[Mono-list] laus stultitia

[Erik Poupaert]

Piers Haken writes:

>>>> Is bytecode necessary? No, probably not.
>>>> Is binary distribution of executables necessary? No, not technically.
>>>> You can build everything from source, in theory.
>>>> Are they equivalent? Yes, virtually. (bytecode being a binary
>>>> distribution medium for executables targeted at a 'virtual' machine)

If binary distribution and source distribution are theoretically equivalent,
why not try to leverage the competitive advantage of open source? Any
feature that can be discovered and that requires source distribution will
re-inforce the competitive advantage of open source.

>>>> Remember, not everyone is capable of installing gentoo or using cvs. If
>>>> you limit your target audience to those that are then you're shooting
>>>> yourself in the foot.

Ok. What I understand from that, is that we need to make source distribution
easier. Gentoo work on making their deployment easier as well. In my
opinion, it requires less effort to make gentoo and cvs easier to deploy,
than expending effort in trying to duplicate binary distribution methods.

>>>> This isn't some religious crusade we're on here, we're just trying to
>>>> make it easier for people to run applications an application servers on
>>>> their machines, and if possible, provide some compatibility across
>>>> platforms.

It has taken Bruce Perens almost five years to change his stand on these
issues. He also used to think that open source is purely a technological
problem. Unfortunately and especially in absence of campaign finance reform,
these issues are highly political as well. I don't want to give them a
political meaning, I just observe that they have one.

You can personally stay for additional five years in denial mode, but one
day or the other you will have to acknowledge the political and social
meaning of technology.

We're up against powerful groups, who have the money to influence Congress
to remove from us exactly the abilities that you have described: "make it
easier for people to run applications an application servers on their
machines". Do you really think that they can be satisfied with removing our
abilities to play mp3, divx, and serve peer-to-peer? You may think that,
since we don't need these abilities in a business environment, we will be
left alone.

Well, you can see from here, that it will be necessary for them to remove
quite a few of the abilities that we take for granted today in a business
environment. I will fight to the bitter end to preserve my ability to serve
my customers and make a living.

If the copyright conglomerates have their way, the final result will
definitely include that a project like Mono will be illegal. By the way,
that may very well already be the case.