Re: GNU licenses

[mike4ty4]

alexander.terekhov@gmail.com wrote:
> mike4ty4@yahoo.com wrote:
> [...]
> > If you want to "charge" for something perhaps "dollars" or "euros"
> > or similar items could be required.
>
> You don't understand the GNU "philosophy", mike4ty4.
>
> Read the GNU Manifesto.
>
> -----
> "Won't everyone stop programming without a monetary incentive?"
>
> Actually, many people will program with absolutely no monetary
> incentive. Programming has an irresistible fascination for some people,
> usually the people who are best at it. There is no shortage of
> professional musicians who keep at it even though they have no hope of
> making a living that way.
>
> But really this question, though commonly asked, is not appropriate to
> the situation. Pay for programmers will not disappear, only become
> less. So the right question is, will anyone program with a reduced
> monetary incentive? My experience shows that they will.
>
> For more than ten years, many of the world's best programmers worked at
> the Artificial Intelligence Lab for far less money than they could have
> had anywhere else. They got many kinds of non-monetary rewards: fame
> and appreciation, for example. And creativity is also fun, a reward in
> itself.
>
> Then most of them left when offered a chance to do the same interesting
> work for a lot of money.
>
> What the facts show is that people will program for reasons other than
> riches; but if given a chance to make a lot of money as well, they will
> come to expect and demand it. Low-paying organizations do poorly in
> competition with high-paying ones, but they do not have to do badly if
> the high-paying ones are banned.
>
> [...]
>
> "Programmers need to make a living somehow."
>
> In the short run, this is true. However, there are plenty of ways that
> programmers could make a living without selling the right to use a
> program. This way is customary now because it brings programmers and
> businessmen the most money, not because it is the only way to make a
> living. It is easy to find other ways if you want to find them. Here
> are a number of examples.
>
> A manufacturer introducing a new computer will pay for the porting of
> operating systems onto the new hardware.
>
> The sale of teaching, hand-holding and maintenance services could also
> employ programmers.
>
> People with new ideas could distribute programs as freeware(7), asking
> for donations from satisfied users, or selling hand-holding services. I
> have met people who are already working this way successfully.
>
> Users with related needs can form users' groups, and pay dues. A group
> would contract with programming companies to write programs that the
> group's members would like to use.
>
> All sorts of development can be funded with a Software Tax:
>
> Suppose everyone who buys a computer has to pay x percent of the price
> as a software tax. The government gives this to an agency like the NSF
> to spend on software development.
>
> But if the computer buyer makes a donation to software development
> himself, he can take a credit against the tax. He can donate to the
> project of his own choosing--often, chosen because he hopes to use the
> results when it is done. He can take a credit for any amount of
> donation up to the total tax he had to pay.
>
> The total tax rate could be decided by a vote of the payers of the tax,
> weighted according to the amount they will be taxed on.
>
> The consequences:
>
> The computer-using community supports software development.
> This community decides what level of support is needed.
>
> Users who care which projects their share is spent on can choose this
> for themselves.
>
> In the long run, making programs free is a step toward the
> post-scarcity world, where nobody will have to work very hard just to
> make a living. People will be free to devote themselves to activities
> that are fun, such as programming, after spending the necessary ten
> hours a week on required tasks such as legislation, family counseling,
> robot repair and asteroid prospecting. There will be no need to be able
> to make a living from programming.
> -----
>
> So think GPL long run: communism will win in the end. No-scarcity,
> girls for free, and all that.
>
> http://emoglen.law.columbia.edu/publications/dcm.html
> (The dotCommunist Manifesto)
>
> regards,
> alexander.

So are you saying that it's bad to make a living from programming?!
That I won't be able to if I use "free" software for it?!