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From: sobiloff@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Chrome Cboy)
Newsgroups: comp.society.futures
Subject: Re: Software Piracy
Keywords: piracy
Message-ID: <1990Dec2.171747.20333@acc.stolaf.edu>
Date: 2 Dec 90 17:17:47 GMT
References: <_&_^R9#@rpi.edu> <1472@hpwala.wal.hp.com>
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Reply-To: sobiloff@thor.acc.stolaf.edu (Chrome Cboy)
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Organization: St. Olaf College; Northfield, MN
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In article <1472@hpwala.wal.hp.com> lupienj@hpwadac.UUCP (John Lupien) writes:
>This is really too bad. If only the software were free to begin with...
> [...]
>Standardization (as exemplified by the FSF stuff (GNU)) of free code
>would not exhibit this particular problem (IHMO), since the sources
>are freely available, anyone who needs to will just compile up the
>utilities they need, and off they go... while the folks who "don't
>do software" would be welcome to pay me a porting fee to get it
>running on their new whizz-bang box. The problem there is that the
>whizz-bang 2000 may not have the architectural capability to support
>the software. This would tend to make the whizz-bang 2000 fail, even if
>the technilogical advances that it represents are actually a step forward.

You ignore the more likely scenario: the software isn't up to the full
capabilities of the hardware. For example, the whizz-bang 2000 is the
first computer on the market with a full virtual reality kernel. This of
course isn't the software's fault, but very few people would be inclined
to buy a whizz-bang 2000 if the software doesn't take advantage of the
unique powers of hardware. So it would seem that free software with source
code is great for the installed base, but it doesn't significantly affect
the new products. No flame on FSF or John intended, and all coments are
IMHO... :-)


--
						    _____________
___________________________________________________/ Chrome Cboy \______________
| "With the zeal of Amerigo Vespucci, who 'discovered' the Americas some years |
| after Columbus landed here, Microsoft's CEO Bill Gates laid claim to the     || 'new' territory of a totally graphical user environment, which he promised   || in future versions of Windows."   --MacWEEK, 11.20.90, covering Comdex/Fall  |


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