Archive of UserLand's first discussion group, started October 5, 1998.
Re: Continuing the Open Source discussion
Author: Joshua Allen Posted: 9/16/2000; 11:30:16 PM Topic: Continuing Dave's Open Source discussion Msg #: 21433 (In response to 21397) Prev/Next: 21432 / 21434
You have read the Open Source Definition, right? It's pedantic and boring and completely orthogonal to your desire to get creativity back into the world's discussions about software. Nonetheless, if you want to know what the "Open Source community" thinks that "Open Source" means, then that document is part of the answer. See www.opensource.org.I saw your earlier post saying it is not right for Dave to try to redefine "open source" as well. I am one of the developers who feels a bit bewildered that the definition I held (before a couple of guys decided to turn a VT text editor into a launch-pad for a new religion) has been so effectively taken away from me and politicized. We all agree about the "riders" I guess. And while I agree with you about being kind to other people's definitions, I think that definitions as "loud" as this one can squeeze out other definitions and leave the rest of us little mice squeaking quietly from the corner, "I am open source too!". It is the domain of fork-tongued politicians to choose labels that further the goal and thwart different perspectives. It is valiant and commendable when someone suggests that a label be selected only for clarity. Clear labels lead to clear thinking.
(For some defense of my stance on labels, think of the label "Pro-Life". While this is really "anti-abortion", getting the general public to use "pro-life" instead of anti-abortion automatically puts the pro-life camp at an advantage. I mean, who is opposed to life? Pro-choice does not sound so noble as Pro-life, but a heck of a lot better than anti-life or pro-death. But as for encouraging stinky thinking, "life" is a fairly broad term to appropriate for political motives, especially when other alternatives like "anti-abortion" were available. Same with pro-choice (although better alternatives might be hard to find) The label itself is a form of persuasion, and is not the most useful way to define things. Other examples, "The German Democratic Republic" was the official name of the former east germany. I mean, who would fight for GDR to become a democracy, can't you see we are already democratic? It's right in our name, fool! How about "Java Community Process", or "Open Source". Who would dare speak out against "open" or "community"? In fact, ESR is very clear that this sort of confusion is his exact motive in his advice to propagandists (or some such title) at opensource.org. He points out that "free software" makes corporate types think of communism and anti-capitalism, so you should be careful to use the term "open source" instead. I could imagine the leaders of the GDR saying "these German people may still not see the wisdom of communism, so we must scrap the name 'glorious peoples collective of the revolution' and instead use 'german democratic republic').)
Re luxury: Yes, I suppose you're right. The best software developers are only interested in creating software which people actually use, and money is an important component of their equation, but a secondary one.
You might revise that to say the best developers want to give the most value to the most people possible. If you write a little clock application that 10,000 people use but could easily live without, or if you write an app that saves 5,000 people an average of three hours of work each day, which do you think is better? Developers who measure success only by the number of machines that have loaded "joe's little clock app" have some questionable motivations. The reason that money is an important component of the equation is that it is the best way we have discovered so far to objectively measure the amount of value that someone perceives in your product.
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