There's a disturbing lack of understanding in this community about free software, the GPL and other licences, and RMS himself. Of course Stallman is an extremist. Every leader of such a movement by definition must be an extremist, even if it makes them look foolish. The ACLU for example takes cases that make them look like a joke, but they are forced to because they must exhibit unwavering believe in their ideals. As the leader of the free software movement, RMS must act in the way that he does.
And as for the commercial viability of open source software, consider 37signals. Their entire tool set (Rails) is open source, and they make millions. Keeping Rails closed source was not necessary for their success. When you pay for a 37signals app you pay for their reputation and quality. If someone else made the same application a year earlier, it wouldn't sell nearly as well. Saying that you need to keep your software closed source is overvaluing the software. That's only a small piece of what makes a successful product. Hell, 37signals probably could open source Basecamp today and they would still make millions.
Every leader of such a movement by definition must be an extremist, even if it makes them look foolish
Why? RMS's movement would benefit most from convincing us, as developers, to contribute to FOSS. I pray that being a foolish-looking extremist isn't the best way to do that.
Again, going with the ACLU analogy, it's not the ACLU's job to convince you that the Bill of Rights is a good thing. It's their job to rigorously defend it without giving an inch. The same goes for RMS, it's not his job to convince developers to join up with FOSS. Leave the convincing to people who are better at it. Google's summer of code is a great example.
Based on the growing size and productivity of the FOSS community, I really don't think RMS needs to change what he is doing. Programmers have already produced billions of dollars of free software and will continue to do so. It's an amazing display of our (the hacker) culture.
While I appreciate those fighting the cultural battles for individual freedom (GOOG's history pretty much confirms for me that being a big requires exploiting the consumer), Stallman's message is unfortunately crippled to me as a programmer. Free software is better in almost every way. It is easier to install, possible to fix, increases the wealth of every owner of a compatible computer, lasts longer (defined by running on more generations of computer), and is often more popular and better known than proprietary software. Yes, software should be free.
Where this becomes useless is in his demonizing proprietary software, because even though proprietary software takes many of your rights away, it has some great benefits. Since it doesn't have to be free as in beer, a person can quit their day job and focus solely on writing that program, leading to better designed and better implemented software. It also creates a stable brand that people can evaluate, and clear responsibility for issues. Without a means of monitizing software, we probably wouldn't have the fit and polish systems that we do.
I love free software, but there are two RMSisms that bother me: 1) The GPL is actually less "free" than a BSD style license because of his campaign to promote free software. 2) His view is entirely supply side (except for the roundabout means of creating personal wealth by forcing others to use the GPL on their software) to the point where it seems to me like free software has to fall out of trees or large corporations (which I would rather due without).
Neither does FOSS software, you realize. Let's say Google charged money for Google Earth. Now, if they open-sourced the client, they would still make money from it, because they'd still be the only one with the license to the map tiles themselves. There are many situations like this, where the software is actually worthless without some resource (perhaps just your brand) that you provide alongside it. You can make plenty of money selling water (a FOSS product)--but remember, it's the bottles that people are buying; the water is obviously worthless when you just pour all over them (or release the source to them.)
> The GPL is actually less "free" than a BSD style license because of his campaign to promote free software.
Here's a thought-experiment that I think shows you RMS's world-view. Pretend, for a second, that AI existed. The GPL would give it rights (it would be "free"), while the BSD license would allow it to be sold into slavery ("non-free.")
On the other hand, the BSD license does not give _me_ the freedom to obtain the source of _your_ closed modifications, therefore making it less free for me.
The GPL guarantees that I can obtain the sources of your modifications, making it more free for me than the BSD license.
So rare that this debate actually gets to the real point, which is that the BSD license and the GPL optimized for two different "freedoms". Ne'er the twain shall meet.
Which is larger, a company of 100 selling $500 million a year of goods, or a company of 1000 selling $50 million a year of goods? Well, it depends on your metric. Two perfectly valid metrics produce two different results.
And as for the commercial viability of open source software, consider 37signals. Their entire tool set (Rails) is open source, and they make millions. Keeping Rails closed source was not necessary for their success. When you pay for a 37signals app you pay for their reputation and quality. If someone else made the same application a year earlier, it wouldn't sell nearly as well. Saying that you need to keep your software closed source is overvaluing the software. That's only a small piece of what makes a successful product. Hell, 37signals probably could open source Basecamp today and they would still make millions.