From owner-freebsd-chat Wed Aug 23 14: 7: 5 2000 Delivered-To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Received: from lariat.org (lariat.org [12.23.109.2]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 15F9537B440 for ; Wed, 23 Aug 2000 14:06:54 -0700 (PDT) Received: from mustang.lariat.org (IDENT:ppp0.lariat.org@lariat.org [12.23.109.2]) by lariat.org (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id PAA17461; Wed, 23 Aug 2000 15:05:09 -0600 (MDT) Message-Id: <4.3.2.7.2.20000823150046.04750f00@localhost> X-Sender: brett@localhost X-Mailer: QUALCOMM Windows Eudora Version 4.3.2 Date: Wed, 23 Aug 2000 15:04:51 -0600 To: j mckitrick From: Brett Glass Subject: Re: GPL v. BSD and fragmentation Cc: Tani Hosokawa , chat@FreeBSD.ORG In-Reply-To: <20000823204149.A43608@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org> References: <4.3.2.7.2.20000823132044.057d1ba0@localhost> <20000822141843.C27208@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org> <20000822141843.C27208@dogma.freebsd-uk.eu.org> <20000822063012.F10643@riverstyx.net> <4.3.2.7.2.20000823132044.057d1ba0@localhost> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed Sender: owner-freebsd-chat@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.org At 01:41 PM 8/23/2000, j mckitrick wrote: >here is what i don't get about the GPL. if a mechanical engineer works for >1 year on a project, he might only be able to sell it for 5,000 US dollars. >but he will have to sell far more than 1 unit to recover his costs, let >alone make a profit. That's right. Fortunately, his design is valuable intellectual property, and so he can make ends meet by selling enough of what he's designed to make a profit. > once a programmer writes or enhances a GPL program, he >or she might sell only one copy At the cost of the copy, not at the cost of doing the work. Even if he or she is working as a consultant, all the programmer will get (and this is the best case!) is an hourly wage for the time spent on the code. > before it becomes open source, and therefore >free. maybe the industry will wise up and realize you get what you pay for, >and commercial software has far better support in general. Sometimes it does; sometimes it does not. The point is that there should be a choice. The stated goal of the GPL is to eliminate choice. --Brett To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-chat" in the body of the message