[LAU] DAWs and licensing Was: Symphony of love illusive

Paul Davis paul at linuxaudiosystems.com
Sun Feb 14 18:02:38 CET 2021


On Sun, Feb 14, 2021 at 9:20 AM Christopher Arndt <chris at chrisarndt.de>
wrote:

> Am 14.02.21 um 09:01 schrieb Sam Kuper:
> > I no longer think the licensing model can be separated from the
> > usefulness of the tool.
> I fully agree with this sentiment and the things you said afterwards.
>
> Licensing choice isn't just a different flavour or colour of software.
> Conversely, choosing a closed license doesn't mean that you don't care
> about your product, but it does mean that you restrict the way it can be
> used, which, as you point out, makes it less useful (all other factors
> being the same).
>

The problem is: all other factors are NEVER the same.

There's no FLOSS application that will give you the possibilities of FL
Studio, or Live, or Bitwig. So, if you want those options, but prioritize
the FLOSS nature of your tools, you're going to have to do without
something you would otherwise prefer. This may be an entirely acceptable
tradeoff for many people, but for others the tradeoff goes the other way.

Similarly, for someone who is deeply committed to the long term nature of
their tools (and thus the work they create with them), proprietary software
probably represents a major compromise which could be unacceptable. For
others, they will make do with the "final" versions of a work in some form,
and deal with the likely forced obsolescence of the tools.

Now, if we had more or less identical tools in both the FLOSS and
proprietary realms, then sure, all factors would be the same, and I'd agree
with you and Sam. But we don't, and we're not likely to get that at any
time in the foreseeable future. Which means that users are actually faced
with complex tradeoff calculations, rather than just "FLOSS gives me more
freedom". As Louigi has noted in his long and excellent essay on software
freedom, sometimes freedom can mean the freedom to do what you actually
want to do, quickly and easily. And sometimes, of course, it means
something else.
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