brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton) (03/29/85)
Indeed, let the people decide about GNU. I don't say it's certain that GNU will not do good. It could very well. But I made my statements in the light of some important facts. The most important is that most people, unlike Richard Stallman, want good rewards for what they do. While it may be very nice of Mr. Stallman and his friends to give us all this software, they certainly can't handle everything. Sadly, in a market where there is a high quality, high priced product and an inferior free product, many will use the free product not because it is the BEST but because it is free. And thus you get the advancement of inferior products at the expense of superior ones. Of course, this is from a purely technical viewpoint, as you might argue that the free product is "superior" in the long run due to the low cost. I know the above rule from personal experience. I have a $50 programming utility on the market. There is a free one, modeled after mine, which the author admits is clearly inferior. Yet I lose many sales to it and piracy, the result being that I've moved on to other things. Perhaps RMS can make a superior product, and still keep it free. Good luck, It's never been done before although it has often been tried. The reason for this is simple. Designing and bringing up neat new software is fun, and lots of people are willing to do it for free. Debugging, maintaining, enhancing and supporting it is NOT, and few will do this at the same bargain price. Unfortunately, in a quality product, the first part takes up 90% of the time, and the other part takes up the other 90% of the time, to bring out the old cliche. But who knows, perhaps they can do it, and time will tell. I am not opposed to any quality product, free or not. What I don't like is inferior products that displace superior products because they were written by fanatical communists like RMS. (I'm not name calling, I use these terms as an accurate description based on my mail conversations with the man.) And remember, the "quality" of a product must be judged over a period of time. It may be good to start, but will it stand up? Does it adapt and suit your needs for a long time? Will people hang onto it long after it is obsolete just because it is free? -- Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario 519/884-7473
tsc2597@acf4.UUCP (Sam Chin) (04/01/85)
<>
"What I don't like is inferior products that displace superior products
becuase they were written by fanatical communists like RMS."
Hey come on, this statement almost degrades to the level of DOCTOR VAX who
has been writing libelious mail to net.apple. I have been using GNU emacs
for a few days now and it is great. RMS and company are certainly good
programmers and I certainly have faith in them producing a decent GNU. GNU
emacs is at least as powerful as commercial versions of emacs which sell for
thousands of dollars. We are not looking at dinky $50 dollar utilities (I
know, I wrote some during weekends when I was bored and sell them too) but
at a major programming effort whose distribution source is about 3
megabytes. Besides, with all the big guys around, and the incredible number
of existing software companies, most of the small guys are doomed anyway
unless they have something *really really* innovative - just ask wall street
or any venture capitalist. Perhaps we shall see a reemergence of free
software after the big software shakeout. Personally, if I wrote another
package which was between "useful" and "good", I would probably give it away
free or freeware. If I wrote something "truly wonderful", then I would weigh
trying to sell it commercially but even then with todays competition, I
would have about a 10% chance of survival.
Sam Chin
allegra!cmcl2!acf4!tsc2597
tsc2597.acf4@nyuBillW@SU-SCORE.ARPA (William Chops Westfield) (04/01/85)
The greatest benefit of RMS's GNU ideas may be just getting a lot of volunteer hackers working together on the same things (the usual case is that there turn out to be 200 different PD communications programs, and so on, all of fairly mediocre quality). With GNU take over the software market? Never. It just isn't possible to provide the sort of support that naive user require without charging a decent amount of money for your program. Sure, RMS says that this isn't true in his manifesto, but he is wrong. I don't think RMS has ever had to deal with really large populations of users. Consider his current successes: 1) EMACS. ITS/TENEX EMACS is a good example of RMS's ideal piece of software. User written. User modified. Free. Constantly improved and improving. One of the most complex, powerful, and easy to use editors around. It's concepts have been copied in many comercial products. Many, many hours of volunteer labor have gone into its development... So what's wrong? Well, for one thing, EMACS has been 15 years or so in the making. The fact that it constantly changes is more of an annoyance than a feature to many sites. New features have taken precedence over things like efficiency... EMACS runs on DEC20's. DEC20s are an interesting machine. There are two PD Operating systems you can run. (maybe 3?). Almost all of the useful software you can run is PD. Why is this? Well, first is that there aren't all that many 20's. Second is that a lot of them are linked together by the DoD ARPANet. DoD funded programs are by definiton free to other DoD contractors. The net makes sharing software easy. The 20 is a popular university computer, generating even more free software... 2) LMI Lisp machine Software. I don't know much about this. I suspect the LMI lisp machine grew up in an environment similar to that of DEC20s. The problem is that I suspect that there were more apple macintoshes sold durring the christmas season than there are DEC20s and LMI lisp machines put together, total! Another point is that all that donated programmer time was in many cases paid for by the programmers current employer. A university or a DoD site, and a lot of companies are quite willing to have a programmer spend a bunch of hours improving the editor. And then the changes get sent back to everyone else, so that THEY can make improvements. Things may change when the majority of people using the software DO NOT contribute to its development or improvement. BillW
jih@usl.UUCP (Juha I. Heinanen) (04/01/85)
Brad Templeton writes: >I am not opposed to any quality product, free or not. What I don't like >is inferior products that displace superior products because they were >written by fanatical communists like RMS. There are two comments I can't resist to make after reading Brad's article and the above quote in particular. First, based on my experience with both CCA Emacs and Gosling's Emacs, there doesn't exist superior, well supported commercial Emacs that the GNU Emacs would be likely to displace. On the contrary, in the DEC world there are thousands of very happy users of RMS's free Emacs who would be surprised to hear that in the Unix world you have to pay for the similar, but in many sense inferior, product. Second, I don't think that Brad's opinion of RMS as a fanatic communist is appropriate. Contrary to the common American belief, every non capitalist is not necessarily a communist. I don't personally know RMS, but rather than being a fanatic communist, he seems to be much closer to an idealistic software anarchist in the most positive meaning of the word. Juha Heinanen {ut-sally, akgua}!usl!jih
Samuel@SU-SCORE.ARPA (Sam Hahn) (04/01/85)
Let's see... To me it looks like where there is a high quality product, and there is an IBM product, many will use the IBM product not because it is the BEST but because it is IBM. And thus you get the advancement of IBM products at the expense of superior ones. Let's separate the issue of technical superiority from the issue of whether you must PAY for the product. One can knock a PD program for its quality/lack-of-quality, but there are enough examples of superb software in the public domain that any attempt to generalize based only on the statements I've seen recently are at best incomplete. Look at ZCPR, MEX, various disk utilities, Kermit, BYE, various Forths, compression utilities, XLISP, and who know what else I've left out in this list that's come just from a quick mental scan. What support have I received from REAL products?? I've paid DRI and its associates over $1200.00 for the various OS products I've bought, but when upgrading from MP/M816 to ConcurrentDOS, I've lost. MP/M isn't a real products any more. Great, I'm out of luck, and am FORCED to go to ConcurrentDOS. Have they ever replied to my suggestions for improvement and consolidation of features from 3.0, -86, -816, not to mention ORIGINAL suggestions? No. What has Sorcim done for me? They tell me that upgrading from SuperCalc to SuperCalcII costs $125.00, is what they tell me. This when I can order SuperCalcII for $149 or so from mail order houses. Is this support? I could go on for many pages (and Kbytes). I've had better response from Ron Fowler, who's on the net, regarding MEX, than I've ever had from my REAL software products. I've had better help from my user groups in setting up PD software than I've ever gotten from software houses. The sources to PD software is often available, and that means a LOT in terms of the support that's possible to obtain. I personally plan to contribute to RMS's GNU effort as soon as I finish my master's project here at HPP. -- Sam Hahn -------
jchapman@watcgl.UUCP (john chapman) (04/02/85)
Brad Templeton writes: > Indeed, let the people decide about GNU. I don't say it's certain > that GNU will not do good. It could very well. But I made my statements > in the light of some important facts. > > The most important is that most people, unlike Richard Stallman, want > good rewards for what they do. While it may be very nice of Mr. Stallman > and his friends to give us all this software, they certainly can't handle > everything. There are an awful lot of people running bbs's at their own expense - no reward financially (in fact it costs them money), just performing a public service - these systems contain an awful lot of free software as does usenet. If people get software they want for free from others they are also quite likely to distribute some of their own free as well. > > Sadly, in a market where there is a high quality, high priced product and > an inferior free product, many will use the free product not because it > is the BEST but because it is free. And thus you get the advancement of > inferior products at the expense of superior ones. Of course, this is > from a purely technical viewpoint, as you might argue that the free product > is "superior" in the long run due to the low cost. I know the above rule > from personal experience. I have a $50 programming utility on the market. > There is a free one, modeled after mine, which the author admits is clearly > inferior. Yet I lose many sales to it and piracy, the result being that > I've moved on to other things. > This does not seem any different to me than someone deciding between the features of a $150 item and a $200 item - you look at what you get for the extra $50 and decide if it is worth it. Apparently most people thought your program wasn't worth $50 for it's extra features; this is hardly a reason to decry the spread of free software. > Perhaps RMS can make a superior product, and still keep it free. Good > luck, It's never been done before although it has often been tried. > The reason for this is simple. Designing and bringing up neat new software > is fun, and lots of people are willing to do it for free. Debugging, > maintaining, enhancing and supporting it is NOT, and few will do this > at the same bargain price. Unfortunately, in a quality product, the first > part takes up 90% of the time, and the other part takes up the other 90% of > the time, to bring out the old cliche. But who knows, perhaps they can do > it, and time will tell. Two points: 1. as pointed out in the "manifesto" if there is demand (and there most likely will be) for support & enhancements then companies will spring up to provide this. Perhaps you should volunteer to help him with the project thus becoming a gnu wizard, you would then be able to open a nice profitable business offering gnu support services. 2. craftsmen who produce products to be given away generally put a lot of effort into what they produce - they have pride in it; on the other hand business writes software to make $$, it doesn't have to be good it just has to sell - if you find a bug and it only affects a small percentage of the potential customers you're not likely to see it fixed quickly (if at all). > > I am not opposed to any quality product, free or not. What I don't like > is inferior products that displace superior products because they were > written by fanatical communists like RMS. (I'm not name calling, I use > these terms as an accurate description based on my mail conversations with > the man.) It is really unlikely that an inferior product will replace a superior product unless the "superior" product is overpriced (or perhaps not considered really superior in the eyes of the purchaser). Since I don't know what your mail conversations have been like I don't know if RMS is a communist or not but it certainly does sound like you are name calling - whether he is a communist or not you are certainly using it as a perjorative. Perhaps from now on you should be referred to as a fanatical capitalist.... > > And remember, the "quality" of a product must be judged over a period of > time. It may be good to start, but will it stand up? Does it adapt and > suit your needs for a long time? Will people hang onto it long after it > is obsolete just because it is free? It seems to me that they would be more likley to hang on to obsolete software if they had paid a lot for it than if it was free. In the event that you are correct though: I suggest we institute a corp of software police (to protect all those poor misguided users out there of course). They can perform surprise searchs and if they find someone using outdated software they will confiscate it and force the hapless user to buy new shiny and expensive software to replace it (maybe you could make a deal with them?). > -- > Brad Templeton, Looking Glass Software Ltd. - Waterloo, Ontario John Chapman Disclaimer: the above is not the view of my employer, friends, family dog, myself, anyone known to me (living or dead) nor that of any fictional character in book I have ever read.
sommers@topaz.ARPA (Liz Sommers) (04/03/85)
> >First, based on my experience with both CCA Emacs and Gosling's Emacs, >there doesn't exist superior, well supported commercial Emacs that the >GNU Emacs would be likely to displace. On the contrary, in the DEC >world there are thousands of very happy users of RMS's free Emacs who >would be surprised to hear that in the Unix world you have to pay for >the similar, but in many sense inferior, product. Just a note: Unipress has come out with a completely new version of Gosling Emacs. Check it out before you put it down. Gosling Emacs can no longer be considered an inferior product. I have been using it in both alpha and beta test and now prefer it to RMS ITS Emacs which I also use everyday. > >Second, I don't think that Brad'sopinion of RMS as a fanatic communist >is appropriate. Contrary to the common American belief, every non >capitalist is not necessarily a communist. I don't personally know RMS, >but rather than being a fanatic communist, he seems to be much closer to >an idealistic software anarchist in the most positive meaning of the >word. > > Juha Heinanen > {ut-sally, akgua}!usl!jih RMS is a pretty close friend. He is not a communist. He is a self-proclaimed anarchist. Some of his ideas are pretty buggy, but his software rarely is. The people who are doing everyday support are also good. Gosling EMACS and GNUmacs have different niches. RMS is not interested in doing a lot of support work, he is interested in developing software and having the users support it. Unipress has a staff dedicated to supporting Gosling Emacs. (Yes, I know they didn't use to, but things DO change). If you want to take the time to do ALL your emacs support yourself, then GNUMACS might just be the thing for you. You just have to realize that bug reports will probably be answered with "Well, what is the fix?" A number of sites outside of universities do not have the time or personel to cope with this method of support. As a second point, soon you will be able to run Gosling Emacs on ALL your machines, using the same mlisp files. This can be real nice if you, like me, might work on 5 or 6 different machines a week. I hate remembering "what is the name of the command on THIS machine?" I have been Alpha testing the new Gosling Emacs for the AT, using it very extensively for both text and programming. The old bugs that made it unusable are mostly out. Will report on it in another message. -- liz sommers uucp: ...{harvard, seismo, ut-sally, sri-iu, ihnp4!packard}!topaz!sommers arpa: sommers@rutgers
john@x.UUCP (John Woods) (04/04/85)
> written by fanatical communists like RMS. (I'm not name calling, I use > these terms as an accurate description based on my mail conversations with > the man.) I know Richard. Fanatical, yes. Communist, certainly not. Check your mailer to see if it is Huffman encoding messages in and out of your site. > > And remember, the "quality" of a product must be judged over a period of > time. ... Will people hang onto it long after it > is obsolete just because it is free? > Sadly, rather likely. Just like they hang onto bad software just because it is IBM, or because they have a huge investment of their time in it, or any number of other reasons for not paying for new software. Some of these reasons would also cause them to hold onto software they've purchased even when a superior free package comes out, too. I doubt you have a number for how much money you lost to free software and software pirates, as neither effect is honestly quantifiable. I have no idea how you r[ua]n your business, but when I buy software, I wish to receive support which is better than that which I could do myself (and given its existance, I will buy software). If you are going to worry about software which is quite inferior but free, remember that you also have competition from software that is slightly inferior and slightly less expensive than yours, as well as software that is markedly better and much more expensive (as well as better/less expensive, and worse/more expensive...). It may just be the nature of the software business that it is quite difficult to come out with an expensive piece of software whose functionality truly eclipses any free software, even given the propensity for non-maintenance. Compare it to the auto industry: very few people can practically build their own cars (and they don't grow on [conference] trees :-). But that is hardly the fault of people who write free software. -- John Woods, Charles River Data Systems, Framingham MA, (617) 626-1101 ...!decvax!frog!john, ...!mit-eddie!jfw, jfw%mit-ccc@MIT-XX.ARPA You can't spell "vile" without "vi".