Why Making Money From Free Software Matters 224
Posted
by
kdawson
from the root-of-all-business-models dept.
from the root-of-all-business-models dept.
Glyn Moody sends in what could be a watershed article, if the recording and movie industries are paying attention. "People have been making money from free software ever since Richard Stallman started selling GNU Emacs on tapes for $150 a pop. That's been good for hackers, who have often managed to make a living from their coding by working for one of the startups based around free software. And as companies like Red Hat and Google have grown in size and profitability, so have the credibility and clout of free software. But there is another reason why the success of these new kinds of businesses is so crucial: in many respects they offer a glimpse of coming shifts in other industries that need to grapple with the conundrum of how to make money from goods that are freely available. In particular, they offer the music and film industries an example of an alternative to fighting people's natural instinct to share digital abundance, by making money from new scarcities."
Re:Google? (Score:3, Informative)
They also use and support free software. Google has made a ton of money *from* free software. They have shown it is possible to grow from a garage operation to one of the most influential company on the planet using Linux. They have shown free software can be relied on to deliver stuff people want and that you don't necessarily have to hand out bushels of money to Sun, HP, Microsoft, Apple et al to make money in the IT industry.
Re:Cognitive dissonance (Score:3, Informative)
Personally, I choose to use the word "libre" to describe GPL (or similarly licensed) software, to help reduce the confusion. There is no confusing "libre" with some other term, and people who are unfamiliar with the word will generally ask for clarification (rather than assuming a specific meaning). Those who neglect to ask for clarification are generally the people who do not care about the issue at all; this is still better than someone who does not care about the issue and just assumes that I want to get my software at no cost.
Re:Google? (Score:3, Informative)
Why do people see free, and read open source? Google has provided heaps of free software - google maps, office, calendar, etc. Just because they're webapps and proprietary does not exclude them from the free as in beer moniker. And the article is obviously about the beer-free, not the speech-free - all it talks about is money, and the making thereof. Leave the OS/Proprietary baggage at the door.
Re:Fundamentally different things, though (Score:3, Informative)
The two industries start from different premises, so that's why software can be free whereas media cannot.
Your opinion is belied by the fact that there is plenty [wikimedia.org] of free [jamendo.com] media [archive.org] out there [creativecommons.org].
Re:Cognitive dissonance (Score:3, Informative)
The word "free" has more than one meaning:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html [gnu.org]
Re:Fundamentally different things, though (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Cognitive dissonance (Score:3, Informative)
If the developer does it because the developer wants to do it, it's a hobby. If he does it because you tell him to do it, it's a job. In the second case, he'll probably expect you to pay him. Bear in mind however that all you're buying his time and the right to direct his efforts.
The software became free because the initial developers chose to release their work under a free software licence. It remains free regardless of whether or not you choose to help fund further development.
Re:Cognitive dissonance (Score:5, Informative)
Software is not scarce, developer time is. I'll never understand the cognitive dissonance that makes people think a non-scarce resource should be treated like a scarce one.
Re:Fundamentally different things, though (Score:3, Informative)
Sometimes both the code and product are free but support costs money.
Sometimes the code is free to download but the compiled version contains trademark or other branding, like CentOS and RedHat.
Sometimes you can buy installation CDs but you can also download and build the code yourself.
Some companies take software they didn't write and put it together in a target way, like Music-centric linux (Ubuntu studio style), or Real-time linux, or whatever else.
Björk, Nine Inch Nails, Public Enemy, Stardust, and in a limited fashion Erasure, have given away parts of the music and allowed fans to re-mix the music. so yes you can give away unmixed tracks, it's been done. The discussion is about music, the article is about music... bringing movies in just makes it more complicated. Animated movies as the other poster said are certainly possible but could require huge piles of data (all fo the models, the environments, the animation and rendering software).
Free software doesn't have just one revenue stream, there are numerous different ways to get money. The fundamental problem is that music does not require support. Most of the revenue streams either assume you're paying for physical media or support. With music, most people don't need the physical product since it's going on the iPod anyway. And they don't need support.
The entire point of the article was that open source software has many solutions, and free music has several options, but music still needs more options in order to be successful. It's not a solved problem, and the open-source model is only an inspiration. Jill Sobule is an example, but she's hardly the typical case. If you're the right person at the right time you can do that, but most people won't make it.
(yes I'm talking about the deserving garage-band people, not the attractive but unmusical pop tarts we have on the radio - they wouldn't make it without heavy AutoTune and would barely be able to scrape by on concerts - Ke$sha on SNL and the recent Black Eyed Peas on American Idol pretty much proved there are some things you just can't do live, but I'm editorializing now).
Re:Cognitive dissonance (Score:3, Informative)
Someone paid them to spend time on it?
If you have free software, you're free to modify and distribute it as you please.
If you want free software, you can:
1. Write it yourself; or
2. convince someone who already has the software to provide it to you under a free software license (perhaps by paying them); or
3. convince someone to write it and provide it to you under a free software license (perhaps by paying them).
Oh boy - Finlands isolation (Score:1, Informative)
Later, it became a development methodology too, largely at the hands of Linus, whose geographical isolation in Finland forced him to develop ways
Isolated? They make it sound like he was living in the wilderness, not in what was then the most technologically advanced and computerised part of the world, spending more per capita than any other on research in Computer Science (Scandinavia). Finland may have been a bit behind the other Scandindinavian countries in 1991 (but Nokia was closing the gap fast), but was still a lot more technologically advanced than USA.
The Scandinavian countries had from the early 1980's until the middle of the 1990's more home computers, workstations and computer servers per capita than any other part of the world. And also the highest average level of education of any countries in the world, mostly in engineering and medicine.
He was less then three hours away by sea and/or road (or a local rate phone call) from companies like Nokia (mobile phone maker since the 1980's), Ericson (worlds first automated telephone systems and the worlds first mobile (cell)phone system (used in some Swedish cities since the 1940's)), Norsk Regnecentralen (SImula and a increadible amount of other innovations ), Dansk Regnecentral (largest contributor in the creation of Algol 60), Norsk Data (once producers of the worlds fastest computers), SAAB (air systems), Bofors (missile systems) and a lot of other high tec, highly computer intensive companies, and lots and lots and lots of universities and colleges in Finland, Sweden, Norway and Denmark, most of them teaching Computer Science (or rather Datalogy) since the 1960's and connected together with a computer network since the early 1980's. Places all using languages close to Linux Torvalds native Swedish dialect (the difference between dialects in Swedish, Danish and Norweigian is at worse less than between Brittish English and American English).
Although not fond of pleasentries and small talk (especially not Finns, go see a Aki Kaurismäki movie, they are spot on), Scandinavians is very cooperative minded and don't hesitate to involve the rest of the world in anything they do (unlike USAians who seem to like to isolate themselves), it is part of the Scandinavian mentality. That is propably a large part of why Linus choosed to develop Linux with developers all over the world using Internet, Open Licenses and the (more international) English language, not geographical isolation.