Jump to content

Home

You might like this, or you might not.


jessor

Recommended Posts

I call bullshit on that.

 

 

Oh don't start McCoy, free doesn't automatically mean better you know. If it did you'd be eating dinner down at the local soup kitchen every night instead of the meals you eat at home.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 70
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Software can be free as in beer ("free beer"), meaning it's free of charge and free as in speech ("free speech"), meaning anyone can read and modify the source code, which, in theory at least, leads to better programs.

 

To take your food example: The recipes of your commercial microwavable taco is fixed, maybe even patented, you have to like it or don't buy it. However, the recipes in a cooking book or family recipes are free (as in "free speech"), everyone who dares to experiment a little can produce a better, a more delicous version.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I call bullshit on that.

 

Very interesting how this discussion has taken a linux vs. world spin.

 

I was just saying that I really like Linux, but my work is far easier to do with Windows or Mac, simply because there's some software for those operating systems that do not have competitive Linux equivalents. And that's a real shame - I don't see why Adobe doesn't do a Linux port of their software. CS2 is so enormously bloated and slow anyway, that they could just port the whole thing to run on java, and nobody would know the difference.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Software can be free as in beer ("free beer"), meaning it's free of charge and free as in speech ("free speech"), meaning anyone can read and modify the source code, which, in theory at least, leads to better programs.

 

To take your food example: The recipes of your commercial microwavable taco is fixed, maybe even patented, you have to like it or don't buy it. However, the recipes in a cooking book or family recipes are free (as in "free speech"), everyone who dares to experiment a little can produce a better, a more delicous version.

 

Okay, but so far, the GIMP hasn't quite reached the peak of what Photoshop can do, not by far, it took a bunch of paid programmers a long time and a few pay checks to produce that program and lo and behold, you have to pay for it. Function wise, Photoshop is better than the GIMP (and I have used both, so I have a frame of reference) and the reason for that is the best of the best programmers got paid (and thus had more of an incentive) to create this superior work.

 

And ironically, analogies don't always work for everything, you can sit there and talk about better food all you want, but food isn't software.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 4 weeks later...

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.


×
×
  • Create New...