Linked by Thom Holwerda on Fri 29th Jun 2007 23:09 UTC, submitted by thebluesgnr
GNU, GPL, Open Source The FSF today released version 3 of the GNU GPL, the popular free software license. "Since we founded the free software movement, over 23 years ago, the free software community has developed thousands of useful programs that respect the user's freedom. The programs are in the GNU/Linux operating system, as well as personal computers, telephones, Internet servers, and more. Most of these programs use the GNU GPL to guarantee every user the freedom to run, study, adapt, improve, and redistribute the program," said Richard Stallman, founder and president of the FSF. This article has some interesting replies from the BSD community (right in the middle).
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RE[5]: GNU/Freedom
by lemur2 on Sat 30th Jun 2007 15:57 UTC in reply to "RE[4]: GNU/Freedom"
lemur2
Member since:
2007-02-17

As I said, I am trying to find out what would be the interests that make developers to contribute to GPL-ed projects, or corporations to contribute to them. I think that many of them will find that is not in their best interest to mess with GPL.


This is what many say, but it turns out that there are many many thousands of developers worldwide, including a number of big name commercial companies, who do contribute software under the GPL.

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1750358,00.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM#Open_Source
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linux_Technology_Center

IBM, for example, has adopted a business plan where they sell mostly services, not software. This is a viable enough business plan that IBM can afford to employ 600 people in their Linux Technology Centers.

The primary reason why people contribute to Open Source is so that they may all enjoy the fruits of collaboration. The concept is explained well enough in the following references:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_collaboration
http://collaboration.wikia.com/wiki/Coauthor
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Source

Edited 2007-06-30 16:15

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 3

RE[6]: GNU/Freedom
by trenchsol on Sat 30th Jun 2007 16:10 in reply to "RE[5]: GNU/Freedom"
trenchsol Member since:
2006-12-07

Your links point to IBM. They might be in a specific situation, as you have said, they are selling services. But, majority of companies that offer software are selling software. The developers in those companies are likely to have contracts that prevent them from sharing the code.

IBM has given up patents, but they still have proprietary software.

You could mention Sun, as a better example. Sun software sales were not going well.

Some people might like to collaborate, it may give additional value to their lives, but will not pay the bills.

I am trying to say that if GPL was more business friendly, GPL projects would attract more developers and more investments.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 2

RE[7]: GNU/Freedom
by lemur2 on Sat 30th Jun 2007 16:25 in reply to "RE[6]: GNU/Freedom"
lemur2 Member since:
2007-02-17

Your links point to IBM. They might be in a specific situation, as you have said, they are selling services. But, majority of companies that offer software are selling software. The developers in those companies are likely to have contracts that prevent them from sharing the code.

IBM has given up patents, but they still have proprietary software.

You could mention Sun, as a better example. Sun software sales were not going well.

Some people might like to collaborate, it may give additional value to their lives, but will not pay the bills.

I am trying to say that if GPL was more business friendly, GPL projects would attract more developers and more investments.


If you want to argue this from an eonomic perspective, then it is surely relevant to point out that for the vast majority of people and businesses, software is not a profit center but a mere expense.

From that perspective, it makes a lot more sense fro and economy to use Open Source and collaboration. The economic benefits are enormous.

But, even from a purely blinkered perspective of just developers, it is arguably easier to sell services to support software than it is to sell the software itself. Selling services people will readily pay for expertise. Selling closed-source software (trade secrets) is a much harder sell ... your customers are not in control of their own computing equipment or their own data.

For most of the history of software and computers, the software has been free and the software houses sold services and expertise. It has only been since little Billy Gates just didn't get this, and he spat the dummy when people didn't do things his way, that there has been a shift away from that concept.

Reply Parent Bookmark Score: 3