--- kelley <kwalker2 at gte.net> forwarded: >> <fwd>
>
> The ``utility function'' Linux hackers are
> maximizing is not classically
> economic,
just an aside: yes it is.
>but is the intangible of their own ego
> satisfaction and
> reputation among other hackers.
Which is not discussed in any interesting way in the whole essay. You'd think that "reputation" and "status", which have a quite interesting economic literature about them even in NC econ, might get a deeper treatment than just reducing them to a commodity and pretending that it's being traded back and forth.
> (One may call their
> motivation
> ``altruistic'', but this ignores the fact that
> altruism is itself a form of
> ego satisfaction for the altruist).
I detect the spoor of Ayn Rand .....
>Voluntary
> cultures that work this way
> are not actually uncommon; one other in which I have
> long participated is
> science fiction fandom, which unlike hackerdom has
> long explicitly
> recognized
Hmmmmmm .... I think "explicitly recognised" is Raymond-speak for "written boring essays about".
> ``egoboo'' (ego-boosting, or the
> enhancement of one's reputation
> among other fans) as the basic drive behind
> volunteer activity.
>
> Linus, by successfully positioning himself as the
> gatekeeper of a project
> in which the development is mostly done by others,
> and nurturing interest
> in the project until it became self-sustaining,
Right. Remember this, for comparison with what comes later. We are actually talking about something identified with *one person*, who *manages* a project.
Students of neo-classical economics will recognise what is typically known as a "firm" rather than a "market".
> has
> shown an acute grasp of
> Kropotkin's ``principle of shared understanding''.
What is it with autodidacts and Kropotkin, bytheway? Not necessarily a bad thing, just something I've noticed.
> This quasi-economic view
> of the Linux world enables us to see how that
> understanding is applied.
>
> We may view Linus's method as a way to create an
> efficient market in
> ``egoboo''
No, no, a million times no. This is not an "efficient market" in any useful sense of the term. For the following reasons:
1. It's structured hierarchically. The production of manna is more or less an oligopoly of the Big Names. They control which computer program thingies get into the the program, and they are the ones dispensing kudos and blame. It looks more like a Talmudic school than it does a bazaar.
2. It's not a market. The manna-stuff (I literally can't bring myself to type "egoboo") can only be consumed. It's not tradeable in itself, it's not a factor of production, it's not a unit of account. There is no "market" in manna -- what there is is some people giving it to others.
> -- to connect the selfishness of
> individual hackers as firmly as
> possible to difficult ends that can only be achieved
> by sustained
> cooperation.
Right. So it's not a market; it's a compensation scheme. As discussed with Justin, this is consistent with *any* economic model you care to name.
>With the fetchmail project I have shown
> (albeit on a smaller
> scale) that his methods can be duplicated with good
> results. Perhaps I have
> even done it a bit more consciously and
> systematically than he.
Again, the active clause of the second sentence here appears to be Raymond-speak for "written a dull essay".
>
> Many people (especially those who politically
> distrust free markets) would
> expect a culture of self-directed egoists to be
> fragmented, territorial,
> wasteful, secretive, and hostile. But this
> expectation is clearly falsified
> by (to give just one example) the stunning variety,
> quality and depth of
> Linux documentation.
I am told by boffins of my acquaintance that there are opposing views on the subject of this documentation . . .
> It is a hallowed given that
> programmers hate
> documenting; how is it, then, that Linux hackers
> generate so much of it?
Because they were told to! The "market" and the hypothesised egoism of the nerds involved are a wheel which doesn't drive anything in this mechanism -- "the market" is being used purely as an invocation.
[snip a whole lot of stuff -- he doesn't mind repeating himself, this bloke, hein?]
As an aside, I'm not sure that Raymond's characterisation of how medieval cathedrals were actually built is an accurate one. How seriously is he taken?
d^2
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