of 17
8/3/2019 Selection.en
1/17
1
The Competitive Advantages
of Free Software
Alexandre Oliva [email protected]
http://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/
Copyright 2000, 2003 Alexandre Oliva; 2009 FSFLA (last modified April 2009)
Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of this entire document worldwide without royalty,
provided the copyright notice, the documents official URL, and this permission notice are preserved.
http://www.fsfla.org/svn/fsfla/site/blogs/lxo/pres/selection/
http://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/papers/free-software/selection.pdf
http://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/papers/free-software/selection.pdfhttp://www.fsfla.org/svn/fsfla/site/blogs/lxo/pres/selection/http://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva/mailto:[email protected]8/3/2019 Selection.en
2/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 2
Summary GNU Philosophy
My Story
Software as a Life Form
The Competitive Advantages
Selection
Survival
8/3/2019 Selection.en
3/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 3
GNU PhilosophyHistory
Richard Stallmans good Ol Days
The printing system
Non-disclosure agreements
How to solve this dilemma?
8/3/2019 Selection.en
4/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 4
GNU Philosophy
GNUs Not Unix
Free Software
8/3/2019 Selection.en
5/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 5
GNU Philosophy
Essential Software Freedoms
Run for any purpose (Freedom 0)
Study and adapt (Freedom 1)
Copy and redistribute (Freedom 2)
Improve and distribute (Freedom 3)
8/3/2019 Selection.en
6/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 6
GNU Philosophy
GNU General Public License
If you get the binaries,
you can get the sources Copyleft: for all,
rights Preserved
No further requirements
Copyleft software remains free
8/3/2019 Selection.en
7/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 7
GNU Philosophy
GNU/Linux
Credit
Freedom
Open Source?
8/3/2019 Selection.en
8/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 8
My Story
Becoming a Free Softwaredeveloper
Getting a job at Red Hat
How can this business succeed?
8/3/2019 Selection.en
9/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 9
Software as a Life Form
I think youll see once open source software colonizes a niche, it will
completely dominate it.
Jeremy Allison, interviewed by ChangeLog
[...] dominant forms which spread widely and yield the greatest number
of varieties tend to people the world with allied, but modified, descen-dants; and these will generally succeed in displacing the groups which
are their inferiors in the struggle for existence.
Charles Darwin, On the origin of species
8/3/2019 Selection.en
10/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 10
Software as a Life Form
Species Program
Variant Release
Individual Copy
Niche Users requirements
Natural resources CPU cycles
Mother nature Developers
8/3/2019 Selection.en
11/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 11
The Competitive Advantages
Variation
[...] variations, however slight and from whatever cause proceeding, if
they be in any degree profitable to the individuals of a species, in their
infinitely complex relations to other organic beings and to their physicalconditions of life, will tend to the preservation of such individuals [...]
Charles Darwin, On the origin of species
8/3/2019 Selection.en
12/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 12
The Competitive Advantages
ReproductionA great amount of variability, under which term individual differences
are always included, will evidently be favourable [for the production of
new forms through Natural Selection]. A large number of individuals,
by giving a better chance within any given period for the appearance of
profitable variations, will compensate for a lesser amount of variability in
each individual, and is, I believe, a highly important element of success.
Charles Darwin, On the origin of species
8/3/2019 Selection.en
13/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 13
The Competitive Advantages
Variation and Reproduction
Variation
Potential to
proliferate Free Software Freeware
Sun Community
Source License
Proprietary
software
Sterile
software
Cloning
8/3/2019 Selection.en
14/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 14
The Competitive Advantages
Achieving Variation
User-driven evolution
Freedom to change
Contributing back
Maintenance costs
8/3/2019 Selection.en
15/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 15
SelectionIt may metaphorically be said that natural selection is daily and hourly
scrutinising, throughout the world, the slightest variations; rejecting
those that are bad, preserving and adding up all that are good.
Charles Darwin, On the origin of species
Anonymous CVS
Changing requirements Survival of the fittest
8/3/2019 Selection.en
16/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 16
Survival
Making a living
Running a company
Selling boxes+ Development
+ Support
Giving software away
Compensation
8/3/2019 Selection.en
17/17
The Competitive Advantages of Free Software Alexandre Oliva 17
Free the Software!
http://www.gnu.org/
http://www.fsf.org/
http://www.fsfla.org/http://www.softwarelivre.org/
mailto:[email protected]
http://www.fsfla.org/~lxoliva
mailto:[email protected]://www.fsfla.org/~lxolivamailto:[email protected]://www.softwarelivre.org/http://www.fsfla.org/http://www.fsf.org/http://www.gnu.org/