Free as in ‘Free Speech’ not as in ‘Free Beer’
Christina and I went to hear Richard Stallman speak to a packed crowd tonight. Unfortunately, we weren’t able to stay for the whole thing, but he had a lot of super interesting things to say.
He gave a brief summary of free software, the history of copyright, and then spoke mostly on and how it’s basically been perverted in the digital age. I was surprised that such an uber-geek was actually a rather good public speaker, but I guess he’s been doing it for a while.
Maybe I should just switch to GNU/Linux and screw this DRM-laden Windows crap.
March 26th, 2008 at 7:01 am
While Stallman’s view of the way things should be appears to be attractive to the consumer, he lives in a dream world. Companies and even individuals need a return on their investment. Most people (unlike Stallman) have families that they need to support and not everyone is content to live “like a student” for their entire lives. I think Lawrence Lessig’s view on things is much more balanced.
Furthermore, my sense is that the potential for profit and the competition inherent in closed-source software has advanced the computer industry much more since, say 1980, than would have been the case if all software written since then had been open source. Thus, I would argue that Stallman’s view, while appearing to be attractive to consumers, does not actually benefit consumers.
Please be aware that I use a lot of open source software and I use Linux daily. So, I am not arguing that these things are bad - just that it’s unrealistic to expect that proprietary software is going to disappear. In addition, I would argue that it’s in the consumer’s best interest that proprietary software exists, even if a particular consumer never buys it. The fact that open source software has to compete with proprietary software makes it better and more attractive to the consumer.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:13 am
Oh, I agree completely. There’s definitely a place for proprietary and closed software, and I think that the market has already shown that people want less DRM and things are swinging that way. I was definitely glad that he talked more about copyright issues (with which I think he’s really got the right idea) than free software.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:40 am
If you could sum up his take on copyright issues, what would you say?
I’ve read the first few chapters of Lessig’s “Free Culture”, which is an interesting book on copyright issues. Lessig argues that some copyright protections are necessary in order to encourage people to exert effort in producing creative works. If no protections were in place, people could put a bunch of effort into making something, only to have it ripped off by someone else. That would tend to stifle creative production. However, he argues that the ability to use copyrighted works in derivative ways encourages creativity and enriches society. So, a healthy balance between protecting the efforts of the initial creator and empowering the creator of the derivative work must be struck. It’s not exactly clear where the happy medium is, but right now, the scales are definitely tipped in favor of the copyright owner.
March 26th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Stallman’s ideas were very similar to Lessig’s, especially when it comes to enriching society. One thing that he pushes is different copyright laws for different kinds of works. So reference works would basically be ‘free’, because there’s great benefit to society in people being able to modify them as is relevant and redistribute them. Works of opinion don’t need as much ‘freedom’ because there’s not really a benefit in modifying them. Works of art would need a healthy balance, as the case can be made for both sides (I think he used the example of Shakespeare, in that most of his plays’ storylines are taken from other works and that if our current copyright law had existed then, he would have never been able to publish them).
He was adamant about one thing as well: lengths of copyrights need to be shortened drastically to have the greatest benefit.
I feel that his basic idea is that there is no blanket answer to copyright issues, and that the best way to do it is treat all works in accordance with their place in society.
March 26th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
That seems pretty sensible.
I should probably finish reading Lessig’s book. The problem I had was that I had been reading it before going to bed and he gives lots of examples of abuses that made me really mad - not a good thing before bed.
Anyway, if you’re interested in pursuing these ideas, “Free Culture” is a good read. I think Lawrence Lessig is like the new Richard Stallman, except that he’s a little more grounded in reality and doesn’t look like Karl Marx.