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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just a few days ago, the ceo of one of the 5 austrian mobile phone providers complained that the low tariffs are ruining his business and he had to sign off 200 people because of the low prices and that was bad for these people yadda yadda yadda.
i thought: what the hell does this guy want? 200 people unemployed is bad, hell yes. but there's 8 million austrians who can use their mobile phones at really low prices, a lot lower than 3 years ago. they spend less money on their mobile phone bills, that means less money for him, but also they have more money to spend on other stuff. and these 200 poor workers will find other jobs in these other sectors.
you can't reject capitalism when it's not working your way.
and it's the same with software. an office suite for 500€? come on! an operating system for 170€? yeah, of course. i see microsofts profit margin and i see that something is dead wrong. they suck away money that all the companies could put to good use for other stuff.
calling linux "communist" is just dumb. whoever thinks that, has absolutely no knowledge what communism was, what marxism was, probably not what a democracy is, a dictatorship and what capitalism means. these people are just throwing around with words that they don't understand. this may sound arrogant, but i, for one, have studied history.
regards,
christian