[AktiviX-discuss] Ufi-learndirect: what should I say?

[Robin Green]

On Fri, Jun 10, 2005 at 02:23:47AM +0100, Dan wrote:
> Thus - I'm looking for some suggestions. If I want to 'lobby' her - to 
> convince her of how huge amounts of government money, via learndirect, 
> should be better spent if one considers oneself to be socialist, or 
> vaguely progressive... what should I say?

All the usual free software arguments - plus this one, which strangely I
never hear in quite this form, even though it's the one closest to my heart,
as a programmer myself:

Proprietary software programmers are alienated from the product of their labour
in a way that's not true of free software programmers - even when they are both
employed by profit-driven multinationals. Proprietary software programmers are
(technically) not allowed to reuse their own code that they have written, in
future jobs, for their own personal use, or to compete with their former
employers. They may even be prohibited from reusing their own _ideas_ in their
own code, by Non Disclosure Agreements, or software patents. They face the
potential for massive, crippling fines, or damage to their career prospects,
if they reuse their own code or even ideas without permission. This, in a field
where the incentive for, and practice of, reuse of code, is huge.

Free software programmers typically don't have to put up with any of that bullshit
with regards to the Free Software code that they themselves have written with their
own hands.

Granted, there is a big variation in programmers. At the lowest end of the
creativity spectrum, some "programmers" are little more than glorified data
entry clerks, and this argument doesn't really apply to them (because the
direct impact of copyright and patents upon their job difficulty is minimal
to non-existent). But it does apply to a significant number of programmers.

-- 
Robin

P.S. As you might expect, I haven't worked on proprietary software for over
5 years. I'm poor but happy.
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: application/pgp-signature
Size: 189 bytes
Desc: not available
URL: <https://lists.aktivix.org/pipermail/aktivix-discuss/attachments/20050610/c8558daa/attachment.pgp>