[Linux-aus] FOSS-as-a-service

[Tennessee Leeuwenburg]

Well, basically, yes, I guess I was saying that :) .

On 20 January 2016 at 22:50, David Lloyd <lloy0076 at adam.com.au> wrote:

>
>
> So a distributed source control system isn’t distributed enough?
>
>
>
> *From:* linux-aus [mailto:linux-aus-bounces at lists.linux.org.au] *On
> Behalf Of *Tennessee Leeuwenburg
> *Sent:* Wednesday, 20 January 2016 10:18 PM
> *To:* linux-aus at lists.linux.org.au Australia <linux-aus at lists.linux.org.au
> >
> *Subject:* [Linux-aus] FOSS-as-a-service
>
>
>
> I would like to present a line of reasoning for constructive discussion
> and analysis. It's just one angle on a complex problem and I acknowledge
> its narrow focus.
>
>
>
> There are many amazing online gratis tools, some of which are libre to
> some degree, but which are essentially single-point offerings from a
> company. Examples include github, slack, travis and many many others. I'm
> just noting some significant examples.
>
>
>
> Software is dead (or worse, boring). Servers providing services are king.
>
>
>
> Essentially central-server designs seem to be meeting network/mesh/p2p
> designs.
>
>
>
> This is in some ways antithetical to FOSS principles, because whoever
> provides the services effectively controls the project. The nature of the
> software contract has changed in our ubiquitously networked world. The need
> to provide URLs for sharing, describing and connecting to particular
> content exhange points have resulted in an arising natural monopoly
> structure.
>
>
>
> One could imagine, for example, a kind of github-on-bittorrent protocol
> which provided the same 'get-it-from-anywhere' and support for exchange but
> didn't rely on funded entities to provide the central networked machine.
>
>
>
> For some reason, we have opted to remove cost and risk from the individual
> by moving the infrastructure responsibility and legal hosting onto private
> companies. Do we need LA or EFF to host a gitlab instance in place of
> github and move FOSS hosting onto a truly libre platform? Should we all pay
> a tithe to an agnostic infrastructure hosting context in order to reduce
> the influence of money? Or, is the ability to draw a rent from hosting
> funding innovation into gratis tools, providing a genuine commercial
> challenge to the axioms of FOSS software in providing a gratis solution to
> users?
>
>
>
> I would like to take the trouble to provide a more coherent essay of the
> topic, but I thought I would like to get the thought exposed to criticism
> early. I'm not finished but I'm going to stop anyway. Thanks for bearing
> with me.
>



-- 
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Tennessee Leeuwenburg
http://myownhat.blogspot.com/
"Don't believe everything you think"
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