Linked by David Adams on Mon 16th Aug 2004 17:44 UTC
I read something in one of the comments for an OSNews posting a couple weeks ago that sent me thinking. It wasn't an original or profound thought. In fact, it's a rather commonly-held opinion that happens to be quite misguided. It's an opinion summed up by the "open source = communist" meme that gets thrown around in thousands of flamewars all over the internet. In this essay, I will explore why this idea is wrong and demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of economics.
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"The open-source phenomenon (For licenses that allow redistribution) will actually REDUCE innovation."
Hmm, I think you are confusing innovation and dividends
Yes open source allows dozens of project/distributions to be create with only limited changes, usually tailored to one goal or another. It's adaptation, here it increases distribution as these software can be distributed to more people who could not afford other software.
So instead of a handful of employees who have access to the sources code, and can innovate, now thousands or millions have. Will they innovate ? Probably not ... not all at least. But among them, some might have ideas.
Also, an example of good closed source developpement is the game industry. Competition exists therefore good games and innovation is coming...
So my point is innovation come from competition... even if open source would fail to create better products (which I don't believe), competition forces closed source developper to do even more. If closed source software was truly superior, they would not be afraid of open source.