A while back, I started watching music industry documentaries again, many of which were about working as a recording artist and/or as a producer – there was a definite “record man” theme going on in some of them, but in this way that struck a “This is what the recording industry is like when things aren’t for shit, which is more than I can say for many corners of the software industry” nerve. Which makes an interesting contrast to things in the software world that are done for “free” – as in, “A business decision that’s based on taking advantage of that” – or that are offered up as a mix of free and paid, that are worse than the music industry’s better angels.
This is impressive, because even when the music industry is “fun to be in”, it’s still the music industry – it’s notorious for being full of shitty human beings, who will screw you over without a second thought – and like the entertainment industry in general, the music industry is driven largely by connections. What I’ve witnessed over the last while though is a bunch of ego-inflated tech bros who are working the “free as in speech” angles of “free” software – while also trying to create their own corporate or corporate-like fiefdoms writ small, then gatekeeping anybody who dares to object.
As gets pointed out often in the “free” software world, larger corporations can and do game “free” software to their own ends, using a fairly standard “Embrace, Extend, Extinguish” model of containment, but that doesn’t mean that more “community-minded” efforts don’t do much the same. It’s a contrast in scale, not intent, far too often. Looking at freedom in this kind of way, including in relation to speech, is both a developer-centric perspective, and a socially privileged one as well. It treats all other social dynamics as externalities, while lauding someone’s own efforts as being inherently good. So perhaps software was a mistake all along! The problems seem to continue on indefinitely, sandwiched somewhere between abject awfulness and what could be, but frequently is not.
Thankfully, there are ways around these problems, but they’re not found in the more ideologically rigid corners of software – “Software that isn’t technically “free as in speech”, but is free or “cheap enough” to make up for that in other ways” is thankfully a thing. (Especially given some of the industry standard products that are out there.) I’m grateful that I’ve taken my time, both as a user and a potential contributor, to figure out how deep this particular rabbit hole of horribleness goes. I’ve found my happy balance and moved on, at least for now.
