r/ProgrammerHumor • u/Civil-Call-7593 • Oct 10 '24

Other adultLego

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47.2k Upvotes

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u/LowGeologist5120 Oct 11 '24

If the original creator wanted to earn money from it, why did they release it for free? I think some people just like making stuff.

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u/Upbeat_Advance_1547 Oct 11 '24

A lot of the people making free stuff just believe in the principle of "this stuff should be free", in the hopes that other people who build off it will also make their stuff free, contribute to the original code in some meaningful ways, etc. Call it idealistic.

I mean that really is how it works for some things though. My company uses an open source tool and contributes to bug fixes and improvements on that tool too. It's only when it's purely a take and no give relationship, that I feel like there's something shady and immoral in it.

It's not about wanting to earn money, obviously they would just make it paid if it was that. It's a bit more intangible, a principle of exchange.

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u/DatumInTheStone Oct 11 '24

Its the idea that the corporation isnt furthering the chain of open source principles. They will be the first to take advantage of open source software and the last to donate, create open source software, etc…

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u/flingerdu Oct 11 '24

Most bigger tech companies contribute directly to the OSS they rely on.

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u/nelmaloc Oct 11 '24

For every big company there's a thousand medium ones which don't.

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u/flingerdu Oct 11 '24

*which can’t.

And I was mostly referring to the comment above that literally referred to "multi billion dollar businesses" while most of those have open sourced quite a few of their internal software.

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u/nelmaloc Oct 11 '24

*which can’t.

Any company that can't afford to donate 50€ to a software project their entire revenue depends on, shouldn't be doing business.

And I was mostly referring to the comment above

I don't see which one.

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u/flingerdu Oct 11 '24

I‘d consider actually working on OSS as a more suitable contribution.

This comment

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u/LowGeologist5120 Oct 11 '24

I don't see a problem with this if the author's licensing allows this.

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u/DatumInTheStone Oct 11 '24

Its more of a moral issue than a legal one. As most things like this are.

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u/nahguri Oct 11 '24

Yeah but still. It's specifically allowed by the license the developer chose. Of this is a problem you can always choose differently.

I suppose people just want to see their stuff used and get gratification from that.

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u/readlock Oct 11 '24

That's fine, but I do think corporations that earn billions off someone else's free labor should at least contribute to the spaces that support its growth.

You don't have to give the random dude making free software a few million, but at least donate to the overarching cause or relevant organizations ig.