PDA

View Full Version : OSS vs. proprietary software essay



nrwilk
November 8th, 2005, 12:15 AM
I'm doing an argumentative research paper for my english class, and I chose to argue that Open Source Software is a better choice for all end users, commecial and personal. So far I have a lot of works to cite from. But, just to make sure that I cover the most topics that I can, and the widest viewpoint of those who agree with me, I'm asking this:

Why do you choose to use open source software over proprietary software? What individual reasons?

I'd like to cram every argument in here that I (and you) can think of. So, offer me some of your sound wisdom and evidence that a world of OSS would be superior to one where private organizations control your computer.

Thanks for any suggestions that you can come up with!

P.S. - If I feel at all satisfied with my resulting paper at the end of this semester, I may just post it up here so you can see how it comes out.

endersshadow
November 8th, 2005, 12:28 AM
Just a quick overview of both sides:

For OSS:
-Huge variety
-Free (woohoo!)
-Adaptable and Customizable to the nth degree

For Proprietary:
-Completely supported. While OSS is supported in the community, and you and I feel it's sufficient, to a company who needs on demand tech support and full documentation, this is a must that should come with the software.
-Easily Standardized. OSS can take on many different file formats, and may not be 100% compatible across the board. Sadly, the huge variety of OSS is a drawback, as well.

Hope that'll get you started! Remember, for a solid essay, you should treat both sides equally, and then hammer home your point on why your view is better (in this case, OSS). Don't forget to go into the positives of proprietary software. Also, going from a "Private organizations controlling your computer!" point of view will not be a very strong argument. In a formal class, a "stick it to the man" type of argument is never really going to get you anywhere.

23meg
November 8th, 2005, 12:31 AM
that Open Source Software is a better choice for all end users, commecial and personal.

That's a tough argument to defend; I'd think twice before signing under it. You should also clearly define you mean by "commercial end user" and "personal end user".

My non-exhaustive list of reasons:

- Endless tweakability
- Community-driven nature
- Better respect to privacy and basic rights
- Decentralized, non-corporate structure
- Availability to all
- The GNU ideology

blastus
November 8th, 2005, 12:35 AM
Read this excellent article, The Advantages of Adopting Open Source Software (http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=376255&rl=1).

BWF89
November 8th, 2005, 12:37 AM
You could put in that proprietary software is like Communism in that it takes away all your rights as a user. It innovates only aslong as there is competition but after that period is over and one product controls the market they stop innovating.

Open source is like capitalism, companies compete to be the best. But unlike proprietary software in open source if one product gains the majority of the marketshare it's programming code can be copied and altered to make a competeing product having all the features of the origional.

az
November 8th, 2005, 12:45 AM
I think that proprietary software will become second-rate soon, since you will be able to get more for less from FLOSS. So, the fact that the quality of the code is dependant on the number of people who contribute to it goes hand in hand with the fact that the more people who use the code increases the number of those who contribute to it.

So, it is free so people use it, people make it better, it becomes better, so more people use it, and so on... When this hits the third world, the impact will be tremendous. All you have to do is hand a few million people a $100 laptop and they can start to contribute back to the free software infrastructure. That kind of manpower is a ressource and the $100 laptop project can tap into it.

There is also the opinion that your computer should not be a "black box" whose inner workings are kept secret. Some can argue that it is their right to know what the computer is doing with their private information. Would you buy a car with the hood welded shut?

Imagine for a second a world where non-free software is illegal...


"Open Source Software is a better choice for all end users, commecial and personal. "

I agree with you on a theoretical level. FLOSS is not prevalent enough. But judging by the limits imposed by proprietary software, this is just a matter of time. So I think this will soon become 100 percent true. For now, there is just too much that is a question of market share and lack of vendor-support. But there is *nothing* to prevent it from becoming a reality.

az
November 8th, 2005, 12:47 AM
http://www.dwheeler.com/oss_fs_why.html
David Wheeler rocks!

drummer
November 8th, 2005, 12:50 AM
For me...
- Totally free
- Community support
- Ability to customise (thinking of Gnome UI here)
- Open nature of cunfiguration (can edit any config file and make any change I want, unlike Windows where I feel lost trying to config/troubleshoot)
- Have complete control over hardware (ok.. maybe a bit linux oriented)
- Security... bugs are fixed quickly by community or by devs with help/info from community. I'm thinking here of Firefox/IE and Apache/IIS, where the commercial companies fix problems/bugs when they feel like it.

nrwilk
November 9th, 2005, 06:15 AM
Remember, for a solid essay, you should treat both sides equally, and then hammer home your point on why your view is better (in this case, OSS). Don't forget to go into the positives of proprietary software. Also, going from a "Private organizations controlling your computer!" point of view will not be a very strong argument. In a formal class, a "stick it to the man" type of argument is never really going to get you anywhere.
This is exactly how It'll be done. I'll present both sides equally, and then (try to) show why the argument for OSS is stronger.

The "sticking it to the man" subject is definitely not part of my argument, it is merely a provocative statement to get some response from those who share my opinion. Thanks for the advice!




That's a tough argument to defend; I'd think twice before signing under it. You should also clearly define you mean by "commercial end user" and "personal end user".
Word. It didn't take long to realize the difficulty involved in such an argument. But, the assignment is to try and argue a difficult point, maybe even one that you don't agree with (which is REALLY hard to do). As for the clarification between commercial and home users, the first section of the paper will be dedicated to summing up the history of the topic, and defining those terms and ideas that aren't clear to the average casual computer user. Thanks for the advice!




Read this excellent article, The Advantages of Adopting Open Source Software (http://www.informit.com/articles/article.asp?p=376255&rl=1).
I will. I'll also use and cite it in the essay. Many thanks! This is an excellent addition to my existing sources. Very good quotation material.




You could put in that proprietary software is like Communism in that it takes away all your rights as a user. It innovates only aslong as there is competition but after that period is over and one product controls the market they stop innovating.

Open source is like capitalism, companies compete to be the best. But unlike proprietary software in open source if one product gains the majority of the marketshare it's programming code can be copied and altered to make a competeing product having all the features of the origional.
I like the thought about proprietary software development possibly leading to market domination, which causes the dominator to not compete to develop a better product. I think that OSS could also be compared to Communism, though, so I don't think I'll make that analogy. Useful, thank you.




I think that proprietary software will become second-rate soon, since you will be able to get more for less from FLOSS. So, the fact that the quality of the code is dependant on the number of people who contribute to it goes hand in hand with the fact that the more people who use the code increases the number of those who contribute to it.
Very nice. I really like this reasoning.

So, it is free so people use it, people make it better, it becomes better, so more people use it, and so on... When this hits the third world, the impact will be tremendous. All you have to do is hand a few million people a $100 laptop and they can start to contribute back to the free software infrastructure. That kind of manpower is a ressource and the $100 laptop project can tap into it.
It's amazing to think of the powerful results this could yield. I've been looking at the relationship between the present amount of success of OSS compared to the amount of collaborative effort driven into it already. Just imagine what we can acheive in a system like this. I like that idea.

There is also the opinion that your computer should not be a "black box" whose inner workings are kept secret. Some can argue that it is their right to know what the computer is doing with their private information. Would you buy a car with the hood welded shut?
Some people do. But the people who buy Rolls-Royces probably belong to the group of car consumers who are the least likely to want to open their hood anyway. A new Rolls-Royce's hood can only be opened with an unpurchasable key which is possessed only by authorized shops and mechanics. Back on topic, I completely agree with this viewpoint, and I have already touched on this in the paper. It goes right along with security issues/phoning home/ backdoors/malware/hidden features. Go to eeggs.com and check out how many easter eggs there are in a piece of Microsoft software. One version of Excel even had a hidden Flight Sim in it. Insane.


Image for a second a world where non-free software is illegal...


"Open Source Software is a better choice for all end users, commecial and personal. "

I agree with you on a theoretical level. FLOSS is not prevalent enough. But judging by the limits imposed by proprietary software, this is just a matter of time. So I think this will soon become 100 percent true. For now, there is just too much that is a question of market share and lack of vendor-support. But there is *nothing* to prevent it from becoming a reality.
I think that my argument is naturally in agreement with you here. The theory and the promise of what OSS does and what it can do is the goal. Of course it won't happen immediately, all at once. But, it is something that can work in the future, and what needs to happen to get to that point is a constant flow of people embracing this new development process/OSS mentality. The stream can be as wide or as narrow as it need be, but as long as it happens, this can be a real working method, replacing the way we currently develop and distribute software. The more I research this topic, the more I believe that that is true.




http://www.dwheeler.com/oss_fs_why.html
David Wheeler rocks!
It's already one of the sources listed in my works cited. Thank you!




For me...
- Totally free
- Community support
- Ability to customise (thinking of Gnome UI here)
- Open nature of cunfiguration (can edit any config file and make any change I want, unlike Windows where I feel lost trying to config/troubleshoot)
- Have complete control over hardware (ok.. maybe a bit linux oriented)
- Security... bugs are fixed quickly by community or by devs with help/info from community. I'm thinking here of Firefox/IE and Apache/IIS, where the commercial companies fix problems/bugs when they feel like it.
Totally free isn't always true of OSS. That's why they got rid of the title "Free Software," and instead coined the term "Open Source Software." The word "free" in the English language is ambiguous. The Latin term for this is "Gratis Versus Libre," meaning the word "free" can mean no monetary cost, or it can also mean freedom od use. The common Linux user's anology for this is "OSS is free as in free speech, not free as in free beer." Although a lot of OSS is distributed without monetary exchange, this isn't a fundamental prerequisite for a program to be labelled OSS. Alternatively, I saw a new point of view tonight, which was that OSS is "free as in a puppy," where the initial cost is zero, but that there are also unforseen costs in reorganizing, upgrading, and generally just switching over to the new system. It was also mentioned that on average these costs are still less than a switch to a proprietary OS would be. Also, this only really applies to corporate users, not home users. After all, my cost in switching to linux is just having a lot of fun learning it.

az
November 9th, 2005, 04:56 PM
Of course it won't happen immediately, all at once. But, it is something that can work in the future, and what needs to happen to get to that point is a constant flow of people embracing this new development process/OSS mentality.

If you can install debian potato (2000) or Debian woody (2002) and take some screenshots and compare them to Ubuntu or Kubuntu released a few weeks ago, you can display the speed at which mainstream (desktop and hardware) adoption is going. Just a though.

nrwilk
November 9th, 2005, 06:58 PM
If you can install debian potato (2000) or Debian woody (2002) and take some screenshots and compare them to Ubuntu or Kubuntu released a few weeks ago, you can display the speed at which mainstream (desktop and hardware) adoption is going. Just a though.
This really makes me wish I could use visual aids. Too bad it's not a presentation. A comparison such as this one would punctuate my arguments pretty well.

earobinson
November 9th, 2005, 07:04 PM
open source != free (!= is not equal)
"in general, open source refers to any program whose source code is made available for use or modification as users or other developers see fit"
(I got this quote by googling define: open source)

and im pretty sure that even the gpl dose not force software to be free, however it lets anyone in possesion of the software freely redistrubite it.

nrwilk
November 9th, 2005, 07:10 PM
open source != free (!= is not equal)
"in general, open source refers to any program whose source code is made available for use or modification as users or other developers see fit"
(I got this quote by googling define: open source)

and im pretty sure that even the gpl dose not force software to be free, however it lets anyone in possesion of the software freely redistrubite it.


See my quote from my post second from the last on the first page of this thread.
Here it is in case you're lazy like me:


Totally free isn't always true of OSS. That's why they got rid of the title "Free Software," and instead coined the term "Open Source Software." The word "free" in the English language is ambiguous. The Latin term for this is "Gratis Versus Libre," meaning the word "free" can mean no monetary cost, or it can also mean freedom od use. The common Linux user's anology for this is "OSS is free as in free speech, not free as in free beer." Although a lot of OSS is distributed without monetary exchange, this isn't a fundamental prerequisite for a program to be labelled OSS.

earobinson
November 9th, 2005, 07:15 PM
See my quote from my post second from the last on the first page of this thread.
Here it is in case you're lazy like me:
Sorry I missed it. do you know if what I said about the gpl is true? Im pretty sure it is

nrwilk
November 9th, 2005, 07:34 PM
Sorry I missed it. do you know if what I said about the gpl is true? Im pretty sure it is

Yes, the GPL does not require those who reuse code under it's protection to offer it for free. Also, I didn't know it until very recently, but Open Source software developers can charge for the code as well (but there are limitations to this). To see the requirements a license must meet to be considered Open Source, see the Open Source Initiative's Open Source Definition.

http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php

On that site is also a list of OS licenses.

BTW, I didn't mean to sound harsh when I quoted myself above. I just wanted to point out that we'd already touched on the subject. (plus I like using the phrase "Gratis versus Libre"). hehe :p

Wolveen
November 9th, 2005, 07:42 PM
Heres my view, being a new Linux user:
Why I choose Open Source over commercial software?

One of the reasons is because I know that there are so many talented programmers out there that are having thier creativity stifled by the company they work for. A wonderful way of seeing all this artistic programming is through OSS, these programmers are able to let go, allowing thier creativity and ingenouty flow into something they have a passion for. These creative and sometimes ground breaking ideas are forbidden in thier workplace because it doesnt help thier company meet thier "financial goal".

Also these developers can attach thier own name to thier masterpiece and not some company logo that enslaves thier innovations. This also lets the community know who created the program and there is a sense of responsibility and pride to the Developer, that she/he is not some faceless, nameless hiding behind a corporate legal wall for any malfunctioning of the code. I mean how cool is it to be able to contact the programmer directly or by email/forum about that sweet app you've been using? That to me makes a strong community.

Now being the program is OSS, not only can we see who all created the program but also how it was made. If I decided to make an adjust the program I can! If I need to add something more to it I can!
And what if I too have a great idea that could implented into the program?
I could contact the Developer and if he liked my ideas we could work on adding it in together.

To me OSS is so much stronger because it doesnt depend on a few ideas from a few developers and bean counters on a corporate budget.
OSS allows the community to add ideas and suggestions, it allows people from all around the world with all kinds of backgrounds, specialities and knowledge to add to it.
What is more powerful 5 minds working on a solution or 100,000's minds working on the same solution?

earobinson
November 9th, 2005, 08:03 PM
Yes, the GPL does not require those who reuse code under it's protection to offer it for free. Also, I didn't know it until very recently, but Open Source software developers can charge for the code as well (but there are limitations to this). To see the requirements a license must meet to be considered Open Source, see the Open Source Initiative's Open Source Definition.

http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php

On that site is also a list of OS licenses.

BTW, I didn't mean to sound harsh when I quoted myself above. I just wanted to point out that we'd already touched on the subject. (plus I like using the phrase "Gratis versus Libre"). hehe :p
No offence taken at all.