Quote:
Originally Posted by Logseman
After a good night sleep, I'll readress what I was saying.
Mainly, my idea is that open source stifles innovation because it makes planned obsolescence harder to apply. Planned obsolescence is, as you can imagine, the fact that companies build in a lifetime for their product, "forcing" you to buy the new version when that lifetime ends, regardless of you being happy with the prior product.
Planned obsolescence is, for software, the fact that every year a FIFA or Madden videogame come out, without interoperability with the former version, forcing you to buy to take out your dollars for cosmetic changes and current player names.
For hardware, it implies that companies build their products with proprietary batteries which only they are allowed to repair or give you a replacement for, or when they design a product in such a fashion that repairing it is more costly than buying a new one (something which is an issue with e-book readers as well).
Open source is, on the other side, more interoperable. The same Linux kernel has versions like Puppy which can be installed in very old computers alongside with the flashy Kubuntu series for the new machines. Kevin Carson explains in the essay I've mentioned some times before. |
I think it depends on what you consider innovation. What you describe to me is not innovation but variation. Innovation is something new, that hasn't been done before, variation is superficial change just for variety.
Example. A car that has the same motor, frame, brakes, ect, but a different body style is not innovation, just a variation. A Hybrid car, with a combination gas electric power train is an innovation, when it first comes out. It's a totally new concept.
Open source doesn't stifle innovation, it stifles variation. And I'm not certain that's a bad thing. It allows mental effort to expended on true innovation, rather that being wasted on (often meaningless) variation.
Your mileage may differ....