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.
Permalink for comment
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
To read all comments associated with this story, please click here.
(Note I'm in the middle of reading the article. But I thought I should mention something)
David Adams: The financial/managerial class has its own value system, based mostly on the necessity to monetize the company's assets. Firms have a responsibility to maximize the return on their investors' money, so every company asset must be leveraged to its utmost. This means that if you have developed a program that can be sold for $1,000,000 to four people in the world or $100 to three million people, it is your solemn duty to keep the price at $1,000,000, even if that means that 2,999,996 people who need that software will have to go without. And at that price, you must keep your company knowledge absolutely secret, advancing the state of the art be damned.
Actually... In that case most intelligent business people would go the other way. You know... 4 x $1,000,000 = $4,000,000 vs 3,000,000 x $100 = $300,000,000. That's a $296,000,000 difference.