Re: looks like it's happening everywhere but the US.

On 27 Oct 2003, Jan C. Depner wrote:

> If you're waiting for the US government to stop advocating proprietary
> software as part of it's foreign policy you've got a long wait. 
> Micro$oft represents a large chunk of change.  Why would we want to stop
> making money from foreign markets?

  Unless you are Microsoft, how does what benefits Microsoft become "WE"?  
I thought we all got past the "What's good for GM ..." mindset.

  The US economy is as much a looser from the "software manufacturing"
sector as foreign markets are.  Looking at things only from the suppliers
point of view never really makes sense.  For most of the economy,
including (and some say especially) that of the US, software is an expense
and not a source of revenue.

  I do not see this inefficient "software manufacturing" methodology as
good for the US or any other economy.  In fact if the US moves further
toward "software manufacturing" as the rest of the world moves away then
the US economy will be at a competitive disadvantage.

> I have to agree with one thing though - software patents are wrong.  
> They're actually bad for the market in the long term.  It's just that
> the companies on top see the short term money gain and start salivating.

  I think that software patents are like the stock market bubble --
beliefs in short-term gains cause irrational people to salivate and
eventually cause their own demise.  Unfortunately they harm the rest of us
in the process.  I wouldn't mind if software patents were an "opt in"
thing that didn't apply outside of "software manufacturing".  Having a
fair use exemption for FLOSS as part of the patent act was one of the
suggestions I made in my patent report:  http://www.flora.ca/patent2003/

> Jan
---
 Russell McOrmond, Internet Consultant: <http://www.flora.ca/> 
 Governance software that controls ICT, automates government policy, or
 electronically counts votes, shouldn't be bought any more than 
 politicians should be bought.  -- http://www.flora.ca/russell/