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posted by Fnord666 on Thursday January 30 2020, @02:07AM   Printer-friendly
from the pull-the-other-one dept.

Upcycle Windows 7

On January 14th, Windows 7 reached its official "end-of-life," bringing an end to its updates as well as its ten years of poisoning education, invading privacy, and threatening user security. The end of Windows 7's lifecycle gives Microsoft the perfect opportunity to undo past wrongs, and to upcycle it instead.

We call on them to release it as free software, and give it to the community to study and improve. As there is already a precedent for releasing some core Windows utilities as free software, Microsoft has nothing to lose by liberating a version of their operating system that they themselves say has "reached its end."

Also at The Register and Wccftech.


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  • (Score: 1, Troll) by barbara hudson on Thursday January 30 2020, @04:25PM (18 children)

    by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Thursday January 30 2020, @04:25PM (#951248) Journal

    If you can't sell the changes without giving away your source, what's the point? Oh, right - developers should just continue passing the begging bowl because organizations like the FSF don't actually have a clue as to how to make free software financially viable unless it's locked behind software-as-as-spyware-service.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 30 2020, @04:57PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 30 2020, @04:57PM (#951267)

    The hacker community is very pleased to have you defending our monetary interests. Thank you very much.

  • (Score: 4, Touché) by c0lo on Thursday January 30 2020, @08:07PM (16 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Thursday January 30 2020, @08:07PM (#951382) Journal

    If you don't like it, don't use it. Nothing unfair, you knew the conditions from the start.

    Otherwise, many (including me) are happy to have a software that works and grows by the effort of many like-minded and we don't like the idea to have our work taken and monetized for the profit of few that don't want to contribute back in kind.
    If you think your modifications/enhancements are more valuable than the rest of the code, feel free to have that rest re-implemented in "clean room" conditions from scratch and, by all means, sell your enhancements this way.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 1, Troll) by barbara hudson on Friday January 31 2020, @02:08AM (15 children)

      by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Friday January 31 2020, @02:08AM (#951558) Journal

      we don't like the idea to have our work taken and monetized for the profit of few that don't want to contribute back in kind

      Facebook. Google. Twitter. All those software-as-a-spyware-service companies are making huge profits with open source that has been modified and not contributed back. So why do you defend them? Why aren't you talking against Android? Or Chromebooks?

      We've been played. I woke up. RMS was delusional with his ideas, as proven by the inability to even give away open source software. You can't sell support for something that people don't want even if it's free.

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      SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
      • (Score: 3, Touché) by c0lo on Friday January 31 2020, @03:04AM (13 children)

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday January 31 2020, @03:04AM (#951606) Journal

        All those software-as-a-spyware-service companies are making huge profits with open source that has been modified and not contributed back.

        So what? Good for them.
        Can I still use the open-source GPL-ed programs under the same conditions, right? Then the GPL works as intended. GPL was never about the money, so I'm not going to move the goal posts only because some are better prepared than me to take commercial advantage of the license.

        We've been played. I woke up. RMS was delusional with his ideas, as proven by the inability to even give away open source software. You can't sell support for something that people don't want even if it's free.

        Nope, the fact that you had unreasonable expectations from GPL is not the GPL's problem.

        There was no promise from RMS or GPL that you will be able to make money from open source or even that the people will want to use open source.
        The itch that GPL scratched is "If the people want to use an open-source software, they must keep the software open source". No more, no less.

        In fact, others realized the expectations mismatch, they expected more and so they asked for more - with the note that the freedom of whether to accept a license (and abide by it) or not accept it (and refrain to use that code) is still... well... free, fair and legal:
        1. Affero GPL [wikipedia.org] asks ASP to provide the code whenever they distribute the use of the code to public (you can still use the code, modified or not, for your internal purposes)
        2. Sybase Open Watcom Public License [wikipedia.org] - which asks the publishing of your modifications even if you use it internally

        Why aren't you talking against Android? Or Chromebooks?

        Git repositories on android [googlesource.com]
        Chromium source code [github.com]
        Anything else is running on top of the open-source ecosystem and makes use of it, but does not modify the open-source in such a way that the copyleft provisos are triggered.

        You are free to write closed source software running on Linux and offer it for sale even today! This is a list of entities that do so [wikipedia.org], this even letting aside closed source games that run on Linux (natively or via the open-source Wine). Really, feel free to join their ranks (or join them as an employee) and earn your living.

        BTW:
        1. Linux Kernel is, to this day, GPL2-ed [kernel.org]. By a deliberate choice of its main author - waaay back in 2006 [lkml.org] and in spite of what RMS was wishing.
        2. GPL3 itself was not against "make money" - but against restrictions on software liberties by the use of patents and the use of hardware locks (DRM included).

        So, fair is still fair, right?

        --
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
        • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Friday January 31 2020, @03:17AM (12 children)

          by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Friday January 31 2020, @03:17AM (#951616) Journal

          BTW - linus can't change the license even if he wants to - he doesn't control all the copyrights. He can't even offer a dual-licensing scheme. That kind of cripples it.

          There are plenty of ways to legally work around the gpl, but why bother? You can't even give it away for free.

          And those who have tried to develop commercial software for the linux market have failed. See Loki Software, who had the rights to some big-name games. People running linux won't pay for software. Look at how much more profitable Apple's app store is for devs, despite it being only a fraction of the size of Android.

          Linux only works when it's locked away, either on servers or under an environment that prevents direct user interaction while sucking your personal data.

          Developers have other options, options where they have a reasonable expectation that if they give the user what they want, they can make a living. And that's what's happening, and why free software is stagnant. And worse, IT'S BORING! Who wants to scratch an itch under such conditions?

          For software development where all you want is to be able to edit source, compile, run, debug, repeat, it's okay. But that is not most people's scenarios.

          --
          SoylentNews is social media. Says so right in the slogan. Soylentnews is people, not tech.
          • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Friday January 31 2020, @04:00AM (11 children)

            by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Friday January 31 2020, @04:00AM (#951637) Journal

            BTW - linus can't change the license even if he wants to - he doesn't control all the copyrights.

            BTW - neither the others can manage the license with his accord.
            This was a matter that was discussed in 2006 - today it would be even harder.

            There are plenty of ways to legally work around the gpl, but why bother? You can't even give it away for free.

            Personal point of view? I don't care about how the GPL serve the interests of others
            I'm happy with how Linux and LXDE and Kicad and all the software underneath serve my interest.
            I can only hope that my position doesn't upset you (more than you are), but if it does, apologies, I stole nothing from you and I owe nothing to you (except the general level of respect I offer to any human being, no "earn it" or any other strings attached).

            Linux only works when it's locked away

            It works for me just fine. I can offer only my sympathies if you can't derive the usefulness you expect from it.
            With the risk of repeating myself, casting a value judgement on how well it works for others - as a particular case of "serving the interest of others" - is a thing I refuse to myself.

            Developers have other options, options where they have a reasonable expectation that if they give the user what they want, they can make a living.

            A consideration that is truly not addressed by the open-source software. It may sound rough, but that's the reality.

            And that's what's happening, and why free software is stagnant.

            Again, I see a good amount of subjectivism here. Stagnant by what measures?

            And worse, IT'S BORING!

            Irrelevant from my point of view - software development is orthogonal on the "excitement" axis

            Who wants to scratch an itch under such conditions?

            Some (including me) would say "many enough".
            Others would say "too many. 'Cause fragmentation and infighting and ..."
            You seem to say "not enough. It evolves too slowly".

            For software development where all you want is to be able to edit source, compile, run, debug, repeat, it's okay. But that is not most people's scenarios.

            I can agree with this one.
            With the note that this only demonstrates that software development is not for "most of the people" - nothing special here, neither "crunching statistics" or "fixing water pipes" is for most of the people.

            --
            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
            • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Friday January 31 2020, @04:27PM (10 children)

              by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Friday January 31 2020, @04:27PM (#951811) Journal

              Developers have other options, options where they have a reasonable expectation that if they give the user what they want, they can make a living.

              A consideration that is truly not addressed by the open-source software. It may sound rough, but that's the reality.

              So why all the hate for pointing out that open source has a shitty financial model? I must have set a record for down-mods yesterday (stopped counting at 50-something). And for pointing out that RMS was full of shit when he kept insisting that the "give the software away and sell support" model was viable? His thinking is from back in the days when people accepted that your car had to go to the corner garage 4-6 times a year for oil changes, tune-ups, etc. We don't make cars with those deficiencies any more, we shouldn't be making software that depends on being deficient to be financially viable.

              Closed-source companies understood that pre-internet. You bought a piece of software, if the company had to mail out patch disks to every user every time there was a bug, they'd go broke, so for-profit companies spent money on testing.

              Open source - "the users are our testers. We'll patch it over the internet." That's the same el-cheapo thinking that got Microsoft into an eternal "patch Tuesday" cycle, which has ended up costing them more than if they did it right in the first place.

              The slow pace of change in open source, with way too many resources being devoted to repackaging the same old software in yet another distro, is going to mean that it will continue to be stuck at the turn of the century.

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              • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 01 2020, @01:17AM (8 children)

                by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 01 2020, @01:17AM (#952105) Journal

                So why all the hate for pointing out that open source has a shitty financial model?

                I don't know, wasn't me.
                I can make the hypothesis of ill-definition of the problem: like saying that feathers make a bad hammer and expressing bitterness about it.

                And for pointing out that RMS was full of shit when he kept insisting that the "give the software away and sell support" model was viable? His thinking is from back in the days when people accepted that your car had to go to the corner garage 4-6 times a year for oil changes, tune-ups, etc.

                First, you seem to say that there was a time when it worked, so perhaps RMS wasn't so wrong at the time? You can't say "Sony was full of shit with its walkman, today everybody listens on MP3-s streamed from your mobile phone", can you?
                Second, RMS can make mistakes as any human. I don't see how you can pretend that RMS lied to you or conned you into open-source, the "full of shit" carries those connotation.
                Third, there are entities that manage to earn good money from selling support for open-source. Not many and mainly not individuals, a sign that it isn't easy. But it does show it's not impossible.

                And last but not least, you can earn a good living from and/or because of open-source. As an employee in a company that consumes open-source. And, oh boy, aren't they the majority? Think at MySQL/Postgress, Docker, Jenkins, xUnit/Cucumber-and-related, compiles/linkers/interpreters, Apache, JBoss/MVC, Hybernate/EF, etc. I don't know your professional age but I needed to pirate development tools just to learn enough for my profession - otherwise there was no chance in hell to buy them. You see today that the job market requires certain technologies/toolsets? Big chances are that you go and download them (or something similar) and practice them, all because the almost ubiquitous open-source ethos made it very likely someone had an itch and scratched it open-source style.

                One on top of the other, that "full of shit" addressed to RMS and open-source does sound so undeserved that I can't blame others suspecting you of trolling

                Closed-source companies understood that pre-internet. You bought a piece of software, if the company had to mail out patch disks to every user every time there was a bug, they'd go broke, so for-profit companies spent money on testing.

                Open source - "the users are our testers. We'll patch it over the internet." That's the same el-cheapo thinking that got Microsoft into an eternal "patch Tuesday" cycle, which has ended up costing them more than if they did it right in the first place.

                The slow pace of change in open source, with way too many resources being devoted to repackaging the same old software in yet another distro, is going to mean that it will continue to be stuck at the turn of the century.

                You're wrong in so many ways here that it would require much more time just to point why it's wrong.
                The problem is aggravated that you mixed right (yes, spending on quality does reduce the cost of defects) in between those wrongs (no, you can not honestly blame open-source for Agile and Agile-done-wrong, heaps of commercial companies do it as well). No, "earn from support" doesn't mean "remove bugs and get paid". Etc.

                --
                https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Saturday February 01 2020, @02:09AM (6 children)

                  by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Saturday February 01 2020, @02:09AM (#952120) Journal

                  The razor blade model has never worked for software. Stallman wouldn't know - he never met a razor blade he liked (bada-BOOM!)

                  50 years ago people tried to sell subscription plans for meat and groceries. Didn't work, because it was always cheaper just to go to the local grocery store and load up on specials. we're seeing the same thing today with meal subscriptions - burning through lots of OPM but ultimately not sustainable.

                  It has NEVER worked with the PC, except dubious leasing programs that sold you a really low end PC for three times what you would pay if you paid cash, but that's a leasing model. Nobody is leasing linux, and the leasing companies all offered DOS and Windows only.

                  His ideas were full of shit - whether he realized it or not. So, either he was dishonest, or deluded. Given that his lifestyle depended on maintaining the delusion, you can pick either.

                  Back in the 70s I scrounged to pay for both hardware (non ibm, obviously) and software. I continued to do the same in the 80s and 90s when I started making money. I valued the manuals.

                  Piracy was never necessary. You worked at whatever job you needed to so you could buy the tools of the trade. And computers were a LOT more expensive than today, and jobs paid a LOT less. There were plenty of opportunities to pirate, but it rang my "hypocrite" alarm pirating software when my job is making software.

                  Would you trust a mechanic who stole their socket sets, wrenches, etc.? Or a carpenter who stole their table saw, radial arm saw, and air gun nailer? How about if they stole their truck? How about if they stole YOUR truck, because what goes around comes around, and if you're willing to benefit from stealing, well, as I said, what goes around comes around.

                  And Agile still sucks. What you call "Agile" I call "releasing software without proper development and testing and throwing shit over the wall and seeing what sticks." Because that's exactly what it is. Boeing tried that with the 737 MAX. Tried to transform themselves from an airplane manufacturer to an integrator of components and software made by others, engineered by others, and put together by others. Last I heard, they're now officially into their first loss in 20 years or more. $19 billion and counting.

                  But the same lax attitude towards refusing to "pay your dues" by buying the tools of the trade shows with the whole "throw shit over the wall and let the customer do the final testing". I've never bitched about paying for an operating system, for a compiler, for an RDBMS, for a spreadsheet or flow chart program, or a game. I respect the work that went into making them into finished products, and I continue to believe it should be rewarded.

                  I also refuse to work any more for any business involved in the surveillance capitalism economy. That shit has to end.

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                  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 01 2020, @04:45AM (5 children)

                    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 01 2020, @04:45AM (#952198) Journal

                    The way you come across sounds like you are decrying the commoditization of software development, longing for the time when programming had a high barrier of entry and you are blaming RMS for the inability to command high income in software.

                    Well mate, it is what it is. Software is now a commodity, long gone the times where "working on computers" was sorta badge of honor., today making software is more like an agribusiness. And no, there's no turning back to the "good ol' times"

                    As "commodity provider", one has the "good, fast and cheap" question to answer to; can't have all 3, so how you choose to answer to that will have outcomes in your ability to adapt.

                    The risk you are running is wasting time casting blame and feeling miserable on the expense of adapting to the current environ (o just having a good time over a beer with your friends).

                    --
                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                    • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Saturday February 01 2020, @05:07AM (4 children)

                      by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Saturday February 01 2020, @05:07AM (#952215) Journal
                      No, I think we fucked up big time by not turning the individual building blocks for software into commodities that people could buy and sell that would work together to make applications exactly the way they wanted. For example, you could buy components for text editing, spell checking, a toolbar, a menu, a file browser, a network connection, and they would snap together to make an editor that worked both locally and over the network. You could then license the components individually and sell the entire assemblage as a complete product.

                      Someone didn't need a spell checker, no problem, ithey can buy it without and add a component from anyone at a later date.

                      We were on that road. The Delphi community has plenty of component vendors . And there were other initiatives. But then we screwed it up with software as a service. Give away the product and spy the shit out of everyone, everywhere, even listening in their bedrooms.

                      We're all poorer and less secure now, and the network effects of online communities resulted in social network monopolies. P2P software built out of components with no central server and everyone, even non programmers, able to build or buy exactly what they want, with the degree of interoperability they want, and the ability to keep it varied because of competition for money from component sales resulting in competitors making improvements all the time ... we lost it for at least the next generation.

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                      • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday February 01 2020, @07:39AM (1 child)

                        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 01 2020, @07:39AM (#952257) Journal

                        No, I think we fucked up big time by not turning the individual building blocks for software into commodities that people could buy and sell that would work together to make applications exactly the way they wanted.

                        But they did. As open source.
                        Letting aside the headless components that you find in all sort of repositories (nuget, maven, nmp, you name it), you have heaps of widget frameworks/toolkits - at least some on cross-platform. You want them for commercial apps? Go buy Qt [www.qt.io], only $5k/y. Otherwise you can use its full power for open-source projects.

                        We were on that road. The Delphi community has plenty of component vendors . And there were other initiatives.

                        Meh, happens. Personally, I never liked Pascal and Borland (as commercial software provider) barely and only temporarily had the reach of MS - so if I had to swallow shit for a living, I picked the most common shit (incidentally, this is why I learned Java when it started. At least I had the cross-platform addressed)

                        But then we screwed it up with software as a service. Give away the product and spy the shit out of everyone, everywhere, even listening in their bedrooms.

                        Who exactly is the "we" that screwed up? 'Cause it's not me and I fail to see how is the open-source's fault that the Vulture Capitalists in Sillyvalley decided that unicorn are worth hunting.

                        We're all poorer and less secure now, and the network effects of online communities resulted in social network monopolies.

                        Ok mate, maybe true. But again... how is OSS or RMS to blame for, say, Facebook's monopoly?

                        --
                        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
                        • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Saturday February 01 2020, @02:04PM

                          by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Saturday February 01 2020, @02:04PM (#952323) Journal
                          No, they didn't. I guess you weren't around when the idea was first floated. You obviously don't understand it. People wouldn't need to actually combine the building blocks into programs to use them. An alien concept today, but it showed the innovative thinking that is missing now. Delphi components required you to use them in a program - they were a step along the way, but not the destination.

                          It's like the code I was working on when my eyes went, where if you wanted a colour dialog box to change an objects colour, you just dragged it on top of it and it worked. No compiling a "program ", no linking software routines. Same with a web browser component - drag it onto a window, it works, type in your URL and go. No recompiling anything. With building blocks, just lay them out and they work. Or package them up and you have a complete application, without compiling.

                          So no, open source never did that. Never even tried to do that. Maybe one day after I finish my current project I'll resume work on it, or maybe I won't. What I won't do is release the code so dummies who are unclear of the basic concept can try to build "programs " out of it. That goes against the whole concept of autonomous precompiled building blocks that can interact without compiling or even run-time linking.

                          I liked the concept when I read about it in the 90s, and every once in a while I'd kick it around in the back of my mind to see how it could be done , then one day sat down and started cutting code, and and the building block worked with each other, no compiling, no linking, no extra programming to glue them together. Show me ANY FOSS that does that. But no, it's all just source code that programmers have to glue together into programs and if you modify it you can break it. The same shitty way we've always made software. Where's the innovation ? M

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                      • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:15AM (1 child)

                        by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:15AM (#954531) Homepage Journal

                        For example, you could buy components for text editing, spell checking, a toolbar, a menu, a file browser, a network connection, and they would snap together to make an editor that worked both locally and over the network.

                        Snapping together -- no. that didn't work well, though I have used emacs over an ssh connection, and it works just fine. Using a browser over ssh isn't as successful. Browsers seem to assume their display is local, and do things like animated scrolling, which take forever because they do it by sending multiple entire pixel maps to their (remote) display.

                        But I have heard rumours about browser components, that could be used (*with* soe real programming) to assemble custom browsers for specific purposes. And that are documented to make it clear what and how the components will do for you and how to use them together.

                        Anyone know anything about such browser components?

                        • (Score: 2) by barbara hudson on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:51AM

                          by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:51AM (#954548) Journal
                          That has nothing to do with the type of components we were talking about 30 years ago. Forget everything that you know because it doesn't apply. And no, not talking about "snap-ins" either. Toud have to see it in action to "get" it.
                          --
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                • (Score: 3, Interesting) by hendrikboom on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:01AM

                  by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:01AM (#954527) Homepage Journal

                  Third, there are entities that manage to earn good money from selling support for open-source. Not many and mainly not individuals, a sign that it isn't easy. But it does show it's not impossible.

                  There are itinerant system administrators whose jobs are to go around to various businesses that use Linux to do routine backups, security upgrades, and the like, and listen to the users' problems and address them.

              • (Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday February 01 2020, @06:34AM

                by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Saturday February 01 2020, @06:34AM (#952250) Journal

                So why all the hate for pointing out that open source has a shitty financial model?

                This is the motte and bailey fallacy. Before you were waxing poetic about how open source software sucks compared to closed source (the bailey). Now, you've retreated to the more defensible position that the financial model for open source is shitty (the motte). All the "hate" is for your more indefensible positions. At least, when you complain about the poor financial model for open source, you're on more secure grounds. We might not respect you for it, since after all, there's no expectation that you should be able to make a living from open source (or for that matter, closed source) so why should we care that you're complaining?

      • (Score: 2) by hendrikboom on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:46AM

        by hendrikboom (1125) Subscriber Badge on Thursday February 06 2020, @01:46AM (#954544) Homepage Journal

        The first open-source software I encountered was in the 1960's. It was the library of user-contributed software for the IBM 1620.

        Users wrote software they wanted to use, and handed it over to IBM to distribute for free to other users.

        In fact, when Amdahl started making IBM 360 clones, they used the operating system that IBM had written.

        Commercial software came later, once people realized that software could be copyrighted. It became widespread in the 1980's.

        But the fundamental nature of free, open-source software back then was that it was written *by its users*.
        That is its greatest strength and its weakness.

        So with the advent of FSF and GPL and the free software movement, its original authors and users were developers. And they wrote software that they needed. Editors and compilers were the start. Then an operating system kernel -- Linux. The actual Linux operating systems were put together by what's now called distros.

        Then, well, we got gradual emergence of everything else.

        Being written by developers for developers meant that if there's, say, a problem, it often remains unfixed if it's more work to fix it than adapt to it. But if enough developers encounter the problem, there's a good chance that it *will* get fixed.

        Among the developer community it is a matter of pride and honour to fix problems in software they release. Even more a matter of pride not to need fixes in the first place.

        When the user base spreads beyond developers, this is where free software starts to meet its limits. Problems become more of a problem. These new users can't fix them. They may not even understand that the problem *can* be fixed. So unless he developer hears about it and it's a matter of pride for her, it remains unfixed.

        So then free software ends up in the hands of the corporations. About a decade ago I heard that IBM had invested about a billion dollars in developing and contributing to Linux and other free software. Why? Because it met the needs of their users. And the GPL made sure it had to remain free.