I think that anarcho-capitalists, libertarians, and Austrian economists should be interested in
Free Software (FS) and
believe there is much to gain from studying FS and OSS. It would allow us
to bring computer-oriented individuals into the larger picture of a
free society overall.
The Free Software movement started with Richard Stallman, who was an AI programmer at MIT. Angered because a printing company with-held the source code for printer drivers which he wanted to fix (so they would work properly at MIT), Stallman, commonly called “RMS”, created the Free Software Foundation in…1984. The foundation’s goal was and is to make Free Software alternatives and innovations, so that anyone wanting to do a job on a computer could use Free Software. Stallman laid out his objective and why he started the FSF in the GNU Manifesto.
This is a very interesting example of how one individual — without even the incentive of great profit, but only of moral correctness — can make an enormous difference, and create alternatives, which individuals on a free market can choose over expensive competing products. Essentially, RMS said, “I don’t like proprietary software, I think programmers should share source code,” and he did something about it. He created the FSF, which is the starting point for all of the Free Software, and Open Source Software, that we have today (OSS is a rift from FS, OSS being more focused on appealing to business than the moral issues dealt with by the FS). Various competitors have whined and whined about MS out-competing them, and have nagged the government into wasting billions of taxpayer dollars to “sanction Microsoft” (despite the fact that it is not violating anyone’s proeprty rights). Meanwhile, at the same time and before, RMS and his followers were actually doing something productive.
Interestingly, RMS has often been accused of being a communist (perhaps his last name, Stallman, has something to do with it). Though RMS is not a libertarian, he is also not a communist, and accusations of such confuse an individual’s private morality with what he thinks should be law. RMS has not suggested that contracts should not be obeyed; indeed, when he was refused the source to printer-drivers due to a NDA, rather than raving to the government and mandating they invalidate all such consentual contracts, he did something productive. He created software that required signing a different kind of contract, which would turn copyright upside down (into “copyleft”). The deeper problem with that accusation is that anyone who is against copyrights and patents is a communist. This is simply a flat-out lie, as there are no natural proeprty rights in non-scare resources, and any attempt to create such property rights (absent voluntary contract) is a Statist intervention, which creates an artificial monopoly.
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IIRC, RMS’s biography (_Free as in Freedom_) made mention that he was raised as a leftist. I think that the “commie” label is further aggravated by his yapping about “bosses” and “suits”.
Example:
When I run “info su” on my Linux box, down at the bottom is a little bit of commentary by RMS:
“Sometimes a few of the users try to hold total power over all the
rest. For example, in 1984, a few users at the MIT AI lab decided to
seize power by changing the operator password on the Twenex system and
keeping it secret from everyone else. (I was able to thwart this coup
and give power back to the users by patching the kernel, but I wouldn’t
know how to do that in Unix.)
However, occasionally the rulers do tell someone. Under the usual
`su’ mechanism, once someone learns the root password who sympathizes
with the ordinary users, he or she can tell the rest. The “wheel
group” feature would make this impossible, and thus cement the power of
the rulers.
I’m on the side of the masses, not that of the rulers. If you are
used to supporting the bosses and sysadmins in whatever they do, you
might find this idea strange at first.”
In any case, you nailed it: RMS went out and *did* something, rather than go whine to the government.
It’s interesting that the only real competitor to Windows on the PC platform is succeeding not just by creating a viable and feature filled product that meets many customers’ needs (Linux and other Free Software) but by also changing the rules of the game. The Free Software space tends to be very decentralized, very entrepenural, and highly competitive. Good projects draw users and developers and remain for years. Projects that don’t appeal to enough people or are technically flawed or deficient tend to fail. Interestingly, though, this “dead” code can be used again or picked up by another group so long as the GPL is followed. Customers never have to worry about a critical piece of software going belly up if they use free software. The company or group that produced it may fold, but nothing stops anyone else from continuing to use and support/develop that product.
Free Software is slowing doing to software what Asian companies and the IBM PC standard did to hardware: make it a low cost commodity. Copyright law is a large difference between hardware and software and the free software movement has used contract law to turn this cost raising effect into a cost lowering effect.
No good thing last however and the Ultimate State has its hand in the pie of “free” software.
From http://www.gnu.org/directory/
The Free Software Directory is a project of the Free Software Foundation (FSF) and United Nations Education, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). The project was started in September of 1999, and UNESCO joined our effort in April of 2003.
Being a libertarian of the anarcho-capitalist variety and having literally been on both sides of the market or ideological “battle” (I worked for Micro$oft for several years, and I have worked on several OSS projects as well), I have thought about the issue quite a bit, and I’ve come to the conclusion that, although Microsoft doesn’t directly violate property rights, a large amount of it’s financial success has been premised on the existence of everyone’s favorite monopolist and property rights aggressor, the state. Specifically copyrights, trademarks, and patents, which as you said quite well are attempts to create property rights in non-scare resources, and these are “Statist intervention[s], which [create] artificial monopolies”. But one could refute this by pointing out that software companies usually have EULAs (End User License Agreements) accompanying their products, which some might define as a form of voluntary contract. But what is a contract without a means of enforcement? And I think this is where Microsoft, and most “intellectual property” companies have relied on the state the most, they have socialized the costs of enforcement for these implicit contracts, while “privatizing” the benefits of the enforcement. Although Microsoft does have auditing agreements with most of their VAR and OEM partners (which are wonderful examples of market solutions for contract enforcement, by the way) they still rely on the state to indirectly enforce most of these implicit contracts that would be unreasonably costly to enforce otherwise. I say indirectly, because when they do actually “go after” small-time software “pirates” they use copyright law as their weapon of choice, and not contract law. I only assume this is because the state hands out more draconian judgments in copyright cases.
I think similar things could be seen in the music and movie industries as well.
Bob,
Great points. I think one interesting thing is that, in the absence of copyright, the EULA and the GPL would still be binding on those who agree to it. However, it would not be binding on anyone who hadn’t agreed to it. If I license my software under the GPL, then anyone who downloads it has to agree to that. However, if they then give it to others, without the GPL attached, in violation of the GPL, and tell others that they can do whatever they want with it, then those they gave it to aren’t binded by the contract, because they didn’t agree to the GPL and didn’t know the software was GPL’ed. In that case, I, however, have the option of holding the person liable who gave away the GPL’ed code without the GPL.
I too have worked for Microsoft, and been employed by competitors of Microsoft. I have had the fortunate experience of being told that if I didn’t endorse a microsoft competitive product, that “we will bury you”… IOW, they will destroy the company, and it was clear that illegal means was not out of consideration.
Microsoft does indeed violate private property rights! They have been caught red-handed many times– the Quicktime code that appeared in windows media, violating NDA and licensing agreements as they did with Sun RE: Java and many other instances where they have taken someone elses technology or violated contracts with other companies. Now Apple enjoys hundreds of millions in quiet payments from Microsoft every year due to their “technology cross licensing agreement”, but many other companies were destroyed by such violations.
Hell, they have sent storm troopers(EG: US Marshells with guns at the ready) into schools to force the schools to pay for copies of windows– for macintoshes that can’t even run windows! IT is microsofts opinion that you have to pay for every CPU you have– even if its not runnign windows, or even if it CAN’T run windows.
They defraud customers regularly this way. Think about it — ever Linux isntall on a PC is a customer who had to pay for windows, even if he immediately installed linux after he bought the computer. Refunds? There is no way to get a refund… and you can’t buy a computer from most places without windows.
MSFT is NOT a pro-captialist organization.
Also, The FSF is not a pro-capitalist organization either.
The GPL is a consentual contract, but the FSF agenda is to try and force all companies to release their software under GPL. There has been no end of complaining and whining by RMS about the fact that Linux has been successful (While his pure GPL OS is something we’re still waiting for– and he had quite a head start.)
The FSF’s goal is to make all software GPLed– if they do it by competing in the market with free software, then great. But if they do it in the courtroom– which they haven’t yet– then there is a problem there.
Open Source is more free than GPL– Many licenses, such as BSD, allow commercial use, and thus they have people who work for businesses contributing back into the code pool. GPL got a boost by Linus choosing it, but BSD has more legs in the long run… many companies are afraid of dealing with GPL code, but not BSD code.
And contrary to FSF paranoia, these companies then contriubte their changes back into the public tree for everyone– not because they have to under the BSD license (They don’t) but because they want to continue to leverage the other contributers work, and that is much easier by contributing back and then using the latest code which already includes your modifications– than to branch and constantly porting the updates from the public tree into your private tree.
I think stallman is very much a leftist– he does not believe people should be able to profit from selling software.
Its a short line from “able” to “allowed”.
I thought this was the Mises Institute, where it would
be obvious that a product that has a price of zero (OSS) effectively
prevents economic calculation, just as in a socialist economy.
People are free to enter into contracts under the OSS license and as a libertarian,
I certainly respect their rights. That doesn’t imply that OSS is a
sound economic principle. Tryng to attach economic soundness to OSS because
it’s a valid contract, is a fallacious argumentation.
Programmers working gratis, to ‘share’ and make a ‘better society’ is as red
as it comes. My claiming this doesn’t imply that I’m specifically defending Microsoft or SCO. I’m
defending capitalism for my own sake.
Also, I’ve been discussing this issue with some supporters of OSS and all of them
are mighty pleased by the existence of ‘antitrust’ legislation and the state
enforcing it in the Microsoft case. These people are NO libertarians.
Well, the point never was that FS or OSS people are libertarians, Austrians, anarcho-capitalists, etc. It was that they have actually *done* something to make a competing product, without themselves coercing anyone (well, at least in the case of RMS, specifically).
The FSF has a wierd definition of “freedom”, which applies only to software (from their definition). Basically, their definition is that if you can see the code, modify without restrictions, and redistribute without restrictions, the software is “free”. Basically, it has to do with transparency of code. However, if they want to license their software under such a license, that’s their right. They still don’t have property rights in ideas; but you do accept obligations when you sign a contract, which would be to obey the GPL, in this case (note, only binding to those who accept the contract).
To state that the GPL or BSD-licenses aren’t sound economic principles is at once both wrong and beside the point (which was condeded). Libertarians are fundamentally about the non-aggression axiom (obeying it). As the GPL nor the BSD-licenses do not require violating the non-aggression axiom, I accept them; copyrights, patents, and trademarks, however, require the violation of the non-aggression axiom, thus I oppose them.
As for the economics of the matter, FS and OSS have proven to be work economically. They require different business models to live on than programmers who don’t reveal the source-code, but one still can make money off of them. Individuals could be paid a fixed amount to produce a certain piece of software and release it under the GPL/BSD (the market value that that software would hold to the persons/groups purchasing it). Alternatively, programmers could sell service.
It is oftentimes in the best interest, even, of competing companies to work together to create common platforms which benefit them all (rather than each company reinventing the wheel to produce software that they all need). Private companies have, in the past, worked together to produce commonly beneficial items or standards (e.g., railroads with track-width).
By the way, working together to improve society for gratis does not require one to be a communist. All that means is that one is a philanthropist. These individuals are using their money, their time, their effort to help others. Of course, they are not working for gratis at all. They are working to maximize their psychic profit (remember, there are no homo economus’). There is nothing wrong or communist about that. They are not violating the non-aggression axiom. They are not necessarily communists or even interventionalists.
Being a FS or OSS developer is like being a social conservative: it says nothing about whether or not one is a libertarian or socialist. To say these people are “no libertarians” is flatly wrong and is a hasty generalization. They are not categorically libertarians; in other words, not all FS or OSS developers are libertarians. But there is nothing about supporting and developing FS or OSS that precludes one from being a libertarians.
All I’m doing is saying FS and OSS developers can be called another group of entrepreneurs (many duel as entrepreneurs and workers). They may not work for money, but rather for psychic profit. There are also many entrepreneurs out there — like Warren Buffet, Peter Lynch, Ben Graham, Philip Fisher — who are great examples of what good things come of the free market, but who are certainly *not* libertarians. Buffet supports a host of government intervention, including higher taxes on the rich. Lynch supports various regulations on the stock market. Graham’s economic ideas were Keynesian, as were Fishers. Yet all were great entrepreneurs.
I would just like to comment that Juan Garafolo’s remarks read like logic-twisting attacks on Capitalism, and anything voluntary; voluntary giving. It seems he is mocking certain “rules” of capitalism for unknown purposes.
In a healthy and (free) free-market, competition works to drive prices down, and the quality of products and services up. This free-software development is the epitome of this process- the product is now free. Free market and capitalism works, let’s let it continue to work in this way. Who knows where this type of thing could lead us (in prosperity’s direction)?
Most economic theories say that the price of a product in the long run tends to be ‘costs’+'economic profit’. In case of Free Software the ‘cost of reproduction’ is zero and the profit was paid when the programm was written. The zero-cost means that for the enterpreneur the cost of using it is zero – it lowers costs and does not hamper economic calculation.
Dave, this was the point I was trying to make, that as the number of parties whom actually agreed to a specific EULA increases, the possibility of tracing the origin of the contract breach becomes increasingly costly. If you have one user, then it is obvious, but if you have, say, one million users, well, it’s just kind of absurd. I would argue that these types of contracts would not be used so liberally in a free market, absent the larger threat of copyright enforcement by the state.
And In response to Don Galt,
Now, considering this is mises.org, and I was discussing the deductive implications of the libertarian principle of non-aggression in regards to IP, and specifically dealing with property rights and the boundaries for the just use of force, I only assume that everyone reading this blog would accept the fact that many perfectly just (non-aggressive) activities are defined as “illegal” by the state, for example, manufacturing/selling/possessing/using narcotics. So I am assuming that what you meant by Microsoft threatening to use “illegal means” would actually constitute a threat of real property rights violation of some kind, and not an imaginary statutory “crime” of the IP or absurd “ant-competitive” variety. There is a difference between representatives of Microsoft burning down Apple’s office buildings and a few of their programmers copying some copyrighted QuickTime code: one’s an actual violation of property rights and the other is not. Microsoft may have violated NDAs and licensing agreements on occasion, but these are contract breaches, they are not prima facie takings or conversions, which is what I was referring to. Microsoft doesn’t have armed agents that actually destroy or take real property as a general tool of business, they rely on the state for that. This is why I said that they don’t directly violate property rights. I suppose I could have been more clear.
Microsoft ought to be considered a monopolist in a very real sense, in the same way my cable company ought to be considered a monopolist, but not for the reasons they have been regularly accused. All IP producers rely on coercive monopolies granted to them by the state and this is obviously not something that you could protest in a government court, for it challenges the legitimacy of the state itself. This is what I was trying to say, that in spite of all the great free-market defenses made in favor of Microsoft, they actually are a monopolist, or more precisely, I was saying that they were a benefactor of the only final monopolist, the state. Microsoft is well known for its uses of market influence (non-violent influence that is) to persuade partners and customers to do one thing or another, and this may not be “nice” or “friendly” to some, but it is certainly not an aggression on the property rights of others. It is not the purpose of law to make people friendly, pleasant or likeable, the domain of law is justice. Threats do not constitute a taking or conversion of property. On a personal note, I don’t really feel sorry for Microsoft’s predicament with regards to the “anti-trust” cases and such. The state giveth and the state taketh away… They could have used the opportunity to renounce the legitimacy of all IP claims, and this would be the principled defense, but the corporate equivalent of suicide for Microsoft.
I believe EULAs to be a flimsy contract at best. It would not be reasonable to expect EULAs to be effective alone. I don’t think EULAs are what is holding the software market in place as it exists, it is the much larger threat of copyright and patent law enforcement. Without the state to enforce IP claims, the enforcement of just the EULAs would become either too arbitrary or too costly. How could a court trace an unlicensed or modified copy of any software back to a specific breach if say, the EULA and any reference to the producer at all was removed from the original copy? And how costly would it be to audit the use of every end user of a specific product? Stephan Kinsella dose a very excellent job covering the issue of IP in the Spring 2001 JLS (V15, #2) in a paper appropriately titled “Against Intellectual Property” http://mises.org/journals/scholar/kinsella6.PDF As he so eloquently puts it “…once third parties not bound by a contract acquire this information, they are free to use it as they see fit… Thus, it would probably be difficult to maintain anything similar to our present patent and copyright laws using contract alone.”
Although, I’ve never read of armed US Marshals invading a school to force payment for copies of Windows, I’d be interested if you had a link to an article on it. I always understood the issue of paying per-CPU was a matter of contracts with VARs and OEMs or site licenses with businesses, that Microsoft would not agree to sell their software to a manufacturer or business if they did not pay per-CPU, supposedly because it was less costly to not have to track what OS was installed on each CPU. Either way, again, without the state’s IP laws, it’s storm troopers to back up the laws, and the general public who consider the state’s IP laws as legitimate or at least tolerable, there would be no bite to Microsoft, or any other IP company, or even the GPL. It isn’t Microsoft’s employees that have the “guns at the ready”.
And on the subject of refunds for an unused pre-installed copy of Windows, actually it has been done before: http://www.netcraft.com.au/geoffrey/toshiba.html
Bob-
I don’t draw much distinction between Microsoft getting state stormtroopers to barge into a school in Oregon, armed and scaring children to sieze properrty, and Microsoft sending their own stormtroopers in to do the same thing.
You say that stealing copyrighted code is not a property violation– well, is it the case that no contract breech is ever a copyright violation to you? You’re throwing contracts out with the copyright bathwater.
And finally, your example from 1998 proves the point– you cannot get a refund after microsoft defrauds you.
Yes, they are a company that uses libertarian recognized property violations to get what they want– fraud, coersion, etc. And they also use the state to enforce theft of property, theft of money (for alleged violations of their copyright, not actual violations), intimidation via threat of violence from armed US marshalls, etc.
Microsoft apologists never believe the things that microsoft has done, but I consider the Seattle PI to be a sufficient source. Microsoft demanded that schools pay per-cpu licensing, and sent armed marshalls to enforce this view.
According to you, this action was ok because the marshalls didn’t get their paychecks from microsoft.
This tells me you have MSFT.
I meant, that if stealing copyrighted code is not a property violation, then Bob must mean that no contract breach is a property vioaltion. Because the code was prevented by a contract, as well as a copyright. But It is interesting that in the next paragraph Bob blows off the legitimacy of that contract.
I think people confuse microsoft and bill gates with Reardon Steel and Hank Reardon, when the reality is, Bill Gates is Orren Boyle– he’s been resting on his laurals and relying on government enforcement of his monopoly for over a decade.
I am an avid user of GNU software and the Slackware GNU/Linux distribution. I find most GNU software to be of the best quality.
I think that enforcement of copyright law does pose some significant threats to our more fundamental freedoms, and insofar as FS protects my freedom, I do appreciate it. I also agree that since it costs almost zero resources to copy software, and since such copying does not deprive anyone else of the use of the software, it isn’t directly harming anyone to do that. I also do not support the notion that an author has any superior right to determine how the software can be modified, simply because they created it. After all, if I buy a vacuum cleaner, there should be no issue with me modifying it, or even turning it into a completely different appliance if I so choose.
My concern with this animosity towards charging money for software is that what I really want to sell is not the individual copies of software, but my programming services. My labor DOES belong to me, and I should be able to charge for it. Likewise, if I choose to sell my labor to a software development company, then they should be able to charge for the end software product in order to pay my salary. There is NOTHING immoral about this aspect of payment for software, because it is really someone’s labor being purchased.
It is along this line of reasoning that I would like to see some discussion. I wouldn’t even care about how many copies got made, or how much I could possibly milk from those who would purchase my software, so long as I got paid a respectable amount for my labor. My best skill is programming, and while I do agree with many of the ideas behind FS, I disagree that someone should not be able to command whatever price they choose for their software programming services. If their price is unreasonable, then like a shoe shiner charging $12,000 per shoe shined, they won’t get any business; however, if they have a reasonable price that people will pay, then the sale is made.
The problem is organizing this trade before the software ever gets released to public. The workers need to be paid the asking price for their labor before the software ever gets released. Then, once the software is released, there are no more copyright rules or EULAs, etc. Anyone can copy or redistribute the software. That’s the only thing I can think of to avoid the infringements on the privacy of users, while “promoting progress” by allowing developers to charge for their work.
David_Heinrich states: “As the GPL nor the BSD-licenses do not require violating the non-aggression axiom, I accept them; copyrights, patents, and trademarks, however, require the violation of the non-aggression axiom, thus I oppose them.”
Enforcing the GPL/BSD does require state aggression. Both rely on copyright law. You can’t logically support them and at the same time be opposed to copyright.
GPL example: You provide a friend or client with a GPL-licensed program, with source code and without license. Copyright law is the only thing preventing your client from propagating this version, since although your license is revoked by contract, the copy you released is not under any license whatsoever.
Similar arguments can be made for the original BSD license (with the “noxious” advertising clause).
Mr. Ali,
You’re confusing copyright law with the GPL and BSD licenses. Contracts or licenses to use software can exist completely outside of copyright law, and on a completely unhampered free-market. Now, in that situation, these contracts wouldn’t bind those who didn’t agree to them (hence, your example of providing the source-code without the license implies no liability / obligations on your friend; you, however, violated a contract).
The GPL does not rely on copyright law to achieve its goals. And, indeed, it is one of the goals of the Free Software Foundation to abolish copyright law (see their numerous articles against copyrights).
My concern with this animosity towards charging money for software is that what I really want to sell is not the individual copies of software, but my programming services.
What animosity toward charging money for software?
David_Heinrich states: “The GPL does not rely on copyright law to achieve its goals.”
From the FSF’s GPL FAQ:
http://www.fsf.org/licensing/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLUSGov
Mr.Ali, I know this is years too late, but you miss understand the FSF, it uses the GPL as a means to an end, if it is public domain, then it can be free software, which is what the FSF wants, not only can it not be GPL’ed, it does not NEED to be GPL’ed.
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