Doug Henwood wrote:
> yeah, that's another point - I'm not convinced that
> the free software thing is really that serious an
> alternative economic model - it involves lots of
> free riding on the resources of parents and
> employers, no? - how, can the free exchange of code
> deal with a world where we still have to use cash
> money to eat and secure shelter?
One important critique to make is that there really is nothing inherently anti-capitalist about Free Software/Open Source. Even to the originators of the term "Free Software," the freedom refers to the ability to modify source code, not necessarily to price. "free as in free speech, not free as in free beer" is a common formulation. Under the GNU Public License, there is nothing intended to keep you from charging a lsum of money for your free software program if you so wish.
IBM, Novell, and other firms have to learned to live happily with and even profit from GNU/Linux because it is an ideal operating system for servers.
"Open Source" advocates, as opposed to the "Free Software" people, tend to be even less idealistic. The core of the "Open Source" belief isn't based upon appeals to "freedoms" as in the case of the "Free Software" advocates. Open Source adherents tend to argue for open code with the argument that software programs themselves will be more efficient with open sourcecode. The argument is purely utilitarian.
Also, there seems to be a romantic, media-created image floating about of anonymous coders collaborating in groovy one-love non-hierarchical ways via the internet to churn out software. In reality, most key programs, such as the Linux kernel, have fairly well-established hierarchies in place to "maintain" particular pieces of code, with select individuals at the top deciding amongst themselves what pieces of code are officially adopted and which are not.
And, from the viewpoint of efficiency, that's not even such a bad idea. But it certainly chafes against the comfy myths concerning any allegedly emancipatory aspect to the practice of creating free or open source software.
One Marxian thinker who writes critically, but nonetheless sympathetically, on issues of technology and intellectual property is Sabine Nuss <http://www.wbk.in-berlin.de/wp_nuss/> whose book <http://www.dampfboot-verlag.de/buecher/647-5.html> on this and other topics has recently been released.
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