Submitted by “When I first got into open source many moons ago, the advocacy movement was a thriving and vocal part of the community. Most of the movers and shakers back in the day were advocating the use of free and open software at work, to their friends and to their local community via LUGs and other groups. Back then, advocacy was a key part of the community, not only in showing existing computer users this alternative software, but also advising disadvantaged people for whom free software could really open up the doors to skill, employment and potential. Recently it seems this community-driven advocacy effort has petered out somewhat, and there are far fewer people talking about, conducting, exploring, refining and pushing open aource advocacy.”
Advocacy can turn into evangelism and turn people off. Stick with the technical and cost benefits and leave the religion out of it.
Thats probably what happened. Telling someone the are dumb for not using linux on the desktop (like quite a few people do) is not the best way to cede the masses from windows.
Telling someone the are dumb for not using linux on the desktop (like quite a few people do)
Actually, very few people do, despite the myths bandied about by posters with anti-Linux agendas. If one was to examing OSNews posts and count the number of times advocates have called people who do not run Linux dumb compared to the total number of advocate postings, we’d get a very low ratio indeed (probably to the order of 1%).
There are as many people (if not more) who’ll call people who run Linux communists/losers/geeks/fanatics – and yet I don’t see anyone saying that this keeps people away from Windows.
Advocacy, whether stringent or not, has little negative effects compared to the positive one. I strongly believe that the only people turned off by pro-Linux advocacy are those who have a strong pro-Windows bias in the first place.
Actually, very few people do, despite the myths bandied about by posters with anti-Linux agendas. If one was to examing OSNews posts and count the number of times advocates have called people who do not run Linux dumb compared to the total number of advocate postings, we’d get a very low ratio indeed (probably to the order of 1%).
Um my statement was an intentional over simplified generalzation and not meant to be taken as exact verbage. Most people that push FOSS use the negative approach to converts was my point.
Most people call long term cost benefits religion…
Your view of what’s “religion” and my view of what’s “long term common sense” are the same. Freedom.
I don’t know about other people, but I know that even though I feel the same way as others do that the ‘free’ part of FOSS is more important than the ‘open’ part of it, I don’t openly speak it when advocating the use of Linux. I prefer to subtly grow the idea in the mind of others that there is something wrong with proprietary software. You can’t force people to be ethical (even the GPL can’t alert anybody if someone sneeks some GPL code into proprietary software), but you can convince them over time the benefits of ethical behavior. I don’t use the ‘free’ argument like a blunt instrament like Stallman, I use it like a warm blanket to show others how cold they are
What I’m getting at is perhaps others are using the same tactics that I am?
Edited 2006-01-19 20:10
……….I prefer to subtly grow the idea in the mind of others that there is something wrong with proprietary software………..
Thank you for illustrating a common FOSS FUD tactic, there is nothing wrong with proprietary software.
Yes, there is. Being at someone elses mercy for fixes and added features isn’t so hot. Not being able to see the code that makes my software tick sucks. Not being able to share and help others is wrong.
Yes, there is. Being at someone elses mercy for fixes and added features isn’t so hot. Not being able to see the code that makes my software tick sucks. Not being able to share and help others is wrong.
None of these criticisms suggests that there’s anything “wrong” with proprietary software. The overwhelming majority of people could care less about those issues. If you’re trying to “grow” that criticism, you’re incubating it among an insignificant portion of the OS market.
“The overwhelming majority of people could care less about those issues.”
This is not a good argument in respect to if it’s “right” or “wrong”.
This is not a good argument in respect to if it’s “right” or “wrong”.
You’re cherry-picking. My argument was based on the fact that practically nobody in the real world needs access to source code in order to find value in software. Availability of source code just isn’t an issue for them.
You want to veer into religion. Sorry, not biting. I don’t see software as a religious issue. It’s a tool. If the proprietary stuff works for you, so be it: Use it. If open source code works better, so be it: Use it.
My argument was based on the fact that practically nobody in the real world needs access to source code in order to find value in software. Availability of source code just isn’t an issue for them.
I disagree. Lots of people in the real world (i.e. developers) benefit from access to source code. It may not be a MAJORITY, but that category of people still exists. “Practically nobody” means that these people are negligible, when in reality they are not.
None of these criticisms suggests that there’s anything “wrong” with proprietary software. The overwhelming majority of people could care less about those issues.
I’m sure they could. One thing that users of proprietary software do seem to like to do is share that software with one another. Lending installation CDs to friends etc, or even installing copies on every machine in your house. This can be illegal with proprietary software, whereas you can quite happily share FOSS software with whoever you like.
The law and human nature are just opposed in this case, and I’m sure people who share software in this way don’t feel as if they are doing anything wrong.
Yes, there is. Being at someone elses mercy for fixes and added features isn’t so hot. Not being able to see the code that makes my software tick sucks. Not being able to share and help others is wrong.
IMHO, this argument works mostly with programmers, but not with many other people. For example, I use the Firefox web browser, which is open source. If there is a severe bug or security flaw, since I don’t know how to code Firefox, I’m still at someone else’s mercy for fixes and such. And I really couldn’t afford to hire anybody to do either. If I could, I’d probably hire somebody to fix the f**king memory leaks.
Exactly. Nicely said. Open Source is great for programmers, but the advantages are much less for most everyone else.
Funny too, since I’m a programmer and don’t use much open-source software at all.
Nope, and nobody in here would expect you to do it. It would be like Bill Gates running Gnome on his own desktop
Why? A lot of the software I use just happens to not be open source.
Some is though. For instance, I love Perl. Just hadda get your snide remark in though, didn’t ya?
Well, you using a lot of open source would be like me using a lot of proprietary software (without complaining).
Exactly. Nicely said. Open Source is great for programmers, but the advantages are much less for most everyone else.
Err…what about the right to LEGALLY redistribute the software as much as you want? Or to use it on as many computers as you want?
The only reason proprietary software thrives is piracy. If everyone had to pay for their copy of MS Office or Photoshop, you’d find that OpenOffice and Gimp would be a lot more popular!
I said there are less advantages, not none.
You tend to make good arguments however I have disagree with you on this one.
The only reason proprietary software thrives is piracy. If everyone had to pay for their copy of MS Office or Photoshop, you’d find that OpenOffice and Gimp would be a lot more popular!
If that were the case, then proprietary software vendors wouldn’t be making any money. While it is true that many in the consumer sector tend to violate their license agreements and use extra copies of their software, most businesses do purchase all their licenses. This is how most proprietary software makes money (games are an exception).
Businesses also tend to weigh factors other than price in their purchasing decisions. They consider things like “Who can I call when I have a support question?”, and “Who can I threaten when I need a problem resolved?”
Open Source Software with paid for support and warranties is still rather uncommon (though some does exist). So for this reason many businesses will go with proprietary software.
As to Open Office and Gimp, well they are rather popular when you consider that they are both competing against strong market leaders with established customer bases (Office and Photoshop).
So while you may feel that the ability to use extra copies of software without violating a license agreement is important to end users, I’m willing to bet that the majority of home users probably don’t care (even if they happen to have more than one computer). They will happily go on violating their license agreements. I would argue further that businesses that do consider this as a factor have other factors that affect their technology decisions much more. I could be wrong, but this has been my experience (OSS contributor and proprietary software writer).
I think your last statement is dead on:
“you’d find that OpenOffice and Gimp would be a lot more popular!”
But I think those doubling in popularity would barely dent Adobe and Microsoft…
Those companies, especially Adobe, are ultimately dependent on people who pay. I’d guess, for Adobe, most of those are people who are selling the work they make with it; or using it in a sold product (businesses). They have to pay, because otherwise Adobe comes in and says “your files have our watermark, you didn’t pay, give us all your income.”
I’ve met a lot of people who pirate everything, but they’re a minority compared to those who pay.
Programmers are not the only people who can hire programmers.
So, group 2 who benefits, anyone with money: Businesses.
Generally this group benefits far more than programmers. Finding a fix for a bug in software you’ve never touched is not easy; and so most of us will look for alternative software (especially if the bug is non-trivial, as most that don’t get fixed seem to be in all software).
The real beneficiary of this becomes the user because:
1.) Someone with wealth will likely need very useful software.
2.) They’re willing to pay to fix it, because they’re probably using it to profit, when the old maintainer dies/retires/gets bored.
3.) It’s GPL’ed, so they have to make their changes available.
4.) So now they’re the new maintainer.
5.) Everyone using it now benefits.
That’s theoretical, so there will be loop-holes and such; practice never perfectly follows theory. But that’s the idea, and that’s why FOSS is not for programmers.
Close source is for programmers, it’s how we can make the most money.
Programmers are not the only people who can hire programmers.
Most people do not hire programmers. They don’t want to deal with those kinds of problems. They buy their computer with an OS pre-installed by an OEM. They get their software pre-installed or install retail shrinkwrap. If nothing suits their needs, they either try to use an existing program or they go without. That’s reality on the ground.
You didn’t read the whole comment.
I couln’t agree more. The notion that people who use open source software can fix it when it goes wrong is laughable in the real world. The reality is people just report the issue and wait for a fix, just like they would do if they were using “proprietary” software.
The open source community really does itself no favours by constantly banging on about the evils of proprietary software. If you don’t want to use it then fine, but stop going on and on and on about it. We pay for plenty of other things in life, I don’t see why you need to get soooooooo upset that there’s software out there than someone is charging for.
In the linked article Jono Bacon mentions that one of the underlying principles of open source is choice and he’s right, but just because people choose proprietary software over open source software they don’t deserve to be shot down…
And I take it you are the absolute monarch of reality so we should simply believe your thesis that lacks evidence, argument, ore event a second sentence of any form…
While he didn’t give evidence for their being something wrong with proprietary software it was not his point; his point was that he tries to show that to people slowly (probably by pointing out when some piece of software is failing where it shouldn’t).
You, on the other hand, have made it your central point and failed to, in any way, defend it.
So please, ellaborate. Go on. Explain how there is nothing wrong with proprietary software. I’m not disagreeing, simply asking you to stop spamming this forum with single sentence comments that serve no purpose other than to cast your vote of opinion.
And I take it you are the absolute monarch of reality so we should simply believe your thesis that lacks evidence, argument, ore event a second sentence of any form…
My comment was directed at those that posess a greater understanding of the subject matter.
While he didn’t give evidence for their being something wrong with proprietary software it was not his point; his point was that he tries to show that to people slowly (probably by pointing out when some piece of software is failing where it shouldn’t).
You, on the other hand, have made it your central point and failed to, in any way, defend it.
I read and understood his point and called bullshit on his tactics why are you so offended? As others have pointed out on this thread the majority people are put off by random FOSS is better ramblings.
If your true intentions as an advocate of FOSS are to see it succeed in the long run. Try arguing FOSS’s technical merits or superiorities over closed source software rather then preaching your personal software political bent or usage habits which have little to no value.
So please, ellaborate. Go on. Explain how there is nothing wrong with proprietary software. I’m not disagreeing, simply asking you to stop spamming this forum with single sentence comments that serve no purpose other than to cast your vote of opinion.
Again a greater understanding of the topic and subject matter is a requirement for this discussion. Repeating what is already common knowledge for those of us who work in the industry serves no purpose. Since you were the only person that seemed lost on this discussion, I suggest you use the archive feature of this site to glean the information you seek.
I’m not offended, I’m asking you to post more than one sentence.
“Since you were the only person that seemed lost on this discussion, I suggest you use the archive feature of this site to glean the information you seek.”
I challenged your undefended thesis, you responded with a refusal to offer explanation. This is akin to admitting you’re wrong. Thanks.
Common knowledge is not proof of anything except the modal beliefs of all people.
I’ve yet to disagree with that there’s nothing wrong with proprietary software by the way.
There is not necessarily any thing wrong with the quality of proprietary software, though poor quality often goes hand in hand with proprietary software.
But there is a lot of things wrong with the licenses, considering how void most of these are in european countries.
Another issue is: If you use proprietary software and it works, and there is an open source alternative that doesn’t work (as well) – then use the proprietary solution. That’s what I do. But in those few cases there is no doubt I’d use an open source solution if there was a reasonable option.
There is nothing wrong with proprietary software as long as it works, but over the past 15+ years as a PC user I’ve found that proprietary software packages have a far greater chance of dying (losing all support due to a lack of interest by the developer) than open source programs do.
The fact that someone else can pick up development or support is a form of insurance policy for end users.
I tend to gravite towards open source now because I see those programs as having a longer lifespan over the long run (they won’t be frozen in time forever simply because the initial developer lost interest or disappeared).
Maybe it’s not quite as big a deal now? Back then, you may have really had to evangelize to convince people, but now, with a wider range of software available for Linux and more corporate backing, the benefits may speak for themselves.
And people wonder why people take jabs at Linux et al. Because of the previous zealotry. Thank god it petered out.
FOSS benefits everybody, that’s the whole point. Freedom of speech doesn’t just benefit businesses or joe users or or politicians, it benefits the rich and the poor, the honest and dishonest, anybody and everybody.
FOSS benefits programmers:
1. For newbies, they have much more access to source code to learn from. This naturally breeds more programmers because the barrier to entry is much less.
2. If something is wrong with a program and a programmer knows how to fix it, he can fix it and send the patch upstream. This benefits the programmer, because he is also a user.
3. If a programmer can find a free library or code for a feature that he needs for his program from some other program, he can use that code as well. In the process the programmer my also fix some bugs and send them upstream to the other program, benefitting both.
4. If a programmer is dissatisfied with the direction a program is heading, he can fork it and modify it in the ways he desires. Both projects can benefit from these changes.
5. More job opportunities are opened up to FOSS programmers because potential employers can actually watch you work and examine the quality of your work.
FOSS benefits users:
Basically, any time software that users use gets better, they benefit. Any time more alternatives to what users already use are available, users benefit. This goes for both free and proprietary software, but the likelihood of users benefiting more increases when programmers and businesses alike are not blocked from using, modifying and improving software that users use.
Users also benefit from not being locked into a program against their will. That is to say, if there was only one email client on earth made by one company, then the user would certainly not benefit. Diversity is what makes FOSS so powerful and so beneficial for users.
Poor users aren’t blocked from using quality software that normally only more wealthy users would have access to. For instance, how expensive would the GIMP, Blender, Evolution, or GNU/Linux itself be if they weren’t free of charge? Likely too much for the normal poor user. And I’m not just talking about your run-of-the-mill poverty-stricken American or European citizens, I’m talking about people in China, Africa, India, etc. that couldn’t afford software even if it only cost $20, because that’s about how much a day’s or week’s pay brings in.
FOSS benefits business:
1. Free help to improve a product through bug reports, bug fixes, etc. all add value to a product that businesses can either sell support for or customize.
2. Free advertisement. When your product is accessible to anybody with an internet connection, or to anybody that has a friend with an internet connection, then your product can become more well-known faster. You also have advocates (like me) that will continue to sing the praises of your product and hand out free CD’s with your product on them. Reputation becomes the key to grabbing free advertisement as well.
Beyond all the listed reasons, FOSS also breeds a superior culture. The open, transparent and helpful culture found in the FOSS world can’t ever be matched by the proprietary world. The collaboration found in FOSS software is also unmatched. This, more than anything, shows how wrong the proprietary world is. It breeds a culture of greed and selfishness, unhelpfulness and incompatibility. It hurts everybody except the guy who has the monopoly on the code. Sure, users benefit from lower prices and higher quality products from the competitiveness found in the proprietary world, but how can you beat free? And what happens if there is a monopoly?
The people who are the biggest fans of Linux and open source, are also the WORST public relations people on earth, they add new meaning to the word “SUCK”.
Convince the cheerleaders to stop attacking Windows, MS, and every single piece of non-open source software on earth, and you might have a prayer.
Don’t get me wrong….. Open source has bungled their marketing from the gitgo, and they continue to shoot themselves in the ass on a daily basis.
They might be very good at writing software….
They totally suck at PR.
They probably care more about the software than they care about the PR.
PR is only needed for companies trying to sell something virtually worthless.
The amount of money spent on PR is reversely proportional to the quality of the product.
A high PR budget equals low quality.
So forget about PR and concentrate on making that damn piece of software working properly.
> So forget about PR and concentrate on making that damn
> piece of software working properly.
If all OSS zealots, and especially Linux zealots did that, they might make a more positive impression on the average user. Tell me again and again that Linux is nothing but a sweet cake and everything works flawlessly (despite the obvious problems I find when using it), and I will just think of you as a zealot. But tell me that Linux sucks at X but then does Y perfectly, and I’m interested (and start comparing the importance of X to Y for me).
The problem is that zealots actually make *negative* PR and scare people off. If they stuck to code, the overall effect on PR would be a positive one. But then, I don’t think that many zealots have actually written any widely used code at all (the actual programmers tend to be much more sane).
– Morin
Well, some things work fine, and some doesn’t.
Personally I’m having the best time ever with Gentoo, with most things being much easier than with Windows. But not all is perfect. I just sort of cope with it, just like in Windows.
Things might work flawlessly, but don’t count on it. The best chance is to use mainstream hardware with a major decent GNU/Linux distribution (rules out most of the socalled newbie-friendly distributions). That ought to do it (in most cases).
Gnome (my favourite DE – at the moment) has many great elements superior to what you find in Windows. But… try and play a tricky movie in Totem and see what happens when ALSA is in bad mood… *oh boy*
So, generally speaking: GNU/Linux is a sweet cake, but sometimes the Baker uses salt instead of sugar, because he doesn’t see so well. In those cases: Drink water.
> Well, some things work fine, and some doesn’t.
My argument wasn’t really about things working or not, but rather about zealots making negative PR about it – because they claim *everything* works. With your arguments (some things work, some don’t), people don’t take you as a zealot, they take you serious, and might be interested. But zealots don’t argue this way, and in the end do more harm than good.
– Morin
First of all, this can obviously not be repeated enough. Freedom is one thing and it seriously has nothing to do with the GPL.
This is strongly related to the first post “What kind of advocacy?”. Everytime I hear this about Freedom and my analytic mind sees through the crappy arguments, I really get sick of it all. Stallman abuses this word and has infected a large part of the OSS movement.
Let’s start talking about benefits and stop talking about arguments which are flawed (The freedom piece).
Maybe someone should stop and ask themselves why advocacy has dropped? MAy it have something to do with that both OS and proprietary software has it’s place? Maybe people are fed up about the “one is always better crap”? There is room for both, and everyone has their preferences, so let it be, let it be, let it be….