From: tzs@carson.u.washington.edu (Tim Smith) Subject: Re: Public domain software? Date: 29 Nov 1992 01:31:14 GMT
baford@labhp23.cs.utah.edu (bryan ford) writes:
>
>"significant" public domain software? Public domain software gets
>snatched up and proprietarized by greedy people and companies, and
>thereafter gets shattered into a thousand different competing threads
>of development which can never be reconciled. The "encumberances" of
So, having *more* software available is bad? You can use a given
piece of public domain software regardless of what other, more greedy,
people have done with it.
>If the GPL is a "significant encumbrance" to what you want to do with
>the software, then what you want to do with the software is probably
>not in the interests of the original authors of that software or of
>the "general public". If you think this statement is wrong, then I
>would be happy to see a counterexample.
OK, how about a small company trying to compete in an area dominated by
one or two large companies. The large companies have a few great
programmers, and a lot of good programmers. The small company has a
few great programmers. To make this a clean example, assume that
the area these companies work in is one that most programmers could
not do at home (e.g., assume the software goes into some embedded
system and to develop this stuff requires in-circuit emulators and
special target systems and stuff like that).
The large companies are *NOT* going to make their source code available.
If the small company makes its source code available, the large companies
will be able to drive the small one out of business, because their good
programmers are good enough to take the work of the small company's great
programmers and put it in their software, and that will negate any
competitive advantage of the small company.
If the small company could use various routines from GPL'ed source,
they would not have to spend as much time rewriting wheels, and could
more effectively compete with the large company, leading to more choice
for the user. The large companies would not benefit as much if they
could use GPL'ed stuff, because they have lots of good programmers that
they can use to reinvent wheels.
Thus, if the small company could use various GPL'ed software without having
to put their entire product under GPL, there would be *MORE* software
available, and more choice (indirectly) for the general public. Isn't
this good?
Another way to look at this is that there *is* a cost in using GPL. If
a company will lose by GPL'ing their software, that has to be evaluated
against their costs in developing their own proprietary versions of
whatever GPL'ed thing they want to use, or licensing something like that
from someone else. In this sense, GPL is as much as an encumberance as
an AT&T license: I have to pay to use the software -- the only difference
to my pocketbook is that with the AT&T licence, I can calculate what I
have to pay, rather than having to try to estimate how much letting my
competitors use my source will cost me.
This is why if I write something useful, other than at work, I will either
make it public domain or only put on a vanity copyright (e.g., my name has
to stay on it). The public benefits both if my software is used by others
in freely distributable software *AND* they benefit if a commercial software
company is able to use my software to make a better product. The benefit
the most of both of these things can happen.
--Tim Smith