Eric spoke in his post about open source encryption algorithms, Jake wrote about free software, even Professor Zapalla talked about open source science.
I'm going to try and make this post as unbiased as possible....but I make no guarantees.
So, I think that the majority of people care about open-source because its free. Microsoft charges hundreds for their Office Suite, people complain and turn to Open-Source for solutions.
People claim that open source is better because there is much more people looking at the code and making changes. But isn't that a disadvantage as well? So if there is an issue with the software, you have to wait for someone else to find the solution in their spare time!
Now don't get me wrong, I think that open source has its place. Most of the web pages on the internet are being served on Linux machines. For such a wide-use product that is necessary, open source may be the best bet. The configurability of linux servers makes their use for webpages ideal. But for a product, like Office, that provides business and personal solutions, why wouldn't you charge?
Maybe I don't fully understand economics. But if we keep going towards free products, especially free computing products, won't this affect our economy severely? If Microsoft goes out of business, if the second wealthiest person in the world goes out of business, won't everyone feel it?
I personally believe that the economy will be fine. People will only spend time on free things if they have motivation to do so. If the economy takes a drop and people are worried about their jobs, then free software will decrease as much as necessary. Its a part of the invisible hand. I
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