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You made a false claim. Your choice of a closed-source license means no one can make derivatives of your work; if you had chosen a permissive license, your user

You made a false claim. Your choice of a closed-source license means no one can make derivatives of your work; if you had chosen a permissive license, your users would have greater software freedom. Hence, someone's software freedom is impeded. Your ad hominem, however, is misdirected. I too oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour. People have the right to compensation when others enjoy their creative output and if that impedes software freedom, so be it. Software freedom is a good thing but by no means an inalienable right. I support open source because it's in our collective interests to subsidize the creation of freely available and high-quality platforms/tools with our earnings from proprietary software. I don't think we'd have those earnings without proprietary software, though. Some people point to the Red Hat model. But most people don't need those kinds of guarantees. Third parties (i.e. every system administrator who's ever been responsible for at least one CentOS box and is not a Red Hat employee) can provide good enough support for drastically cheaper because they don't have the extra costs associated with developing the product. Without proprietary software, it is in no one's interest to make software. (Well, maybe for personal amusement.) Not even line-of-business software, because you're just handing your competitors the ability to undercut your prices and push you out of the market (similar productivity boost, lower costs than you).

gress 13y ago
> someone's software freedom is impeded Nobody's freedom is impeded. They didn't have the freedom to modify the code in the first place, since they didn't have the source code. Nothing they could do before has been taken away. It's really intellectually dishonest to use this freedom and morality rhetoric when you're actually talking about compelling people to give away something they have created. Not that I think it's conceptually a bad idea. I see nothing wrong with the idea of the GPL as a concept. A contract that says 'if you use this software, you agree to also give away any code you base on it' seems fine. But I see no reason not to just call it 'permanenrly malleable' software or something like that. It's the faulty rhetoric around freedom that is presented as a moral crusade that is a problem.
- superuser2 13y ago
  Someone switches to your product, or a new user chooses your product over the open-source alternative. The proportion of people who can modify their software decreases. That is a decrease in software freedom. Not necessarily a bad thing (your product might be legitimately better), but it is a decrease in software freedom.
  - gress 13y ago
    Freedom hasn't decreased at all. Those people have exactly the same choices as before. They can use the open-source alternative if they want to change the code. Merely 'using' a closed source product doesn't prohibit them from doing that.
    - superuser2 13y ago
      Lots of people who would otherwise be Linux or BSD users instead use OSX. Consequently, they are not free to modify their operating systems where (had it not been for Apple) they would have been. Their freedom has been reduced voluntarily, but it has been reduced. Forking FreeBSD is not remotely the same thing as forking OSX and you can't "just use the open-source alternative if they want to change the source code" of OSX.
      - dsuth 13y ago
        Their freedom has not been reduced, as they are still free to choose an alternate, FOSS operating system if they prefer. Instead, they have access to more options than they otherwise would have, because it's highly unlikely that Apple would have expended so much effort in improving their OS, which is a competitive advantage for them, if they were forced to turn over all of that work to anyone who wanted it. I really don't like the idea of licences which compel their users to act in a certain way. Freedom cuts both ways.
        superuser2 13y ago
        Software freedom has a specific meaning which necessarily encompasses freedom to study and modify the software you're running. OSX users do not have this freedom. Hence, prevalence of OSX reduces software freedom. Ability to choose between OSX and alternatives is something but it is not software freedom.
crististm 13y ago
"I [...] oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour" - where did you get this is FSF's mission?
- superuser2 13y ago
  Stallman advocates for a utopia in which software is developed by the masses for enjoyment and individual utility. Programmers are expected to work other jobs to subsidize their hobby. IIRC he also suggested that they could sell copies of their software on physical media, but this is irrelevant in the bittorrent era. He acknowledges that realization of the FSF's goals would most likely end the phenomenon of professional developers and is perfectly okay with this. It's somewhere on the Philosophy section of the gnu project's website. It's late, but I'll find the specific link later.
dllthomas 13y ago
"I too oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour." Eliminating the revenue from selling the same work multiple times is probable consequence of the FSF's mission. It is uncharitable to say that it is the FSF's mission. It is also false that this implies an hourly rate of $0.00 - there is a huge amount of programming work for which the first copy is the only copy, and that can be sold just as readily as ever in a world using even the strictest AGPL for everything. And that's not even considering donations, threshold pledge systems, &c.

gress 13y ago

> someone's software freedom is impeded Nobody's freedom is impeded. They didn't have the freedom to modify the code in the first place, since they didn't have the source code. Nothing they could do before has been taken away. It's really intellectually dishonest to use this freedom and morality rhetoric when you're actually talking about compelling people to give away something they have created. Not that I think it's conceptually a bad idea. I see nothing wrong with the idea of the GPL as a concept. A contract that says 'if you use this software, you agree to also give away any code you base on it' seems fine. But I see no reason not to just call it 'permanenrly malleable' software or something like that. It's the faulty rhetoric around freedom that is presented as a moral crusade that is a problem.

superuser2 13y ago
Someone switches to your product, or a new user chooses your product over the open-source alternative. The proportion of people who can modify their software decreases. That is a decrease in software freedom. Not necessarily a bad thing (your product might be legitimately better), but it is a decrease in software freedom.
- gress 13y ago
  Freedom hasn't decreased at all. Those people have exactly the same choices as before. They can use the open-source alternative if they want to change the code. Merely 'using' a closed source product doesn't prohibit them from doing that.
  - superuser2 13y ago
    Lots of people who would otherwise be Linux or BSD users instead use OSX. Consequently, they are not free to modify their operating systems where (had it not been for Apple) they would have been. Their freedom has been reduced voluntarily, but it has been reduced. Forking FreeBSD is not remotely the same thing as forking OSX and you can't "just use the open-source alternative if they want to change the source code" of OSX.
    - dsuth 13y ago
      Their freedom has not been reduced, as they are still free to choose an alternate, FOSS operating system if they prefer. Instead, they have access to more options than they otherwise would have, because it's highly unlikely that Apple would have expended so much effort in improving their OS, which is a competitive advantage for them, if they were forced to turn over all of that work to anyone who wanted it. I really don't like the idea of licences which compel their users to act in a certain way. Freedom cuts both ways.
      - superuser2 13y ago
        Software freedom has a specific meaning which necessarily encompasses freedom to study and modify the software you're running. OSX users do not have this freedom. Hence, prevalence of OSX reduces software freedom. Ability to choose between OSX and alternatives is something but it is not software freedom.

crististm 13y ago

"I [...] oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour" - where did you get this is FSF's mission?

superuser2 13y ago
Stallman advocates for a utopia in which software is developed by the masses for enjoyment and individual utility. Programmers are expected to work other jobs to subsidize their hobby. IIRC he also suggested that they could sell copies of their software on physical media, but this is irrelevant in the bittorrent era. He acknowledges that realization of the FSF's goals would most likely end the phenomenon of professional developers and is perfectly okay with this. It's somewhere on the Philosophy section of the gnu project's website. It's late, but I'll find the specific link later.

dllthomas 13y ago

"I too oppose FSF's mission to value our craft at $0.00/hour." Eliminating the revenue from selling the same work multiple times is probable consequence of the FSF's mission. It is uncharitable to say that it is the FSF's mission. It is also false that this implies an hourly rate of $0.00 - there is a huge amount of programming work for which the first copy is the only copy, and that can be sold just as readily as ever in a world using even the strictest AGPL for everything. And that's not even considering donations, threshold pledge systems, &c.