From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-1.9 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_00,FREEMAIL_FROM autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,52a0bacbcdd2da17 X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 2003-08-13 07:40:40 PST Path: archiver1.google.com!news1.google.com!newsfeed.stanford.edu!headwall.stanford.edu!newshub.sdsu.edu!elnk-nf2-pas!newsfeed.earthlink.net!news.astraweb.com!news-small.astraweb.com!newshosting.com!news-xfer1.atl.newshosting.com!newsfeed.kabelfoon.nl!195.129.110.21.MISMATCH!bnewsfeed00.bru.ops.eu.uu.net!bnewsinpeer01.bru.ops.eu.uu.net!emea.uu.net!ash.uu.net!spool.news.uu.net!not-for-mail Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2003 10:40:19 -0400 From: Hyman Rosen User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows; U; Windows NT 5.0; en-US; rv:1.5a) Gecko/20030611 Thunderbird/0.1a X-Accept-Language: en-us, en MIME-Version: 1.0 Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Realtime/embedded project to help with employment. References: <3F367B39.8060108@noplace.com> <1060611604.45048@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3F38DEBC.8040208@noplace.com> <1060696097.54858@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> <3F3A306D.4050302@noplace.com> In-Reply-To: <3F3A306D.4050302@noplace.com> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Organization: KBC Financial Products Message-ID: <1060785619.779768@master.nyc.kbcfp.com> Cache-Post-Path: master.nyc.kbcfp.com!unknown@nightcrawler.nyc.kbcfp.com X-Cache: nntpcache 3.0.1 (see http://www.nntpcache.org/) NNTP-Posting-Host: 204.253.250.10 X-Trace: 1060785619 20895 204.253.250.10 Xref: archiver1.google.com comp.lang.ada:41395 Date: 2003-08-13T10:40:19-04:00 List-Id: Marin David Condic wrote: > I suppose it is all right for me to assemble various digital recordings The difference is that the bands you mention didn't give anyone permission to do this, while the software developers did. But you know that, obviously, so what is your purpose in drawing this analogy? Are you trying to say that the developers didn't give this permission? That they were duped? All of them? > Oh, yes. I nearly forgot. Microsoft followed the model you outlined (not > mine - the proprietary and closed model) and last I checked they had > money coming out of their ... ears. Seems like that model *can* be the > right one in at least some cases. Everyone wants to be Microsoft. But most people who try wind up being BeOS. > I also never said that companies want to deal with a > few thousand different developers or different licenses. Compnaies that make and distribute Linux distributions, or BSD distributions for that matter, normally have hundreds and perhaps thousands of packages in their distribution. Those are the companies I was talking about. > Systems have been set up to distribute copyrighted material > and compensate authors that don't leave individuals or > companies having to cut a thousand deals to use some product. Congratulations! You have rediscovered Richard Stallman's software tax idea. In any case, no one is stopping people from setting up such systems. You could even try to do it yourself. You will discover that a major problem is that there is so little money to be made that the effort to collect it will be more expensive than what you get. Writing a piece of software and releasing it under the GPL is infinitely easier than writing a piece of software and trying to make money from it. The fact that some compnaies are managing to earn money selling GNU/Linux distributions may give some people the illusion that there is money to be made in individual software packages, and for some tiny percentage that would even be true. But not fro most. > Most of the stuff that gets released under the GPL is really > not all that special or wonderful that someone is going to pay > $$$ to get it But they don't have to. And meanwhile, as long as the project has some signs of life, distributors will pick it up and package it, so it will be out there for anyone who might want it. > companies may look at the GPL and not want to infect their own > code with it and say "The R&D cost to build my own unit isn't > that huge, so why should I use a GPLed unit?" One goal of the FSF is to have enough good GPLed code out so that this cost differential becomes ever larger. In any case, no one is stopping them from doing anything they want. > Hence whatever scheme got adopted, it needs to be simple and > inexpensive. Which means that the developers won't be paid much. > And it isn't any different for GPLed code. Anything under the GPL can just be distributed without a second thought. It's very different from Joe's Own Version of the No-Bomb Pay-Me-If-You-Use-It license. > Your presumption is that the model for constructing software How did we switch to talking about constructing software? We were talking about RedHat, whose basic product *is* an assembled conglomerate of the random work of hundreds or thousands of people.