Piotr Kalinowski wrote:
On 06/08/06, Brian Hulley <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Therefore I think this distinction between concepts is just
sophistry.
The distinction is there and relies on the community and people being
honest to avoid situations as you described. If you don't want it
however (well in this case relying on honesty seems ... naive, to say
the least), you may choose a different license. You're free after all
:)
True, but then I'm faced with the worry that someone at FSF may think I'm
not ethical or that I don't care about human rights! :-)
Ok I can live with that, but to continue with an exploration of the ethical
implications of GPL, consider this hypothetical situation between two
law-abiding neighbours:
Ned : Howdy Homer! Come and see this new supperty-dupperty
wimbly-wambly program I've just bought from Nick [who's now a software
developer living in a tumble down shack on the edge of town]!
[Homer follows Ned inside and Ned types something into the program and
a funny animation appears on the screen.]
Ned : It can do lots of other stuff too!
Homer: I want a copy
Ned: It's really cheap. Only $20 from Nick.
Homer: Come on Ned! We're neighbours! Just give me it!
[Ned checks the license and finds it's GPL]
Ned: Well I could give you it, but ...
Homer: But what? [Jumping about trying to contain his excitement at
being able to make funny animations at home]
Ned: [Knowing that Nick is struggling to pay his bills] Well if I gave
you it then that won't help Nick.
Homer: I don't like him anyway! Come on Ned, we're friends...
[Ned can see that if he refuses to give Homer a free copy, Homer is
still so excited about the program that he'll go out and pay Nick the $20.]
So now Ned, who's a very conscientious person, is faced with an impossible
moral dilemma, ie a choice between helping Nick establish his business or
losing Homer (who's a bit slow when it comes to matters of conscience) as a
friend.
If Ned is strong enough to just tell Homer that Nick needs the money and
that Homer is being selfish and can easily afford it, then GPL would have
played a positive role in forcing more honesty between neighbours so deeper
friendship could develop in the community.
However if Ned is not that strong, and just agrees to give Homer a free
copy, then he'll feel guilty about poor Nick, and he'd have GPL to blame for
removing the only excuse that Homer would have understood.
The system of owners of software encourages
software owners to produce something---
but not what society really needs.
And it causes intangible ethical pollution
that affects us all.
Is this not designed to stir up feelings of guilt in proprietary
software developers? And is it desirable to limit the production of
software to "what society really needs"? Eg I'm glad the Coca-Cola
company chooses to produce Coke because I like drinking it but in no
way could it be said that I actually *need* it, and I wouldn't
expect them to reveal their secret recipe so endless other companies
could instantly start competing with them.
The Coke is not the best example. First of all you don't expect that
Coca-Cole gives you right to modify the drink to suit your needs.
Nobody knows even what that would be supposed to mean :)
Continuing the example, neither Ned nor Homer knows anything about computer
programming so it never occurs to them to want to be able to alter the
program. They just want to use it as it is.
Proprietary 3d art programs like 3ds Max and AliasWavefront's Maya allow
users to write scripts or use third party plugins. This is not the same as
the ability to completely re-write everything in the program or fix bugs
etc, but perhaps it is enough for many people - after all, everyone only has
so much time and it would be hard work trying to understand the code of such
a large program anyway - why not just let the company that produced it do
that work? If all else fails, people are always free to write their own code
from scratch or pay someone else to do it.
Secondly, even if Stallman's philosophy is quite idealistic, there is
number of practices in software industry that make ethical doubts
arise (at least when I'm concerned). Yet still it is customers' choice
that they allow to be fooled.
I think the choice of whether or not to engage in unethical practices is
orthogonal to the choice of whether or not to follow the course of action
that Stallman wants to enforce using GPL.
However a positive aspect of his writings is that he draws attentions to
issues that might otherwise go unnoticed, regardless of whether or not one
agrees with his conclusions, and it certainly makes interesting reading
(I've got RMS's book "Free as in Freedom" here in front of me as I type
this).
I can't entirely dismiss GNU/FSF/GPL but it poses a fundamental
conflict with the only way I can see of earning a living so it's
like a continuous background problem which drains some of my energy
and enthusiasm hence the length of my rambling post where I made
another attempt to understand my relation to it.
Well, setting aside usefulness of GPL in a commercial world, it did
serve a purpose not allowing anybody to buy out the opensource world
and kill it, didn't it?
FSF (as well as other organisations) continues to serve a purpose in raising
awareness of the ridiculousness of software patents and the dangers they
pose, so I'm grateful to them for that.
Also, I'm still open to new ideas so ... who knows what business model I'll
eventually come up with...
:-)
Regards,
Brian.
--
Logic empowers us and Love gives us purpose.
Yet still phantoms restless for eras long past,
congealed in the present in unthought forms,
strive mightily unseen to destroy us.
http://www.metamilk.com
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