We live under a capitalist system that is driven by the profit motive, and the idea that you can have an "agnostic" system for software, separate from the rest of society, seems like a fantasy to me.
Anything that can't be sucessfully integrated by capitalism is fought agaisnt by the system itself, much like an organism defending itself agaisnt a virus. This would deweaponize the whole issue.
If you were to legislate that the user can modify the software, but not redistribute it (at least not unless he shut off his own DRM keys and gave it to someone else, preventing duplication) you would allow for the profit motive AND open-source, which would make it work for everyone.
That agnostic system for software that you think is a fantasy already exists, it was created and is managed by the Free Software Foundation and the GNU Project, both organizations that Stallman started.
Of course, it's not mainstream, but it's definitely not a fantasy. Capitalism isn't the monolithic agency you seem to think it is. There's room for both approaches under the umbrella of capitalism.
Stallman is not opposed to the profit motive. He is perfectly fine with selling software. He just wants you to sell free software.
As it is right now, free software competes with proprietary software in the marketplace. Depending on how you look at it, both approaches can be winning. There is far more free software in use today than there is proprietary software. But of course most of the money is made with proprietary systems.
Stallman is smart and he probably has a better grasp of the realities of the software world than both you or me. He's playing a long game. When he says you should give up your Facebook account, he doesn't really believe you're going to just go and do it. He's giving you a glimpse of a better world, sharing his vision of what could be. This approach has proven extremely successful. He has said that he feels like he's succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. He just never thought he would get this far. He never thought his ideas could gain so much traction.
Ok well I agree with you. That's a very good point. And I'd like him to have even more sucess.
I think closed source software is a terrible, terrible problem for non-programmer workers. Productivity gains from the Computer Revolution to non-programmers have been very small. I think that's partially attributtable to the fact that general-use programs for enterprise are mostly closed-source. And this is a problem because it A. Doesn't allow for customization of applications for specific uses, which I believe would unlock a lot more productivity gains and B. it discourages workers from learning to program (because what the hell would they program anyway!), which again, I believe would unlock productivity gains.
So I do believe making most software open-source and modifiable should be a matter of legislation at this point. It's ridiculous that users have less capacity to modify their work tools today than they ever had during the Industrial/Mechanical Age. And I believe the reason why this is because you can't make any money out of open-source. Because of that, companies discourage it, workers don't see the benefit in programming. The compounding effects of this are getting worse by the day.
Anything that can't be sucessfully integrated by capitalism is fought agaisnt by the system itself, much like an organism defending itself agaisnt a virus. This would deweaponize the whole issue.
If you were to legislate that the user can modify the software, but not redistribute it (at least not unless he shut off his own DRM keys and gave it to someone else, preventing duplication) you would allow for the profit motive AND open-source, which would make it work for everyone.