Sun, 29 Mar 2009 09:29:33 +0200, "Jérôme M. Berger" wrote: > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE----- > Hash: SHA1 > > Sergey Gromov wrote: >> Sat, 28 Mar 2009 15:38:45 +0300, Yigal Chripun wrote: >> >>> When you buy >>> a car you are free to look under the hood and the same should apply to >>> software. sure, the manufacturer can and probably should void any >>> warranty if you mess with the internals of its product, but they >>> shouldn't prevent you access to those internals. >> >> I hear automotive analogies here and there as "explanations" why open >> source is good. But automotive does not apply. >> >> Yes you can buy Ford, modify it and sell it at a higher price. But you >> cannot put Ford out of business this way because you must start from >> scratch on every single car you modify and that's a significant amount >> of work. And if you actually try to manufacture copies of Ford cars >> you'll be sued for patent infringement. >> >> Now, how would you make money on free, as in libre, software? How would >> you make a free, single-player RPG and still stay in business? All you >> can under GPL is take payment for distribution, as long as nobody else >> starts to distribute it for free. This means giving your hard work for >> free, as in gratis, not business. > > Ask RedHat, or any of the increasingly large number of companies > that *do* make money on free, as in libre, software. Basically, you > make your customers pay for specific developments and > customizations. Once the software is released you still get paid for > tech support and maintenance.
Yeah, sure. How much support a single-player game needs? Or a 3D-modeling tool? I agree with Nick: to make a profit on support you must create something unusable in the first place, and then charge money for fixing it. I agree that support is sometimes a valid business model, like when you create customized Linux kernels for various hardware and requirements. But it's definitely not universal enough to apply to every software created out there.
