Re: [ox-en] Re: Role of markets
- From: "Samuel Rose" <samuel.rose gmail.com>
- Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:12:32 -0400
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On Thu, Aug 14, 2008 at 12:21 AM, Michel Bauwens <michelsub2004 gmail.com>wrote:
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Hi Sam,
I agree with the messiness argument, but nevertheless, I think models and
conceptual distinctions remain useful, as long as we do not confuse the map
with the territory.
My point though is that there is a difference between:
1) voluntary contributions to a commons, without direct salary and payment
(though another means of subsistence is necessary)
2) payment with freedom, which corresponds to a basic income: in this
scenario, practiced to some degree in the corporate commons that Linux has
become, programmers have varying degrees of freedom to voluntarily
contribute, without command and control of those that pay the salary
3) conditional payment with relative freedom: this is I think your care.
Your freedom is that by choosing your clients, you can exert an important
degree of influence of what part of the commons you are contributing too
4) conditional payment without freedom: those that pay you direct your work
entirely, this would be the classic command and control corporate setting,
Michel
The model is certainly useful. I fall both within #2 and #3 depending on who
I am working with.
One thing that non-software developers may not realize is that contribution
can actually become involuntary through automated means, so that it can even
happen in #4. Indeed, it is possible to mirror code repositories back to
f/loss project repositories. It is also possible to run bug tracking/issue
posting to f/loss projects right from the desktop, for instance (which
definitely counts as contribution). For instance, prior to becoming self
employed, when I worked for a corporation, we ran Fedora Core OS on our
desktops, and some of our applications reported issues to the projects that
created them. Not that this negates your model and point in any way.
I think automation and better source control methods are also making it
easier for Linux contributors who are working in #2 to more easily
contribute without disrupting regular production. Distributed source code
revision control systems like git, mercurial, and darcs are making it
possible to quickly merge your work with external work (and vice/versa).
This makes it easier to synchronize your local work for your employer with
the f/loss project commons (git was actually created by Linus Torvalds, who
despises Subversion and CVS, both of which we common non-distributed
revision control systems for a very long time in f/loss development
communities. )
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