[H-GEN] Linux games are still proprietory

[ben.carlyle at invensys.com]

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Trent WADDINGTON <s337240 at student.uq.edu.au>
Sent by: Majordomo <majordom at caliburn.humbug.org.au>
04/04/03 10:13
Please respond to general

 
        To:     <general at lists.humbug.org.au>
        cc: 
        Subject:        Re: [H-GEN] Linux games are still proprietory

On Thu, 3 Apr 2003, Robert Stanford wrote:

> > On the argument of proprietry vs open source. It's like religion, it's
> > like beer, it's like sex. Everyone has preferences, some create their
> > own product. When they do so I feel they have the right to do what 
they
> > please with it, this includes licensing and distribution. To force a
> > point of view on an individual is not only rude but moraly wrong. To 
be
> > able to present a point of view without fear of reprisals is a 
wonderful
> > thing.

> Heh, your argument is very much like my argument *against* proprietary
> software.  You feel they have the right to do what they please with it,
> but then you go on to say that forcing a point of view on an individual 
is
> wrong.  Well then what *is* a license, if not a way of using law to 
force
> your opinion on others?  Microsoft's opinion is that everyone should pay
> them a large amount of money every time they use a piece of their
> software.  Do they have the right to hold this opinion?  Sure.  Is it
> moral for them to use the power of law to force this opinion on others? 
I
> don't think so.

I would suggest that generally when a venture requires significant time or 
energy input it should be the right of whomever invested the time to 
control access to and operation of the product. Copyright law and 
licencing agreements are ways of extending control over the product to 
cover what occurs to the product after it leaves the hands of the party 
who created it. I don't think there is usually an inherent right to deny 
the wishes of the content creator when a product comes into your hands.

Perhaps there are circumstances, though. If you need to share some 
software so that your family can eat tonight no court in the world would 
convict you, right? On the other hand if you want to share it because you 
think the content provider doesn't deserve the right to control it's 
creations then perhaps you don't deserve control over what you create, 
either. If you want to share it because you think you can make a quick 
buck out of someone else's product then perhaps you're just a theif. If 
you think that you can just take a commercial product and make it "free" 
of your own will and accord, then I suggest that a commercial vendor has 
just as much right to confiscate all existing copies of your free software 
and steal them to make them commerical.

The thing that's supposed to keep licencing agreements and requirements of 
copyright law honest is competition. Open source software models offer 
some competition to proprietary software models. Primarily, proprietary 
sofware products offer competition to other proproprietary software 
products. The exception of course is Monopoly, which can exist not just at 
the industry level in software, but at the individual product level. If 
one company controls the only product that can meaningfully make use of 
".doc" files and controls the information required for competitors (open 
or closed source) to produce meaningful competition then in my opinion 
they should be dealt with very seriously indeed.

As for shink-wrapped licences... well... you should always be able to get 
a refund if you don't agree to the terms. If one is not forthcoming than I 
would have to describe the retailer who provided the product as criminal.

If producers lose the right to control their content's use and 
distribution (or at least lose the right to fair compenstation for their 
work) then we'll simply see less and crappier production over time. Well, 
I might be wrong. Perhaps a communist reality will step up to replace our 
capitalist reality in some if not all areas of software practice and the 
people will themselves create the content a little at a time out of sheer 
numbers and willpower. That's already been happening with the open source 
world... but I think there's still a commercial reality in there 
somewhere. Anyway, I agree with what I think Robert was saying: that it is 
as morally wrong to force commercial providers who are operating in a 
genuinely competitive environment to use open source licencing against 
their will as it is to force open source developers to use classic 
commerical-style licences against their wills. It's wrong whether you're a 
government telling them what they write in their agreements, and it's 
wrong if you're a user who chooses to ignore the agreements. Commerical 
providers who do not live in genuinely competitive environments should 
have their licence agreements written by someone more or less independent, 
such as government or the courts. If the government and the courts fail to 
do this then perhaps it really is necessary for the individual to ignore 
the agreements :)

Benjamin.


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