← Back to context

Comment by otterley

2 months ago

Free Software as a concept could not exist without copyright. Copyright is what allows the license to declare the terms under which a copy is permitted, including the provision that the source code ship with the binary form. (This is discussed in the commentary to the GPL.)

Despite the SaaS model under which many of us build, there is still a tremendous amount of packaged and distributed software that people use every day: your phone and its OS and apps, most computer OSes, databases, medical records, transportation, communications—the list goes on—that many of us work on to put food on the table.

15 comments

otterley

Reply
brainwad  2 months ago

Copyleft software couldn't exist. But all software would be free by default, because all source would be in the public domain, and all reverse compilation of binaries would produce public domain code.

  • otterley  2 months ago

    Sure, but if all software is in the public domain, then the profit motive for developing software will be completely wiped out, and much less will be produced as a result. Software development be reduced to a hobby or developers will have to seek out patronage like artists did in the 1600s. That’s not a world that most of us want to return to.

    • brainwad  2 months ago

      Why do you think so much open source software is written, if you need a profit motive for software to be created?

      Also, let's be real - human written (and therefore copyrightable) code is dying already. When the machines can write anything on demand, why do you need a profit motive?

      2 replies →

    • loup-vaillant  2 months ago

      Or have a universal income. Capitalism isn't inevitable. And it will end anyway, at it hits planetary limits. Better start thinking of alternatives before one of the worst ones gets imposed on us.

      1 reply →

    • account42  2 months ago

      We had arts and sciences being funded long before copyright even existed. Your concern is not based in reality. If people want something to exist they will be willing to pay for its creation.

  • aleph_minus_one  2 months ago

    > But all software would be free by default, because all source would be in the public domain, and all reverse compilation of binaries would produce public domain code.

    I am not aware of any open-source license which tries to approximate the "there is no copyright" situation:

    - Such a license would not compulse you to publish the source code of any modification you make for it.

    - Such a license would allow you to distribute compiled programs only.

    - On the other hand, such a license must not restrict you to de-compile, modify or re-destribute any binaries built from the source code.

    - But any such derivate of such a binary or source code would have to stay under the same license (this is a different kind of virality than "normal" viral licenses).