The ESR error?
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| Author | Content |
|---|---|
| dinotrac Jun 24, 2007 5:57 AM EDT |
This author, I believe, has fallen prey to the ESR problem: focusing on the quality of the software and the nature of its development. Much of the piece is comparing the development of free software with non-free. Worse, he makes an unfortunate error by ignoring the fact that much of FOSS these days is developed by the same kind of paid full-time developers who write proprietary stuff. The real problem, however, is that free software's biggest benefit is not great software. Yes, there is a lot of great free software. The thing that makes free software valuable to business, however, is the freedom as much as the software. With free software, you can tailor your IT to your needs and to your benefit without concern for unreasonable licensing restrictions. Gosh! How powerful is that? Just as free software lets individuals do things that would be beyond their means, it lets companies do things that would make no sense in a license (and cost) restricted world. |
| land0 Jun 24, 2007 9:01 AM EDT |
@dinotac I just happen to be the author of this post so let me offer some clarification. In terms of the ESR error, I have based what I wrote concerning security and reliability on the experience of my customers and myself. So I believe it is fair for me to say that FOSS applications are more stable and secure by default than proprietary ones. If you have experienced something different than I am sorry to hear that. There is much to be said about additional security measures that can be taken. But that is far outside the scope of my blog post. Much of the piece... Are we reading the same post? Most of the piece is talking about the human element in FOSS software development and what fuels it. I find that when I love what I am doing I work better faster and more efficiently. Take sex for example. When done right ;) it can constitute a lot of effort. But because we tend to enjoy it and bask in what we get out of it we are (hopefully) willing to put a lot more effort into it than we ever would into things we consider work. As for my unfortunate error... From the article--> "In fact many of the developers who are paid to develop are the same ones who are able to accomplish in 2 hours what many times takes 4 hours or more while on the clock. This amounts to better code and a richer feature set." I agree that there is more power in FOSS software than just the quality of software. --> "We need something that communicates what FOSS is and what benefits there are for using FOSS applications. To communicate in simple terms that by using FOSS you are in fact staking a claim to reliability, usability and security. It is time to get your work done the way you choose to do it. One size fits all is crap!" I hope this clears up any misunderstandings that you seem to have had with what was written. |
| Aladdin_Sane Jun 24, 2007 9:20 AM EDT |
"We need something that communicates what FOSS is and what benefits there are for using FOSS applications." "Take sex for example." I think you already figured out how to say it: "FOSS is like sex." |
| land0 Jun 24, 2007 10:03 AM EDT |
rofl lol You are so right! :D |
| dinotrac Jun 24, 2007 10:19 AM EDT |
land0 - I didn't say you were wrong, though it seems you might be dissing those full-time paid FOSS developers who work on pretty much the same basis as proprietary developers. I would bet that many of them do wonderful work -- just as many proprietary developers do wonderful work. WRT the ESR error, I think that most businesses don't really care that much about how the software is developed. Some do, and some care about having the source code available. Absolutely. Lots of them, however, care about the freedom to use and deploy software without unreasonable restrictions. ESR, I think, made good points but underplayed the most beneficial aspects of free software to business. |
| land0 Jun 24, 2007 1:39 PM EDT |
@dinotrac ...dissing those full-time paid FOSS developers who work on pretty much the same basis as proprietary developers. Be rest assured that is not at all where I am coming from. :) You do make a good point though. If a developer is paid to develop FOSS chances are they are much more satisfied with their job. right? One might even ask if you are truly doing what you love. Are you really working at all. Ok that may be taking it too far. ;) But the point still stands. I do not know what it is like for your job to be developing FOSS so i can only speculate as to what it is like. Once again I drew on my personal experience and only addressed what I know. It would be very interesting to know how a full time FOSS developer views their job. I would love to hear about that. Any volunteers? |
| dinotrac Jun 24, 2007 2:59 PM EDT |
>It would be very interesting to know how a full time FOSS developer If we don't have any full-timers out there, I'll bet we have one or two who were able to do some FOSS development as part of their regular job -- maybe extending a project, adding a driver, some such thing. |
| Aladdin_Sane Jun 24, 2007 3:09 PM EDT |
As a tester I worked with full-time FOSS developers. If they ever came into the lab at all, they had that far away look in their eyes that says they could see things the rest of us could not. |
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