I understand
the forces and influence of big government, big corporations, imperialism,
etc. If less industrialized companies want to "catch up", as they should,
then their governments should write their laws to encourage that (have some
respect for the natural environment, of course) rather than thwart it.
Nah, I don't think it's that easy. We can't just make copyright void
by law, for example - we'd be facing penalties from everywhere. You
have to play by the rules, or risk isolation...
I think you made a good point in that Octave makes it possible to
enter the world of scientific computing without the need to pay in
advance for the privilege (or use pirate copies). But the primary
point is that Octave, as free software, grants everyone the freedom
to study, understand and modify - these are essential for innovation.
Octave encourages everyone to improve it, while Matlab's EULA in fact
deems it a possibly criminal act if you create an improvement of one
of its functions, for instance.
That's why Octave actually plays a different league than Matlab; even
if it were worse in all functional aspects (which it is far from), it
would still be more free.