[Fsf-friends] Re: Fsf-friends Digest, Vol 33, Issue 10

[Raj Shekhar]

in infinite wisdom Mishi Choudhary spoke thus  On Monday 16 January 2006 
04:19 PM:
>   
> hi krishna
> tons of thnx for answering my questions,thgere re a few more

> as i understand if i develop a software licensed under gpl it implies
> 
> that anyone else is allowedto copy it ,distribute it,modify it and do
> whatever is allowed to do as per gpl.then if i develop a software and a
> person x makes an exact copy of it and sells it for some priceand makes
> millions over it,hows it justified in that case?

This is based on the premise that all computer programmers will write 
software for their own company or eventually build a hugely successful 
startup.  Unluckily, there can be only few Yahoo!s and Googles.  Most of 
the CS students will end up becoming the fodder for our outsourcing 
giants or end up churning java code for the banks and MIS departments.

Coming back to the point. DevX develops a piece of software, let us call 
it Mooo. CustomerY buys this piece of software for, say, 200 bucks. 
CustomerZ comes to DevY and tells him to sell Mooo. CustomerY offers him 
a competitive price of 100 bucks (as opposed to the 200 bucks being 
charged by DevX). What is DevX to do now ? Won't he starve to death ?

As a college student, I would have answered - "Yes, DevX will starve. 
CustomerY will take away all his customers". As a somewhat experienced 
man, who has changed quite a few jobs, I answer - "I doubt DevX's 
business will flounder". The secret to running a successful company is 
to produce "customer satisfaction". Products are necessary props in 
producing satisfaction, but they're not the only necessary props.

Providing support for the GPL software is currently the most popular 
means of making money from it. Free Software offers the best option for 
software developers worldwide to develop a common public body of 
software and then sell it in their local market as a service. For 
example, let me take the example of a mail server. Setting up postfix 
(which is one of the mail servers available under GPL) is a piece of 
cake if you know what you are doing. Postfix comes with tons of 
documentation. However, not everyone has the time and inclination to 
read through them and get it working. Most people want to send emails to 
their colleagues, not spend time understanding how smtp works. They are 
perfectly willing to pay good money to someone competent to setup the 
who damn thing. (I know this is a hard thing to grasp, especially if you 
are nerd like me who likes to do thing his own way)

> do all proprietary software have free software to copmete with?
> 

Yes.  If today someone chooses a piece of proprietary software for his 
needs, he would better know something that the engineers at Yahoo!, 
Google and Amazon don't.

> why should normal ppl like you n me be interested in free software when we never buy licensed software?

So, you admit to having pirated software on your desktop ?  Be prepared 
when BSA comes knocking on your home requesting to audit you software 
inventory.  The BSA has been putting pressure on many small scale 
companies to pay  up or face data loss.


-- 
          _.-,               raj shekhar
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