The Free Software Battle Rages On!
Apparently, Darl McBride, CEO of SCO, says something along the lines that, “At the end of the day the GPL isn’t about protecting software, it’s about destroying value.” I’m glad that SCO has decided that the study of computer science should go back to the dark ages where religion was written in Latin so that only certain people could study it. Since computer science is so focused on profit, the GPL protects knowledge and stops us from entering a patent-induced dark age of non-disclosure agreements, restrictive licensing, and manipulation of the general population.
While we’re at it, let’s patent calculus and tell engineers that they can’t do their work any more either. If they do, maybe they can pay $10,000 per integral performed. Let’s also eliminate our public libraries and replace them with libraries that impose licensing fees to read any book in the library. Let’s tell little kids that working in teams is wrong. After all, collabaration is a bad thing.
I admit that some of these references aren’t the perfect ones. There aren’t essays written for every example. The point is simple: no one is destroying value, people are protecting information. Information access stops things like social class differences. That is a good thing, and few can disagree with it.
I know that a lot of times I like to talk about how free software is a good thing. The reason is that it is a good thing. I also know that the typical thought is that “normal people don’t know” or that they don’t care or even that it’s too difficult. No one said that these things are easy or that people do know what’s going on. However, people should care and know what’s going on. It’s not easy. I occasionally have to use proprietary software. I don’t claim to be perfect, but I do try to aknowledge the problems with proprietary software.
Most people don’t care. It’s true. The people that tell me that most people don’t care usually acknowledge my points at least partially, but don’t care about the points that I do bring up. Acknowledging correctness and ignoring it is more of an intentional lock out of information in my opinion. Most people don’t care. Most people will never use this information anyway. Most people wouldn’t like to be locked into something, though. This I know to be true.
I’m going to have a hard time once I leave school. I know this. It’s going to be difficult to find a job that I can write free software for and get paid. Unfortuantely, free software is not as widespread as it honestly should be. I will probably have to comprimise my morals at least for a while. It’s going to be tough to do. I’m still wrestling this issue. Do I comprimise my morals for a living and then try to encourage free software outside of my job? Is that enough for me to be morally okay? I like to think it is, but who knows.
The SCO people should atone for their sins.