are rivalrous goods. There is a difference, and I would suggest you look it up before treating them all the same.
        cscurmudgeon 13y ago
        > Well, I never said anything about any such thing, so I’m not sure which strawman you are arguing with. If you think I implied it, please show it, and be more explicit in your reasoning. What is the negation of the statement below? > Does this have anything to do with the necessity of allowing software makers to forbid the sharing of software? > Because those are rivalrous goods. There is a difference, and I would suggest you look it up before treating them all the same. I know what rivalrous goods are. What on God's earth makes them so special and different from non-rivalrous goods? You are not born with a piece of land attached to your neck. Only a piece paper with words and ideas says so. Who says one should be entitled to anything permanently? If you have a rivalrous good X, why not use it only for Y years and give it to the public for the common good? The whole idea that you own a piece of a rivalrous good is an unnatural and a relatively new social construct just like intellectual property and ownership of ideas. It is a good solution when we are confronted with scarce resources (land, ideas, software). Once again, there is no "rivalrous good fairy" granting them special rights. We decided to so as the other option was barbarianism and anarchy.

teddyh 13y ago

I would argue that some free software projects can be compared to Google search and Watson. Sharing the source to Google would be better for society, but a bit bad for Google, and since Google decides, they are deciding not to. The same goes for Github. It’s the collective action problem.

cscurmudgeon 13y ago
You have good intentions that are not realistic. Your model would work if everyone is selfless, honest and moral. Everyone has to be a perfect moral machine. More concretely: free software always mimics commercial software badly after someone takes risk building it. No free software is comparable to Google or Watson in both technical capability and market results. They need 100s to 1000s of PhDs working full time. These PhDs have already slaved off in academia for years. If software should not be treated as property, nothing else should be!
- teddyh 13y ago
  I think you are projecting; what is my "model"? Why would it fail? > free software always mimics commercial software badly One could argue against this, but let’s assume that it is true. Does this have anything to do with the necessity of allowing software makers to forbid the sharing of software? Are you arguing that it is impossible to make money with software which is not forbidden to share, when lots of people are doing it today? Let’s say the world stopped allowing ideas and other non-rivalrous goods to be considered property. Would the world still need software? Yes. Would the world still need people to write software? Yes. Would the world be willing to pay people to write software they need? Obviously yes.
  - cscurmudgeon 13y ago
    >One could argue against this, but let’s assume that it is true. Hmm. It is true. Which free software are people using to search more than Google search? Which free software won Jeopardy? > Are you arguing that it is impossible to make money with software which is not forbidden to share, when lots of people are doing it today? I never said that. But forcing people to give up their software would result in a bleak Soviet like future for all of us. >Let’s say the world stopped allowing ideas and other non-rivalrous goods to be considered property. Then why should anything else be considered property? Are you not denying my right to enjoy land that you claim to own?
    - teddyh 13y ago
      > forcing people to give up their software Well, I never said anything about any such thing, so I’m not sure which strawman you are arguing with. If you think I implied it, please show it, and be more explicit in your reasoning. > Then why should anything else be considered property? Because those are rivalrous goods. There is a difference, and I would suggest you look it up before treating them all the same.
      - cscurmudgeon 13y ago
        > Well, I never said anything about any such thing, so I’m not sure which strawman you are arguing with. If you think I implied it, please show it, and be more explicit in your reasoning. What is the negation of the statement below? > Does this have anything to do with the necessity of allowing software makers to forbid the sharing of software? > Because those are rivalrous goods. There is a difference, and I would suggest you look it up before treating them all the same. I know what rivalrous goods are. What on God's earth makes them so special and different from non-rivalrous goods? You are not born with a piece of land attached to your neck. Only a piece paper with words and ideas says so. Who says one should be entitled to anything permanently? If you have a rivalrous good X, why not use it only for Y years and give it to the public for the common good? The whole idea that you own a piece of a rivalrous good is an unnatural and a relatively new social construct just like intellectual property and ownership of ideas. It is a good solution when we are confronted with scarce resources (land, ideas, software). Once again, there is no "rivalrous good fairy" granting them special rights. We decided to so as the other option was barbarianism and anarchy.