Re: [Fsuk-manchester] RMS on Swedish Pirate Party vs Free Software

[Pater Mann]

Andrew John Hughes wrote:
> I disagree that proprietary software
> needs to or should be able to exist though.  Such an argument is based
> on the idea that the source code is somehow special and unique.

It may be! I wrote a library that implements B-trees in a unique way
that has advantages over conventional implementations. As far as I am
aware, no-one else implements B-trees in that way. (I must confess
that I haven't looked very hard though!) I have used my skill and
expertise to create this library and, although I currently have no
plans to sell it, I don't see why I should give the details away to
anyone and everyone without any recompense. Even if I did decide to
try and sell the software, you don't have to buy it but, if you did, I
would also give you the source code so that you were not dependant on
me for fixes and extensions. It would not be FOSS because you would
have to buy it to get the source and it would be tied up with legal
agreements that would prevent you from passing it on to others but at
least you would not be locked in.

> Keeping the source code
> secret is born of fear that something dreadful will happen to it.

Not necessarily. I have no fear that something dreadful will happen to
the source code to my library. I may well open-source it at some point
in the future - I just choose not to do so at the moment.

However, if by "something dreadful" you mean that someone with little
or no expertise themselves could simply take advantage of the time,
money and effort that I have poured into developing the software
without giving anything back whatsoever, then I agree that would be a
big worry for a software company. If they cannot make money from the
software that they develop, what incentive is there to write it in the
first place? Even worse, if someone else can make money from it
without having contributed to it in any way. It seems to me that could
potentially stifle innovation rather than encourage it, at least as
far as software companies are concerned.

> the developer is already providing a good service in producing and
> supporting the software, FOSS developers aren't going to attack and
> fork the project, just as you point out below.  I just really don't
> see how keeping source code proprietary helps anything.
>
> This wasn't an anti-Microsoft argument.  Feel free to replace them
> with Apple, Adobe, etc. if you want.

I was merely using your example. My argument also applies to many
other companies such as those you mention.

> But I'm going off the actual point which was simply that the actual
> development cost is overshadowed by the amount of profit made because
> there is no continuous outlay to produce more copies.  It's not like
> making sofas where you have to make back the cost of producing each
> one.

Apart from the obvious fact that a company has to make more money than
it costs to produce (and market) the product, in general the price
that you pay for something is rarely directly related to the
production cost. If a product is in short supply or is available from
a limited number of sources, it will generally carry a high price
regardless. If the product is freely available from a variety of
sources then demand comes into play. High demand generally leads to
low prices as companies compete for business; conversely, low demand
generally leads to a high price because companies need to make more
money from each sale. The final element affecting price is value to
the customer. For example, if I create something that saves you a
thousand pounds per year then I could argue that I am perfectly
justified in charging you say two hundred pounds for it even if it
costs only pennies to make. You are still saving 800 pounds per year
and I get a good sum of money to develop the product further and/or
create new products whilst still having enough for a decent holiday!
[grin]

One other thought: If I put tap water into bottles and then sell them
at 5 pounds each, providing that I make it quite clear that it is
simply tap water both on the label and in the marketing, am I doing
anything wrong? If so, why? It is not fraud because I am not
pretending it is something that it isn't and the people who buy it (if
there are any foolish enough to do so) know exactly what they are
getting.

> You can still satisfy people and make money without having to pretend
> the software source code is some kind of secret sauce that only your
> company can produce.

I may not be only one who *can* produce the software but I may be the
only who actually does so...

>  Competition should be based on the actual value
> of the product to the user.

And people often do not value things that they do not pay for. If they
can get it for free, they tend not to consider it valuable. A company
who I used to work for had a client who acted as a good sales
reference for them. Because of this, the client was rarely charged for
work done and when they were it was only a small amount. Consequently
the client became more and more demanding and treated the company very
badly. One day, the company decided that enough was enough and
informed the client that in future they would have to pay the going
rate for any further work. Immediately the client's attitude changed
and the company and client ended up with a very good business
relationship. The problem was that while the work was free, it did not
have any perceived value even though it was actually saving the client
considerable sums of money. Although the value to the client's
business had not changed, once they had to pay for the software, it
suddenly gained a tangible value in their minds. Of course, they did
complain at first but it wasn't long before they came to appreciate
the change.

Another old joke: Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day; give a
man a rod and teach him to fish and he will complain about the loss of
his free meal-ticket! [grin]

> That's true of business generally but sadly I don't see a lot of
> competition or innovation in the software field.  The only reason some
> still exists is because of Free Software forcing proprietary vendors
> to rethink their ideas.  A lot of the most prominent pieces of
> software continue to exist by charging their users for new versions
> that add fairly minor features and fix bugs.

Sadly, you are right in many cases. The problem is that the majority
of commercial software is bought by businesses and these tend to have
a lot of inertia. To change something as fundamental as the office
software used - or, even worse, the operating system - can be a
support nightmare for a company so the tendency is to stay with the
status quo.

The same applies to individual users albeit to a lesser extent. That
is why so many people are still using IE for their browser in Windows.
It works (up to a point) and it takes effort to find and install an
alternative. Not a lot, I know, but unless there is a compelling
reason to change, non-techies simply will not bother.

Cheers,
patermann