Some random (and similar to may other view points already experessed in this discussion and many previous discussions) comments on the Biased and confusing article:

Mr assis cant decide if he is an (free beer seeking?) ordinary user or a software developer. Usually ordinary users cannot fix the software, they have to depend on the services offered by developers, and hey services are not free beer.

But in case of free software users/ customers can choose any developer, benefit from the free market and of course pay. Under ideal conditions business will not benefit from monopoly but by the merits of their offers and services.

There are incentives for developers and software developement: Developers get the money and ordinary users/ and the software itself benefits by competition and quality of services offered by the talented/ motivated developers.

In the early days of free software movement IMHO the work was based on individual and usually free as in beer efforts (thanks to RMS and many other talented guys). But now it has attained its own momentum to break apart the monopolies and there is nothing stopping it now. But India is a free country (as in freedom) everyone can speak, lets not try to overwhelm ToI, the truth will still happen. There is lot of money and opportunities in free software, much more than Mr Assis can see or want others to believe.

The article and our subsequenting discussion will bring out nothing new except for free (as in beer) publicity for Mr assis.

Sincerely

Ajay Pal Singh Atwal Dept of CSE & IT BBSBEC, Fatehgarh Sahib Punjab, INDIA -------------------------------- http://www.bbsbec.ac.in http://www.ajaypal.com -------------------------------- ajaypal[at]bbsbec.org, ajaypal[at]acm.org