and again to list.
---------- Forwarded message ---------- From: David Gerard dgerard@gmail.com Date: 11 Feb 2008 20:29 Subject: Re: Freedom or Copyright? - GNU Project - Free Software Foundation (FSF) To: Matthias-Christian Ott ott@enolink.de
On 11/02/2008, Matthias-Christian Ott ott@enolink.de wrote:
"David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Er, what? Both are growing in the market, not just in a small world of predefined terms.
Come on, loot at it seriously - from the perspective of the average Joe. He doesn't know what Wikipedia or Free Software is, he just knows that Wikipedia is his first entry on his google search page. Do you think he has realised the philosophical dimensions of Wikipedia or Free Software and believes in it?
No, and that's not what the original says either. But nevertheless, out-cooperating is their particular method of out-competing. Wikipedia never set out to out-compete Britannica, it just did. (Wikipedia's goal is *not* to run a hideously popular and expensive website ...) Linux is not out to destroy Microsoft, that will be a completely unintentional side-effect. The end results are sufficient, the philosophical reasons are only useful if you want to understand the truck that just ran over your business.
- d.
On 2008-02-11 21:29, David Gerard wrote:
Come on, loot at it seriously - from the perspective of the average Joe. He doesn't know what Wikipedia or Free Software is, he just knows that Wikipedia is his first entry on his google search page. Do you think he has realised the philosophical dimensions of Wikipedia or Free Software and believes in it?
No, and that's not what the original says either. But nevertheless, out-cooperating is their particular method of out-competing. Wikipedia never set out to out-compete Britannica, it just did. (Wikipedia's goal is *not* to run a hideously popular and expensive website ...) Linux is not out to destroy Microsoft, that will be a completely unintentional side-effect. The end results are sufficient, the philosophical reasons are only useful if you want to understand the truck that just ran over your business.
True, but we are here to understand, aren't we?
Remember, the initial question was, if it is good when copyright vanished. And my answer was: It doesn't matter, proprietary software will be out-cooperated anyway. But it is not "their particular method", it is _our_ method when doing free software. Things changes, and in this case we are the changers. We should be aware of it, we should use out-cooperating in a positive sense.
Ciao, Stefan
Stefan Meretz stefan.meretz@hbv.org wrote:
On 2008-02-11 21:29, David Gerard wrote:
Come on, loot at it seriously - from the perspective of the average Joe. He doesn't know what Wikipedia or Free Software is, he just knows that Wikipedia is his first entry on his google search page. Do you think he has realised the philosophical dimensions of Wikipedia or Free Software and believes in it?
No, and that's not what the original says either. But nevertheless, out-cooperating is their particular method of out-competing. Wikipedia never set out to out-compete Britannica, it just did. (Wikipedia's goal is *not* to run a hideously popular and expensive website ...) Linux is not out to destroy Microsoft, that will be a completely unintentional side-effect. The end results are sufficient, the philosophical reasons are only useful if you want to understand the truck that just ran over your business.
True, but we are here to understand, aren't we?
Remember, the initial question was, if it is good when copyright vanished. And my answer was: It doesn't matter, proprietary software will be out-cooperated anyway. But it is not "their particular method", it is _our_ method when doing free software. Things changes, and in this case we are the changers. We should be aware of it, we should use out-cooperating in a positive sense.
I didn't question the whole fact - that's the law of history. But we have to consider time. If we now abolish copyright law, we could really speed up this process.
I think in ancient times the slaves know that there will be some point of time when slavery ends - it was a matter of time. But I think all slaves would have been happy to end it very soon.
Ciao, Stefan
Regards Matthias-Christian
"David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
On 11/02/2008, Matthias-Christian Ott ott@enolink.de wrote:
"David Gerard" dgerard@gmail.com wrote:
Er, what? Both are growing in the market, not just in a small world of predefined terms.
Come on, loot at it seriously - from the perspective of the average Joe. He doesn't know what Wikipedia or Free Software is, he just knows that Wikipedia is his first entry on his google search page. Do you think he has realised the philosophical dimensions of Wikipedia or Free Software and believes in it?
No, and that's not what the original says either. But nevertheless, out-cooperating is their particular method of out-competing. Wikipedia never set out to out-compete Britannica, it just did. (Wikipedia's goal is *not* to run a hideously popular and expensive website ...)
I didn't say that it was Wikipedia's intention ((simply defined) they wanted free knowledge that everyone can edit), but in the end the result was the same. I got in touch with the (German) Wikipedia in early 2004 and saw it growing in Germany and promoted it. I know that it was never it's intention to compete with Brockhaus or similar encyclopedias. People just joined, because they liked the concept of Wikipedia - the concept of cooperation (which is think is the most powerful tool you can have). But when I talk to people about Wikipedia I often have to tell them, that they can edit it, because they didn't (really) know (maybe they heard it once or so, but couldn't imagine that it works). Anyway they notice that Wikipedia is editable, but don't make use of it, even if they claim the content is wrong. Now consider the average Joe again: He just believes what mass media tells him, hasn't heard about editing Wikipedia and so. In the end Wikipedia will win this unintentional competition because of its productivity and will form the base, but people wont be a Wikipedia author anyway if nobody fills them with enthusiasm and tells them about cooperation.
Linux is not out to destroy Microsoft, that will be a completely unintentional side-effect. The end results are sufficient, the philosophical reasons are only useful if you want to understand the truck that just ran over your business.
The end results are only sufficient to change society of you really see it very materialistic, because if you change the being of the people, you change their consciousness. I agree but I think teaching is also required. You can't give Free Software to people and wait until they stumble upon the source code to tell them about the philosophy of Free Software. That's simply ineffective.
I believe Free Software will at some point of time make the highest ratio in terms of software, but by teaching people we could accelerate this process.
For me it's not a question of "if", it's a question of "when".
- d.
Regards Matthias-Christian