Re: Non-free software and GNOME (The conclusion)

[Rob Brown-Bayliss <on_the_net clear net nz>]

> 1) false, if we have an interesting platform for them to develop on, they
>    will certainly notice it and develop applications for it.

Well...  Thats just not true.  How many people thought that the other
computer systems (Amiga|BeOS|CPM|Atari etc) were interesting platforms? 
How many of them are viable today?  How many of them were superior to
Windows/Dos in many ways?

I remeber talking to Pro MS people in the late 80's who really believed
that multitasking and GUI's  were just a gimick when I spoke about the
Amiga.  Interesting but not worth developing for...  

Being interesting is not what it takes, it takes developers developing
software.  Lots of them, and believe it or not the vast majority of
developers want money, they like having clothes to hide their skiny
pasty white geek bodies.  They like having the means to impress non
geeks, and that means money.

Most of all they like being feed and having a place to live, and that
also requires money which brings us to prostitution.   

> 3) prostitution is not a good way of doing things.

I believe that prostitution is derived from a latin word prostituere
which is to "offer for sale"

This makes everyone who earns money by providing a service (IE cleaning
floors) a prostituite and really, whats wrong with that? 

As for closed software, if we are right then they will become irrelevant
so who cares.  I believe just getting people to the linux platform is
the first step, once here they will realize that it is more stable than
windows (Myth No1 Exposed as a lie) and it really wont be long before
they start to think if the open source OS is better then surely the open
source WP or spreadsheet is better, no doubt they will already know
about the better browsers etc etc...

But first we need to get them here. 
 
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  Rob Brown-Bayliss
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