[sclug] Cheap'n'nasty Tesco Linux machines

[Dickon Hood]

On Sun, Mar 16, 2008 at 18:45:14 +0000, Pete wrote:
: --- Dickon Hood <sclug at splurge.fluff.org> wrote:
: > Is it not morally and ethically right to allow the
: > entity which spent
: > those resources some mechanism to recover those
: > costs?  Surely it isn't
: > ethical to deny a writer or a filmmaker the fruits
: > of their labour?

: That's the way the old system worked, yes. But that's
: no guarantee that things will always be that way.

True.

: > There wouldn't be much left of the entertainment
: > industries left if not.

: Industries change. To quote a popular example, the
: blacksmithing industry changed a lot once people
: stopped using horses as a primary means of
: transportation.

That was less a change, and more an overnight total destruction.

: The entertainment industry is overcrowded. The reason
: why people don't feel obliged to compensate the
: directors of the music and film companies (oh, and
: don't forget that the artists and filmmakers get their
: 1% too) is that the supply is copious. There are so
: many films and albums coming out, people consider them
: to be worthless. If you were in a room with ten
: million chocolate bars, you'd be much more likely to
: steal one than if you were in a room with two
: chocolate bars.

People are willing to pay for entertainment that they see value in: I
present the cinema as a good example of a portion of the industry that has
been slated for destruction many, many times, and yet still seems to be
thriving.

I maintain: it does all need to be paid for.  Television is (barring the
BBC) prescription and / or ad-funded, but even that involves a cost: you
are worth 20p/hour to ITV, and for that, you have to endure up to 12
minutes of adverts per hour of programming.  That's a cost a lot of people
are willing to bear; personally I hate it.

Excepting the usual communist arguments -- and I agree with Alex here:
Eric Raymond would be *most* put out, being a run-for-the-hills
survivalist gun-nut... -- people need paying.  Free software can only do
that via services (or where the software is a byproduct of the (usually)
company's main activity).

I'd also put it to you that enforced freedom is no freedom at all.  I
should be free to charge for my software should I so want.

-- 
Dickon Hood

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