Re: [ox-en] Book project
- From: MJ Ray <markj cloaked.freeserve.co.uk>
- Date: Sun, 19 Jan 2003 18:28:20 GMT
Graham Seaman <graham seul.org> wrote:
I'm still confused... :-(
I think the comments about common languages are pertinent. From now on, I
will refer to what I had called "capitalism" as "Smith-capitalism" (after
Adam Smith) because it appears that others (including Marx and some
dictionaries) later defined it to be other things.
[...]
But the fact that there is a restricted supply of programmers means that
they (inevitably?) fit in a capitalist model. Now I'm not sure what you
mean by 'capitalist model', whether you're talking about the real world,
or economic theories, or both, or what?
Probably more theoretical than anything. As I think we are all painfully
aware, making such analyses of what happens in the world is messy because of
obstructions and complications due to imperfect implementations.
And I'm not even sure if it's true that there are a finite number of
programmers. [...] I'm sure there are more programmers now than there
would have been without free software, especially in the so-called '3rd
world'.
Well, it is bounded above by the finite population of the world, so it is
finite. Even generalising to some unknown infinite universe will still
leave more computers than programmers (won't it?), so we still have the
programmers as the scarcer supply. The only question is at what point
demand becomes so low as to make this all non-viable, but even that isn't
the same as zero-price.
You are doubtless right about the number of programmers: it serves the rich
countries much better to have barriers to entry, such as scarcity of
established programs to learn from and work on. Free software doesn't allow
this and levels the playing field a bit.
I think the logical next step is for us to level the playing field further
by spreading copyleft into other areas regarded by the rich world as
"intellectual property" and I'm very pleased to hear some noises like that
being made in the book threads.
[...]
Alternatively, if you're saying you know someone who will pay you money
just for providing him with software he could download himself, please
could you give me his address? ;-)
That would not be good business on my part ;-)
[...]
Your example didn't convince me, so I'm afraid I still think it is a
general truth.
OK, prove it in the general case. You can state it as a hypothesis if you
wish, but it is not true.
A program itself can always be sold to one customer. The customer may be
going to use the program, in which case the license is normally irrelevant
(he won't pass it on), or may be a free one (say he likes the idea of a
bigger pool of programmers who know the program). The money he pays is for
the labour of creating the program, just as if he'd paid a carpenter to
make him a bookcase.
Now this is where I disagree with this attempt at proof: although you say
one is paying for the labour, the value of that labour is vested in the
program (therefore it is not gratis, because it has a price), which one then
buys. At no point does a contract for the labour exist. The program may
arguably be a vehicle for the contract, but it does have a price, so the
statement "free software is gratis" is false. No?
[...]
Now, the next stage is that the program is to be distributed on a mass
scale (assuming it wasn't just for internal use). Either it's under a
proprietary license, and users pay for the license (in this sense all
programs are gratis - end users never buy the program itself, just pay a
license fee); [...]
Why do you claim that only proprietary licences may be charged for?
Indeed, if you wish to be accurate in that way, all software is gratis and
the copyright licensing is not. That just means that saying "free software
is gratis" as if it is something different is a little sly, I think. No?
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