You could have made your own transmission for your car. But you didn't, instead you paid for one. You're not paying the open source community where's the motivation supposed to come from? You're not willing to make any kind of contribution yet you want a "huge extra effort" to be made on your behalf. Why do you think the free lunch should be handed out? The auto companies aren't making transmissions for the betterment of society. They're doing it for a paycheck. The same motivation will get your open source software developed, you just have to be willing to fork it over.
Those people who would find the community and bounty system such a huge extra effort aren't ever going to stop using Windows (or Mac). Not until Dell (or some large reseller they trust) tells them to. It has nothing to do with a community that doesn't want to support your video card failing, and everything to do with a lack of motivation. Open source development is fueled in a large part by what programmers want to work on. Unless you want to encourage them (with $$ or charisma) to work on something else how can you complain they aren't? That's not a broken system. It's the exact same way the rest of the world operates. Auto manufacturers aren't going to just go make cheap, safe, efficient, low polluting autos because people want them, or because the world would benefit from them. They're going to do it because people will pay for them. The government doesn't just build roads for everyones benefit without collecting not only the cost of the road, but a paycheck for their effort. Open Source is only revolutionary in that we can all participate in the effort to effect change, not in that it freely distributes work and effort for the betterment of society at large.
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ninetydegrees
Re: I think you just made a very good point
on 2006-01-30 03:14 pm (UTC)Those people who would find the community and bounty system such a huge extra effort aren't ever going to stop using Windows (or Mac). Not until Dell (or some large reseller they trust) tells them to. It has nothing to do with a community that doesn't want to support your video card failing, and everything to do with a lack of motivation. Open source development is fueled in a large part by what programmers want to work on. Unless you want to encourage them (with $$ or charisma) to work on something else how can you complain they aren't? That's not a broken system. It's the exact same way the rest of the world operates. Auto manufacturers aren't going to just go make cheap, safe, efficient, low polluting autos because people want them, or because the world would benefit from them. They're going to do it because people will pay for them. The government doesn't just build roads for everyones benefit without collecting not only the cost of the road, but a paycheck for their effort. Open Source is only revolutionary in that we can all participate in the effort to effect change, not in that it freely distributes work and effort for the betterment of society at large.