"Brian Hulley"
I meant "even a non-programmer" in the sense of "even someone who is not a C hacker" to show that the threat of people being able to "steal code" from a program is not the only source of problems that GPL could impose on a commercial application. No derogatory implication towards people who choose not to learn computer programming was intended.
The GPL itself refers to a cost of distribution, since it recognizes such things are not free-in-price. This is in reference to offering a copy of the source code. The price of a binary copy can be as large as desired. Likewise for the cost of support.
Well I understand the "free as in free speech not free beer" motto, but suppose person A is talented at writing software but prefers a peaceful existence and lacks the contacts/refs/desire/energy etc to be a consultant or contractor, and has had the bad experience of being forced to work extremely long hours with low pay while in an employed position, and person B is outgoing, ebullient, and talented at marketing and advertising. Now person A spends some years quietly writing some code, which uses a GPL library and is therefore GPL'd, and sells it, as is his/her right under the GPL to person B. Then person B is free, as in "free speech" to do whatever he/she likes with the software, and so in particular could use his/her marketing skills to completely undermine person A's one and only hope of earning a living, so from person A's point of view the *amortized* effect of the GPL is to make his/her software free as in "free beer" as well.
Then someone discovers a bug in the program of person A. Person B is being so busy being outgoing, ebullient and effervescent that he does not easily find the cause of the bug. Moreover the code needs to be ported to a the new Warthog MacOSX release. Person A being not only talented but also shrewd now uses the contractual obligations of person B as leverage to screw him out of most of his previously made profit for delivering said work. He lived peacefully ever after. What is this, Economic Analysis by Parable? Immanuel -- *************************************************************************** I can, I can't. Tubbs Tattsyrup -- Immanuel Litzroth Software Development Engineer Enfocus Software Antwerpsesteenweg 41-45 9000 Gent Belgium Voice: +32 9 269 23 90 Fax : +32 9 269 16 91 Email: Immanuell@enfocus.be web : www.enfocus.be ***************************************************************************