Off the Beat: Bruce Byfield's Blog

"You say the little efforts that I make will do no good; they never will prevail to tip the hovering scale where justice hangs in balance. I don’t think I ever thought they would, but I am prejudiced beyond debate in favor of my right to choose which side shall feel the stubborn ounces of my weight."

- Tommy Douglas

As a writer, I am more comfortable reporting the news than making the news. For that reason, I'm reluctant to encourage the discussion started by my article, "Tech Pundits Surrender: The Retreat from Free Software and Open Standards" about the use of proprietary software when it's convenient. At the same time, I can't help wondering when idealism became a dirty word in free and open source software (FOSS).

Understand, this comment is not directly aimed at my colleague Jason Perlow, whose article in favor of using proprietary software I was reacting to. Nor is it exactly a response to his response, "Why I'm smarter than an Open Source surrender monkey". Perlow and I have discussed our different attitudes, we've amiably agreed to disagree, and I enjoyed the humor in his reply. So in no sense am I pursuing a personal vendetta.

Nor am I advocating an impossible purity. Free software comfortably meets my needs these days -- so much so that my new workstation doesn't have Windows installed -- but in the past I've reviewed proprietary software and resorted to it when no free alternative was available.

Taking control of your own life

However, it is with a genuine sense of puzzlement that I read comments like David Schlesinger's.

"The position of open source advocates," Schlesinger writes, "is something like being a carpenter who won't buy tools from Garett-Wade (even though they're excellent tools) because he doesn't like the personal politics of one of the owners, preferring to buy inferior chisels from someone whose outlook better matches his own. And that's silly.

Silly? Well, maybe from one perspective. But I'd call it principled and responsible consumerism, and add a few words about how the carpenter was taking control of his own life.

I don't shop at Wal-Mart, although I live a kilometer away from one, because I don't like the company's anti-union practices and its tendency to destroy owner-operated businesses in small towns. In much the same way, I don't eat fast food, buy shoddy merchandise assembled in sweat shops, wear corporate logos or listen to a song because it's on everybody's music player. So far as I'm concerned, life's too short not to live it on my own terms as much as I can.

For precisely the same reason, I don't buy Microsoft or Apple products, because I object to their proprietary business practices. In fact, the whole point of FOSS has always seemed to me to provide an alternative to the products of such companies.

In my mind, to buy and use proprietary products, except in the utmost necessity is something to be ashamed about. And that's how I've felt the few times I've bought proprietary myself. It seems an undermining of FOSS' efforts to provide an alternative.

Then to do so cheerily, and to dismiss the idea of the alternative as silly -- well, that sounds uncannily like a repudiation of FOSS and all it stands for. Having spend twelve years working with FOSS and writing about it, and accepting a lower income as a fair exchange for writing about something I believe in, I'm not about to accept that I've wasted my time simply being eccentric or devoted to hopeless causes.

Not Judging by the Company

Sure, it's easy to dismiss FOSS, as Schlesinger does, by citing those he calls the "crazies" like Roy Schestowitz or those who rush to apologize for Richard Stallman when he shows himself to be fallible or callous.

However, a position exists independently of those who hold it. If I wanted to play the same game, I could discredit Schlesinger by emphasizing his obsessional hatred of free software in general and Stallman in particular -- he has, after all, devoted a website to these topics. But ad hominem attacks are not a valid refutation of a position, and to dwell on them would only obscure the fact that, for all his anti-FOSS outbursts, Schlesinger often has some worthwhile observations.

In the same way, mentioning the shortcomings of some FOSS supporters does nothing to disprove its principles. You can score some cheap debating points by playing to the crowd that way, and nothing more.

I admit that sometimes the antics of some FOSS supporters embarrass me. At times, I've called them on their excesses. Yet the fact that they are foolish doesn't make FOSS ideals foolish, or make me think that trying to lead a principled life is foolish.

So far as I'm concerned, the effort to live up to my ideals in my daily life is part of what makes life worth living. Ideals may not be everything (obviously food, shelter, and affection come first) but they are high on my priority list.

Besides, looking at history, I can't recall many people who chose convenience over principles leaving much of a mark. I mean, who do you remember -- the merchants and CEOs, or the reformers and activists? To paraphrase George Orwell, I'm not the sort who gets all starry-eyed whenever the name of FOSS is evoked, but when I know what side I'm on when it counts.

And if that makes some people call me silly or strident -- well, I've been called far worse. I can live with their opinion of me because doing my best to live up to my principles lets me live more comfortably with myself.

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