To: mozek who wrote (50375 ) 10/2/2000 9:58:54 AM From: PMS Witch Respond to Thank-you for posting your explanation about free software. For some time now, I've been reading posts on this, and some other, threads about the age of free stuff we're about to experience. The problem I have understanding all this free stuff is that it all takes some effort and investment to produce, and I don't believe we're currently on the brink of some sort of worldwide altruism epidemic. In fact, much available evidence points to an increase in people's desire to extract profits from their endeavours. Your post helps me reconcile this change in how software will be distributed with what appears to be well established human nature. As you've pointed out, those who labour to produce useful, desirable, and improved products still continue with the expectation of being rewarded: Only the pathways those rewards follow on their journey to their final destination may change. If this is true, those who enjoy the greater utility of those free products will continue to extract some value from using them, and this value will be directly correlated to the price they are willing to pay. Those sitting on the providing side of this equation will be keenly interested in ensuring that benefits do not continue to flow only in one direction for long, (especially to someone else) and will quickly discover methods of securing their fair share too.
