The commoditization of software (ZDNet)

Posted Mar 18, 2003 5:08 UTC (Tue) by riddochc (guest, #43)
Parent article: The commoditization of software (ZDNet)

I think the article is taking the term "free software" to mean free as in money... which isn't entirely wrong, granted. I may just be a poor college student, trying to wait out the bad job market, but even from this perspective it doesn't seem a horrible thing to think that software might not be where the money is made.

Carroll (the author of this article) rambles on about the economics of software, and finally ends up getting around to saying that "software is a strange market," before admitting he can't explain why. He then says...

"Free software has the same effect free TVs would have in the market for televisions. The question on the minds of people involved in the production of software (or TVs) should be whether that effect is desirable. As investment in software shrinks, so will the value of developers. That's a reality that even open source developers must face."

Even granting that this may be true, the article seems to imply that software commoditization is a bad thing. This inspires me to bring the attitude I take towards the RIAA to bear - nobody is *entitled* to a market, even if one previously existed and has now disappeared. Law and economics shouldn't generally guarantee permanence of any market. What are all of us programmers going to have to do if the value of programmers somehow drops to nothing, as the article suggests? Adapt, somehow.

People made money with computers before software was sold. We can do it again. Computers are tools, to be used to accomplish something, and even if the hardware and software become ridiculously cheap, knowledge isn't - and computers will continue to be somewhat complicated beasts.

I do expect I'll have something resembling a career, when I get out of school. It might not be programming, but I suspect it will involve a computer, and this article hasn't convinced me that I won't be able to use my Linux skills in *some* way that puts food on the table.

(The economy is supposed to be based on people's collective confidence in the value of things, right? Is this article *trying* to deflate things more than they already are?)

The commoditization of software (ZDNet)

Posted Mar 18, 2003 6:53 UTC (Tue) by ekj (guest, #1524) [Link]

"There has grown up in the minds of certain groups in this country
the notion that because a man or a corporation has made a profit out
of the public for a number of years , the government and the courts
are charged with the duty of guaranteeing such profit in the future,
even in the face of changing circumstances and contrary public
interest. This strange doctrine is not supported by statute nor
common law. Neither individuals nor corporations have any right to
come into court and ask that the clock of history be stopped ,or
turned back, for their private benefit. "

Life-Line, Heinlein, 1939