rms@prep.ai.mit.edu (12/21/85)
From: rms@prep.ai.mit.edu (Richard M. Stallman)
How would you like it if someone took something that you had
worked on very hard and was planning to make a living from,
and declared that through some technicality, everyone could
have it and no one had to pay you for it?
If someone was making plans like that, he was already planning to do
something wrong: software hoarding. If he was stopped, by a
technicality or by other means, that's great. We can rejoice because
the public has been saved from being victims of hoarding.
Software hoarders complain when thwarted, but we should not give them
our sympathy. Mafiosi, welfare cheaters and make-work bureaucrats
also complain if their funds are cut off, but we don't sympathize with
them, because that's what they deserve.
If a person you care about is a software hoarder and you want
to have good wishes for the person, the right way to do it
is to hope the person comes to understand the wrongness of
hoarding, and stops making plans to base his livelihood on
hoarding. Success in ill-gotten gains is not really a good wish.mjc@cad.cs.cmu.edu (Monica Cellio) (12/23/85)
To RMS:
If I write a book, I have the right to distribute it and reap the profits
(royalties). If I write a program, why don't I have the right to distribute
it and reap the profits?
In both cases, I can also limit the distribution. I can say that if you
don't pay, you don't benefit. (There are no laws saying free public
libraries must exist.) It seems to me that you have to either abolish the
rights of *all* producers to benefit from what they produce, or you have to
give up this "making a living from programming is evil" attitude. I don't
see how you can have both.
-Dragon
--
UUCP: ...seismo!rochester!cmu-cs-pt!cmu-cs-cad!mjc or if that doesn't work:
...ucbvax!dual!lll-crg!dragon
ARPA: monica.cellio@cmu-cs-cad or dragon@lll-crgmzal@pegasus.UUCP (Mike Zaleski) (12/23/85)
[...]
In response to:
How would you like it if someone took something that you had
worked on very hard and was planning to make a living from,
and declared that through some technicality, everyone could
have it and no one had to pay you for it?
Richard M. Stallman (allegra!mit-eddie!rms@prep.ai.mit.edu) writes
(indented paragraphs):
If someone was making plans like that, he was already planning to do
something wrong: software hoarding. If he was stopped, by a
technicality or by other means, that's great. We can rejoice because
the public has been saved from being victims of hoarding.
I reject outright two of the premises in this paragraph: (1) that
there is such a thing as "software hoarding" and (2) that it is wrong
for a person or group of people to release their work only to those
who have paid for their efforts.
"Software hoarding" (if I understand your term correctly here) is
the practice of producing some computer software, but only releasing
it to those who pay to get it. What I assume you find objectionable
about this state of affairs is that something which can be copied
or shared without damaging the original work and that in some sense
something which can provide knowledge/a resource/(beauty?) is concealed
from others while not being used by the original creators.
If you (RMS) agree with this definition, can you explain how software
differs from any book, magazine, videotape, record, tape, movie,
or photograph? All of these are media which can be quickly
duplicated without damaging the original. Are all authors and
artists "hoarding" their work by asking to be paid before releasing
it to the public?
As an aside, I assume you mean: "... stopped ... by other LEGAL
means ..."?
Another aside: Of all the things I am the victim of, "software
hoarding" is not one that I feel at all. Indeed, I doubt the
public at large feels that way either.
Software hoarders complain when thwarted, but we should not give them
our sympathy. Mafiosi, welfare cheaters and make-work bureaucrats
also complain if their funds are cut off, but we don't sympathize with
them, because that's what they deserve.
Please explain the analogy between a person or group of people thinking
through a solution to a computer problem, implementing, debugging,
and testing the solution, and then trying to sell it and a mafiosi.
If a person you care about is a software hoarder and you want
to have good wishes for the person, the right way to do it
is to hope the person comes to understand the wrongness of
hoarding, and stops making plans to base his livelihood on
hoarding. Success in ill-gotten gains is not really a good wish.
This paragraph reads like a lot of religous drivel. Indeed, when
I first read this message, I thought it was a joke, but I noticed
no :-) anywhere. I do, however, hope you (RMS) will answer my
comments in this message and maybe include some words on the
right way to make one's livelihood.
-- "The Model Citizen" Mike^Z
Zaleski@Rutgers [ allegra, ihnp4 ] pegasus!mzalroger@celtics.UUCP (Roger Klorese) (12/24/85)
In article <818@mit-eddie.UUCP> rms@prep.ai.mit.edu writes: >From: rms@prep.ai.mit.edu (Richard M. Stallman) > How would you like it if someone took something that you had > worked on very hard and was planning to make a living from, > and declared that through some technicality, everyone could > have it and no one had to pay you for it? > >If someone was making plans like that, he was already planning to do >something wrong: software hoarding. If he was stopped, by a >technicality or by other means, that's great. We can rejoice because >the public has been saved from being victims of hoarding. > >Software hoarders complain when thwarted, but we should not give them >our sympathy. Mafiosi, welfare cheaters and make-work bureaucrats >also complain if their funds are cut off, but we don't sympathize with >them, because that's what they deserve. > >If a person you care about is a software hoarder and you want >to have good wishes for the person, the right way to do it >is to hope the person comes to understand the wrongness of >hoarding, and stops making plans to base his livelihood on >hoarding. Success in ill-gotten gains is not really a good wish. Software HOARDER? Boyoboy, are you lost in academia! You mean, all programming should be done for the good of society, and we evil nasty commercial programmers should go out getting jobs hauling trash, or go on welfare, and donate the software we develop in our spare time, out of the goodness of our hearts, to the world at large? Grow up! This IS a capitalist society. -- ... "What were you expecting, rock'n'roll?" Roger B.A. Klorese Celerity Computing, 40 Speen St., Framingham, MA 01701, (617) 872-1772 UUCP: seismo!harvard!bu-cs!celtics!roger ARPA: celtics!roger@bu-cs.ARPA