[Ilugc] Re: Five crucial things outsiders do not understand about the Linux community
- From: anant@xxxxxx (Anant Narayanan)
- Date: Fri May 25 20:31:56 2007
Manoj Srivastava wrote:
This is not an unlaudable goal. I wonder, though, how
prevalent that view is amongst the worker bees of free software, as
opposed to the armchair intellectuals. In my experience with people in
free software development, I have never heard the goal above stated as
a major motivator (and never heard it stated so succinctly).
It is true that most of the *current* free software is a result of
scratching your own itch. But the entire GNU project was founded with
the exact goal of being a replacement for the then proprietary Unix -
and what good is a replacement that isn't used by the masses?
Over the course of time, free software developers; or the worker bees as
you call them, have indeed forgotten the *original* motivation behind
free software. A trend perhaps started by Linus - I doubt if he really
knew the moral and social implications of releasing his kernel under the
GPL. He did it simply because he really didn't care if the source was
visible to the whole world, something that any university student his
age would have done at the time.
Let's not forget that the "armchair intellectuals" of today were the
"worker bees" of the past, albeit, with different motivations.
The original discussion revolved around what needs to be done by
the creators of free software -- and while saving the world from
software patents and DRM can't be argued against, it usually lies in
the same sphere as ending world hunger or curing aids. Nice, but rarely
does one spend 20-40 hours a week doing that in ones free time, unless
one is very very unusually motivated.
Indeed, saving the world from DRM can hardly serve as a motivator for
writing software these days. However, it certainly plays a role in the
marketing of the software that is written. Regardless of why free
software is written, a small portion of the free software community
*must* be devoted to convincing the masses to actually use that software
- not only for the greater good of the society but also for the
developers of the software itself. I quote from Frederick P. Brooke's
"The Mythical Man-Month":
"Why is programming fun? What delights may its practitioner expect as
his reward? <snip>
The pleasure of making things that are useful to others. Deep within, we
want others to use our work and to find it helpful. In this respect the
programming system is not essentially different from a child's first
clay pencil holder `for daddy's office`"
The result is that the general free software development flows
down the scratching ones itch route. If people are truly motivated
in catering to the unwashed masses in order to save the world, they
need to gird up their lions and actually pitch in and do the work.
I don't question the motivation of free software developers. However, I
oppose the view that free software developers shouldn't care about
whether their software is used by the masses or not. As long as there
are people ready to do the pushing voluntarily, the problem is solved.
The worker bees keep developing software for whatever reason - while
others spend time in convincing the masses to use that software. The
free software community is not only made of developers who can code but
also of people who are interested in spreading its message.
Of course, a small percentage of free software developers *can* afford
to keep "free society" as their major motivator: a vast majority of
university professors and students - who have nothing to lose. And of
course, people who are paid to write free software.
The essence here is not to forget the original goal of free software
development - and one of the objectives is to get the masses to use it.
The OLPC project is an exemplary example.
Regards,
--
Anant Narayanan
http://www.kix.in/
gpg --recv-keys 0EF6914E
<anant@xxxxxx,gentoo.org,php.net>
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