[linux-audio-user] Re: Free Software vs. Open Source: Where do*you* stand?

[Ross Vandegrift]

On Tue, Feb 21, 2006 at 10:02:46PM -0600, pjfjacks wrote:
> A computer program is created as a collection of words - a unique collection
> of those words, that when compiled and executed on a target OS will
> (hopefully!) perform some function(s).

No.  A computer program is not it's source code.  That's an important
distinction to make!

A computer cannot run your source code.  The source code is merely
there so you do not have to write out big integers to make the
computer do some work.

If I write code down on a piece of paper, a computer will *never,
ever* be able to run *that*.  I must enter it in a digital form and
have it translated by some kind of compiler/interpreter/virtual
machine/whatever.

However, if I draw a picture on that piece of paper, it is already
serving as a perfectly good picture.  That's why I say a computer
program is merely an integer.

> To say that a software author cannot "own" that software nor have copyrights
> to it is the same as to say an author / poet / screenwriter / columnist /
> etc. cannot have any control over his work (or get paid for doing it) once
> it is finished.

This is preciely the thesis that I debunked in my first mail.  I do
see something funadementally different because a computer program (not
the source code) is merely an integer.


Like I said to Lee - I don't necessarily feel like I'm ready to throw
away all copyright as a result.  There are oodles of pragmatic reasons
to keep it. 

But I also find it very uncomfortable to assert ownership to an
integer.

-- 
Ross Vandegrift
ross at lug.udel.edu

"The good Christian should beware of mathematicians, and all those who
make empty prophecies. The danger already exists that the mathematicians
have made a covenant with the devil to darken the spirit and to confine
man in the bonds of Hell."
	--St. Augustine, De Genesi ad Litteram, Book II, xviii, 37