Journal entries - March 2008.
17th March 2008
The curse of being free?
Yesterday I read this entry on the "Amazing Mind" blog. The writer says he is a psychology student.
An amazing mind: Why Linux doesn't spread, the curse of being free.
Apparently, because people do not have to pay for "Linux", they do not see it as being in any way valuable and that is why people do not want to use it. He proposes lying to people about how he is giving them an illegal copy of a $500 operating system to encourage them to use it.
Oh dear.
Swish!!! That's the sound of the point going straight over this guys head.
Am I going to explain, rather than just be rude and tell you that he's a twit? Of course I will.
The first problem is that he doesn't understand what the operating system is and why it exists. This is important because unless you understand that Linux is a kernel that was slotted into the GNU operating system you will have little chance of understanding why and how the operating system was created in the first place.
The second fundamental problem is his understanding of value. He seems to think that value is a thing that can be arbitarily attributed to a commodity. He then confuses himself further in thinking that value is embodied in the effort that the consumer is asked to invest.
To show the absurdity of his argument I could just go to an extreme. For example, if I spent a week in the Himalayas to find a dog turd, brought it back to Coventry and offered it to my mates down the pub, well, you can imagine their reaction. The fact that I spent a week trekking to find it is utterly irrelevant. As a more sensible example, imagine if I dug a deep mine and then brought up ordinary clay, I'd have no market since it would be expensive clay and no-one would be interested in it. However, when a deep mine was dug just outside Coventry in the 19th century, it brought up coal which was very usefull. The value of the coal as a commodity is a mixture of it's use value, it's scarcity and the labour power invested in it's production, which is also often a product of it's scarcity.
Free Software may not have a value as a commodity, but that does not mean that it does not have a value in it's usefulness or it's social value.
So, how does that apply to GNU? Free Software, like the GNU operating system, serves not only a technical purpose but also a social one. Richard Stallman and the Free Software Foundation started the GNU project to keep the control and development of computer software in the hands of it's users. Their belief was that locking people into a business model by strongarming them with secret codes and software was wrong. They also feared the society that could be controlled by secret software that could enforce all sorts of social controls and abuses.
The GNU operating system is made to be shared, developed and distributed whilst being protected by the GNU General Public Licence from being made secret and prorietary.
Incidentally, the fact is that relatively few people actually buy Windows directly. Rather, they have Windows thrust upon them by it being automatically added to their new computer. Millions are also using unlicenced (unpaid for) copies. This shows the lack of commodity value that Windows has in the minds of most consumers. Their computer is a commodity, Windows simply equates in their mind to having a computer and they are not really conscious of how much they pay for it in money and imposed restrictions.
The GNU operating system is not unique in having social aims; Microsoft's Windows operating system also has them. In fact, for Microsoft, the social/economic aims undoubtedly outweight the technical ones. If they can't sell licences, they have no business model. If they do not control markets, they cannot enforce the use of their software. If they cannot monetise the use of computers, they do not pay dividends to their shareholders. That hits the nail squarely on the head, the social purpose of the Windows operating system is not technical, it is to pay dividends to Microsoft shareholders, and abusing the rights of their customers is no barrier. A similar situation of course pertains to Apple and many other companies.
Therefore the true value of Free Software is not monetary or technical, it is that you are free to study, adapt and freely share it. There are no secrets, lockins, odious licences or non-dislosure agreements.
Being free is not a curse, it is the only real way to explain why people should use Free Software such as GNU/Linux.
For more information about the GNU operating system, see http://www.gnu.org.
For a completely free (as in "free beer" and "free speech") GNU/Linux system, see http://www.gnewsense.org.
4th March 2008
Amarok update
According to the gNewSense wiki, compiling the latest version will cure the dependence upon some GLX libraries. These had to be removed from gNewSense of course after non-free binary code was discovered.
In that case there's not much point to mucking around with the source of the version in the gNewSense archives to try to get that to work.
2nd March 2008
The BBC, it's homepage and "web 2.0".
The new BBC homepage is being heralded as a new age of interactivity and tailoring of the web to your needs. Actually, it's just the ability to move a few boxes around on the homepage and change a few of the contents.
Is any of this any use? What is it you're really after on the BBC website?
- One day it might be the latest news in Asia. Right, go to the BBC homepage and click through to the Asian news page. Oh, look I can make a box showing the lastest Asian news on the homepage. OK. *
- Next day you're wondering about that programme you heard about on BBC Four. Right, go to the BBC homepage and click through to TV and BBC Four. Oh, look, I can put a list showing what's playing on BBC Four on the homepage. Okey dokey. **
- Next day. Blimey, the local football club has sacked it's manager, wonder what the BBC has to say. Go to BBC homepage and click through to Sport and find the local club news. Oh, look, I could put that on the homepage. Twiddle, twiddle, how do I choose it, ah, there you go.***
- A week later, go to the BBC home page and it's full of Asian news, the local football team and a BBC Four listing. Ignore it all and try to find a link to CBeebies (children's programmes) because of a conversation you had about the type of programmes they're showing these days. Think, "I could put that on the front page", then think, I can't be bothered and bookmark an article about Cbeebies.
- A couple of days later. Oops, something happened with the browser and now when you go to the BBC home page it's back on it's default settings. Can't be bothered to fix it now, click straight through to the news page for news about elections in Russia.
- You realise that there is already a way of finding the "top world stories" and that is by going to the BBC world news page, or if want local news on the BBC to bookmark the page.
This is not a new paradigm, a revolutionary new way to interact with the web. It's moving a few things around on the BBC homepage, a page that is simply there to be clicked through. A page that should just get out of the way as quickly as possible whilst you go off to do what you actually want to do.
The BBC really should get a grip. Their news rooms are full of journalists, editors and creative types who's job it is to report, investigate, make programmes, entertain me and tell me something I don't know.
On the television, the radio and the web it is them that mediate the BBC output. The Emperor's New Clothes of "web 2.0" does not change that. Trying to obscure their mediation with fake "interactivity" doesn't wash, what it actually means is that people fiddle around with "widgets" on a web page, get tired of them and continue reading the same news and listening to the same radio which won't have changed an iota.
The brave new world of "web 2.0"? No, just a BBC website that is slower, uses tons of buggy Javascript, frequently locks browsers, relies on numerous unreliable cookies and gives fake interactivity.
On a personal note, the BBC homepage now takes over 30 seconds to load whilst freezing the rest of the browser. It doesn't even load on Firefox (re-branded as Burning Dog on gNewSense) and locks it up completely so it has to be killed and restarted. The "interactivity" doesn't work properly, i.e. add or remove a couple of things and the page all ends up looking crap and lined up all down the left hand side of the page.
* In reality it's not actually possible to do this. There are only choices for different parts of the UK, the whole World or areas such as Health or Technology.
** In reality it's not actually possible to do this. You can only choose between different sports like Cricket or Rugby.
*** Again, in reality it's not actually possible to do this, you are only given a link through to the BBC Four page, just like you always did have and what you actually wanted anyway; very "web 2.0" eh?
