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nice article on "Open Source Versus Commercial Software"

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mouser:
vegas pointed me to this in the irc channel:

"Open Source Versus Commercial Software"
http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=420290&seqNum=1

clif_notes:
I love Open Source software. The author of the article makes a valid point. People (coders) need to be compensated. Open Source will always be the poor step child. I don't find that disturbing. I've always rooted for the underdog.

Does this sound strange coming from me, the guy who says "Why buy when you can get it free?".
Actually, the inspiration that's driven me to find freeware over the years is simple. Lack of $$$$!  ;)

The fact that I love freeware and open source doesn't mean I will go out and use warez or download copyrighted materials. I find that practice to be immoral. I support the rights of all those who wish to enforce their legal rights to their creations.

mouser:
it's interesting that in recent years quite a few open source projects have been very smart in securing complete financial funding from one or two big commercial vendors who use their stuff.

and companies like TrollTech who make Qt, are getting rich off their dual open-source - commercial license.

although i'm not all that fond of TrollTech, i think the dual license model has real appeal from an ethical standpoint - those who use something to make money from it must compensat developers; those who use it in free work can use it freely.

the only thing about these models is that they tend to work for only a very few open source projects which have big companies willing to fund them.

i think the second route to providing open source authors with some reasonable compensation would be the move in this society towards more ready donating by users to support the work.  if people got into the habbit of making small donations, it would be enough to support independent coders, writers, musicians, etc., who really aren't motivated by the idea of getting rich, but would just like to be able to do good work and get enough to survive.

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