Re: [OT] Re: Bitkeeper outrage, old and new

Murray J. Root
2002-10-22T05:33:27Z

On Tue, Oct 22, 2002 at 01:26:20AM -0400, Hacksaw wrote:
> >It is NOT the same as claiming a criminal/immoral/unethical act - you
> >still want me to produce software - you just want me to do it for free.
>
> I think RMS has made this clear a number of times. He doesn't expect
> programmers to produce software for free, he expects them to produce software
> that the end user can easily modify for their own applications, without legal
> or technical hassles.
>
> He's happy for them to be paid for this work.

Without selling it? Rather tricky to accomplish. And yes, he does effectively
say selling it is wrong - when he says that users should be allowed to give
it away. If you can get it for free, why would you pay me? Don't tell me for
support - someone else does the support. I do the writing.
Basically, he's trying to set limits on what I do with what I created. There is
no justification for that.
I contribute time and effort to open source because I want to return something
for all the benefit I get out of it, not because some self-appointed arbiter of
morals tells me I should.

--
Murray J. Root
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