Forgot your password?
Cyhist Dec 3 1998 A
Document Actions
========================================================================= Date: Thu, 3 Dec 1998 00:26:37 -0800
Reply-To: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: David Smith <smithx@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Earliest "free software"
In-Reply-To: <19981125164125.A7606@thyrsus.com> Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
______________________________________________________________________
Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
I begin with an apology.
I am only a little familiar with the FSF principles and I no very little of its history. I certainly can't contribute to answering this question... but I do have another one. As a former(?) economist I've always been interested in the idea of free software. It seems to be a real life example of the economic principle that something which has a zero marginal cost should have a zero price. (I believe most of the economic arguments for selling software have to do with the cost of improving it in the next version?)
I would guess that this is an FSF argument (?)
If this is so, does anyone know the when this type of argument was first put forward in relation to free software?
David Smith
At 04:41 PM 25/11/1998 -0500, Eric S. Raymond wrote:
>______________________________________________________________________
>Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
>
>
>I am trying to date and locate the roots of the Internet "free software" culture. Specifically, I'm trying to pin down when sharing of software over the Internet or UUCP between people with no face-to-face contact first became a routine and marked feature of hacker behavior.
>
>I know those roots go back before the Free Software Foundation in 1982. Earlier that year I was already writing modes for free redistribution under Gosmacs.
>
>I believe the net.sources archives also predated FSF, but can't have by very long, as USENET did not exist before 1980.
>
>I don't have good data on the routinization of code sharing in the early Unix community, as I did not become part of it until 1982.
>
>Does anyone else have data points or a coherent historical picture of "free software" pre-FSF?
>--
><a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr">Eric S. Raymond</a>
>
>We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.
>-- T.S. Elliot
>
>______________________________________________________________________
>
Reply-To: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> Sender: "CYHIST Community Memory: Discussion list on the History of
Cyberspace" <CYHIST@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> From: David Smith <smithx@SFU.CA>
Subject: Re: Earliest "free software"
In-Reply-To: <19981125164125.A7606@thyrsus.com> Mime-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
______________________________________________________________________
Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
I begin with an apology.
I am only a little familiar with the FSF principles and I no very little of its history. I certainly can't contribute to answering this question... but I do have another one. As a former(?) economist I've always been interested in the idea of free software. It seems to be a real life example of the economic principle that something which has a zero marginal cost should have a zero price. (I believe most of the economic arguments for selling software have to do with the cost of improving it in the next version?)
I would guess that this is an FSF argument (?)
If this is so, does anyone know the when this type of argument was first put forward in relation to free software?
David Smith
At 04:41 PM 25/11/1998 -0500, Eric S. Raymond wrote:
>______________________________________________________________________
>Community Memory: Discussion List on the History of Cyberspace ______________________________________________________________________
>
>
>I am trying to date and locate the roots of the Internet "free software" culture. Specifically, I'm trying to pin down when sharing of software over the Internet or UUCP between people with no face-to-face contact first became a routine and marked feature of hacker behavior.
>
>I know those roots go back before the Free Software Foundation in 1982. Earlier that year I was already writing modes for free redistribution under Gosmacs.
>
>I believe the net.sources archives also predated FSF, but can't have by very long, as USENET did not exist before 1980.
>
>I don't have good data on the routinization of code sharing in the early Unix community, as I did not become part of it until 1982.
>
>Does anyone else have data points or a coherent historical picture of "free software" pre-FSF?
>--
><a href="http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr">Eric S. Raymond</a>
>
>We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time.
>-- T.S. Elliot
>
>______________________________________________________________________
>
