Re: Economics and the GPL

On Thu, 6 Jun 2002, Matt Seitz wrote:

> I see two ways of looking at this problem.  The first is:  welcome to the 
> free market.  If someone is willing to offer people a good or service at 
> a lower cost, then that's just good old-fashioned competition.  If one's 
> profession is no longer profitable, it's time to find a new profession.  
> No one is entitled to a profit; it has to be earned.  

The only problem with this idea is that the GPL isn't really "free market" 
because it coerces the programmer into applying the GPL to other code that 
might not have been licensed that way given a choice.  If the programmer 
loses to right to choose the license on their own code, the market can 
hardly be said to be "free".

Sure, the programmer can avoid using any GPL code at all, but that puts him 
at a disadvantage against a competitor who can draw on that code.  The 
stronger the GPL codebase grows, the more of a disadvantage this becomes.  
Right now, the GPL is the underdog -- if it ever becomes the majority, it 
could drive competitors out of business because of the artificial subsidy 
it creates for programmers willing to use the GPL.

This can hardly be claimed as "free market" dynamics.  This situation can 
arise from a free market, perhaps, but it doesn't represent one.  Antitrust 
law regulates monopolies because they impair the free market, even though 
they can naturally arise in a free market.  A true free market has active 
competition on a relatively level playing field...

It would be curious to see if antitrust law might be thought to apply to 
the GPL if it ever becomes a monopoly -- it might not be possible due to 
the distributed nature of the code, yet a GPL monopoly could potentially 
impair the free market just as much as Microsoft's monopoly does today...

> The nice thing about this solution is that it is exactly what the FSF is 
> asking for.  The FSF has been advocating for years that the length of 
> copyright should be cut way back.  The GPL is intended as a way to return 
> to a system where creative work flows into the public domain.  A shorter 
> copyright would achieve the FSF's goal, while also allowing commercial 
> developers to profit from enhancing existing free software.

I agree.  Copyrights were already too long BEFORE the Sonny Bono Copyright 
Term Extension Act.  Five years might be a bit short.  Do we really want to 
start differentiating between different types of expression?  I'm inclined 
to think maybe we should go back to the terms of the original copyright law 
in this country -- you only get a copyright if you apply for it, it lasts 
for 14 years, and (if you bother), you can renew it for another 14 years.  
That could still tie up something for 28 years, but it's a whole lot better 
than 95 years, and there's precedent for it...

Personally, I'd be happy with 10 years, automatic, but non-renewable.  Five 
years is probably a little shorter than I'd like...

Deven