4 ms·

just being a bit more controversial, is open source software a bit socialist in nature?

by arisAlexis 12y ago

tom_scrace 12y ago
Not at all, because there is no coercion.
- mcv 12y ago
  So libertarian socialist, then. GPL in particular has strong socialist tendencies: you can build on it, but you've got to share your changes too.
  - tom_scrace 12y ago
    It's not socialist at all unless people are being forced against their will (or perhaps 'regardless of their will' would be more accurate) to contribute to some common project. Nobody in the open source world is being forced to do anything.
    - mcv 12y ago
      That is not really what socialism is about. It's about equality, not about forcing people. The big question is how to get that equality, and state socialism says some degree of forcing will be necessary. Libertarian socialism (also known as social anarchism or left-libertarianism) says you need freedom just as much as you need equality, or you end up with oppression. Open Source strikes that balance in a very natural way.
coolsunglasses 12y ago
Closer to voluntarist.
jawns 12y ago
I think of it more as distributist. Distributism's core principle is that the ownership of productive property should be as widely distributed as possible, which is in contrast with both capitalism (where it's held by a relatively few wealthy shareholders) and socialism (where it's in the hands of political leaders). To the extent that open-source software is geared toward benefiting the community of contributors, rather than generating a profit, and the resultant product is free for anyone to use and improve upon, I'd say that definitely has a distributist feel to it.
eli_gottlieb 12y ago
Means of production are owned by the workers, and the product is distributed collectively, without the intervention of a money or wage system? Yes, very socialist. Actually, outright communist.
- hga 12y ago
  Yeah, but without the vanguard of the proletariat or its like, with its pesky need to oppress and slaughter those who don't get with the program, not such a problem.
  - dragonwriter 12y ago
    > Yeah, but without the vanguard of the proletariat or its like Yeah, but vanguardism was part of an effort to divorce Communism (as articulated by Marx) from a key element of its theoretical foundation, in which it must be grounded in an advanced capitalism, some Communism without it is, just, well, Communism.
    - hga 12y ago
      But the problem is that Marx's one, true "scientific" study of history and economics turned out to be flatly wrong. It was only by adding vanguardism that it was rescued from ending up in the ash heap of history ... and the strange thing is, other forms of collectivism, to use the broadest term, also end up with a form of vanguardism. And that vanguardism opresses, and if given half a chance, slaughters those who don't get with the program. Here's the latest major US example: http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-plan-proposed-rule http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p... As a resident of a flyover state that's 80% powered by coal, I'm not looking forward to this this precipitous action that will cause my electric rates to "necessarily skyrocket"....
      - dragonwriter 12y ago
        > It was only by adding vanguardism that it was rescued from ending up in the ash heap of history ... Vanguardism mostly distracted people with the (historically) brief ascendance of Leninism, which was most influential in states which lacked the prerequisites Marx identified for transition from capitalism to socialism on the way to acheiving the communist end state while the developed capitalist societies to which Marx's theories applied continued to change in the direction Marx predicted. > And that vanguardism opresses, and if given half a chance, slaughters those who don't get with the program. Here's the latest major US example: http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p.. http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p.... I'm failing to see how: (1) That has anything to do with "vanguardism", or (2) that has anything to do with oppressing or slaughtering anyone. (3) where the "necessarily skyrocket" quote comes from (its not from the linked page, doesn't seem to be from any linked documents, and doesn't seem accurate in any case, since there is nothing inherent in the proposed rule that requires any costs to be born by rate payers -- although, of course, state plans could result in that.)

just being a bit more controversial, is open source software a bit socialist in nature?

tom_scrace 12y ago

Not at all, because there is no coercion.

mcv 12y ago
So libertarian socialist, then. GPL in particular has strong socialist tendencies: you can build on it, but you've got to share your changes too.
- tom_scrace 12y ago
  It's not socialist at all unless people are being forced against their will (or perhaps 'regardless of their will' would be more accurate) to contribute to some common project. Nobody in the open source world is being forced to do anything.
  - mcv 12y ago
    That is not really what socialism is about. It's about equality, not about forcing people. The big question is how to get that equality, and state socialism says some degree of forcing will be necessary. Libertarian socialism (also known as social anarchism or left-libertarianism) says you need freedom just as much as you need equality, or you end up with oppression. Open Source strikes that balance in a very natural way.

coolsunglasses 12y ago

Closer to voluntarist.

jawns 12y ago

I think of it more as distributist. Distributism's core principle is that the ownership of productive property should be as widely distributed as possible, which is in contrast with both capitalism (where it's held by a relatively few wealthy shareholders) and socialism (where it's in the hands of political leaders). To the extent that open-source software is geared toward benefiting the community of contributors, rather than generating a profit, and the resultant product is free for anyone to use and improve upon, I'd say that definitely has a distributist feel to it.

eli_gottlieb 12y ago

Means of production are owned by the workers, and the product is distributed collectively, without the intervention of a money or wage system? Yes, very socialist. Actually, outright communist.

hga 12y ago
Yeah, but without the vanguard of the proletariat or its like, with its pesky need to oppress and slaughter those who don't get with the program, not such a problem.
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > Yeah, but without the vanguard of the proletariat or its like Yeah, but vanguardism was part of an effort to divorce Communism (as articulated by Marx) from a key element of its theoretical foundation, in which it must be grounded in an advanced capitalism, some Communism without it is, just, well, Communism.
  - hga 12y ago
    But the problem is that Marx's one, true "scientific" study of history and economics turned out to be flatly wrong. It was only by adding vanguardism that it was rescued from ending up in the ash heap of history ... and the strange thing is, other forms of collectivism, to use the broadest term, also end up with a form of vanguardism. And that vanguardism opresses, and if given half a chance, slaughters those who don't get with the program. Here's the latest major US example: http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-plan-proposed-rule http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p... As a resident of a flyover state that's 80% powered by coal, I'm not looking forward to this this precipitous action that will cause my electric rates to "necessarily skyrocket"....
    - dragonwriter 12y ago
      > It was only by adding vanguardism that it was rescued from ending up in the ash heap of history ... Vanguardism mostly distracted people with the (historically) brief ascendance of Leninism, which was most influential in states which lacked the prerequisites Marx identified for transition from capitalism to socialism on the way to acheiving the communist end state while the developed capitalist societies to which Marx's theories applied continued to change in the direction Marx predicted. > And that vanguardism opresses, and if given half a chance, slaughters those who don't get with the program. Here's the latest major US example: http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p.. http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-p.... I'm failing to see how: (1) That has anything to do with "vanguardism", or (2) that has anything to do with oppressing or slaughtering anyone. (3) where the "necessarily skyrocket" quote comes from (its not from the linked page, doesn't seem to be from any linked documents, and doesn't seem accurate in any case, since there is nothing inherent in the proposed rule that requires any costs to be born by rate payers -- although, of course, state plans could result in that.)