I certainly never said that I expect or even want companies to give everything away for free. "Not for free" is kind of central to the definition of a company. But when the environment changes, you have to adapt to it. The record companies, and companies that sell to microcontroller users need to account for the low cost of information storage and dissemination made possible by the internet. I'm not saying that it is right or wrong, just that IT IS. I'm sorry Dan, that I'm the person who is slapping reality in you face, but it is reality. I don't know what you should do, but I know that what you are doing isn't making you any money, any friends, or bringing you much satisfaction. What I'm doing is making me no money (yet... In fact, I still haven't raised enough to buy three hard drives for the server RAID array... well, I have gotten hooked up with some very nice consulting jobs due to my activity on the list...) but it is making me friends, and it brings me great satisfaction. I don't suggest that you give away your cool workbench product, but before long, someone will open source a replacement. The information will make its way to the internet and then everybody will have it. Your "secrets" just as much as the decryption code for MP3. Lawyers, laws and lawsuit's couldn't erase that and you won't stop people from learning how to generate pulses, do fast A2D captures, and so on. In fact Bitscope already did. They just did it with more hardware. Tony is doing that with his product http://www.picnpoke.com/pocket/pocket.html and I think he is on the leading edge of a new reality. I really like that I can tweak the software. Its a marketing point. And I like that he did a good job on the PCB design so I don't have to spend time on it. And the Windows GUI. Its worth MORE to me to have that, than it is to buy from some other vendor who could drop the product tomorrow and force me to replace it when a new line of PICs comes out. A good example is the SXKey (an ICD for Ubicom (Scenix) SX chips). Parallax has had some stupid hissy fight with Ubicom and now they have basically walked away from the product. I used to recommend the thing to people and now all the people who listened to me (including me) are stuck with a unit that doesn't really support the latest SX's correctly and is very feature starved in the GUI compared to the new SX ICD's that have become available recently. Parallax still sells the units, and what could they do to get my recommendation back? OPEN SOURCE it so that its current user base can add features as they wish. They have made noises but as of right now, they are still "hoarding and hiding knowledge = bad" And it is hurting their sales. Really STUPID. (Can you hear me John! ) If you want to make money, mass produce and sell the physical items, or write custom, one off code. As far as I can see, open source and low volume production are soon to be a thing of the past. James Newton, PICList Admin #3 mailto:jamesnewton@piclist.com 1-619-652-0593 phone http://www.piclist.com ----- Original Message ----- From: Dan Michaels To: Sent: Sunday, April 22, 2001 09:29 Subject: Re: [OT]: Pocket Socialism? Peter wrote: >James wrote: >> The point is that not only MP3's but also knowledge and data in >> general is now basically free to store and transmit. Compared to just >> a year or so ago, the site really doesn't cost me very much. > >I am starting to worry seriously about you. What do you mean by 'The point >is that not only MP3's but also knowledge and data in general is now >basically free to store and transmit'. I hope that you mean public domain >knowledge, yes ? I'd like you to answer this. > I'll second that, Peter. History shows that utopias do not work, James - some people do all the work, and others just mooch. "Some" knowledge is free, but it is a real stretch to think that "evolve or die" means companies will eventually be giving everything away for free. Only if they have another soruce of income. -- http://www.piclist.com hint: PICList Posts must start with ONE topic: [PIC]:,[SX]:,[AVR]: ->uP ONLY! [EE]:,[OT]: ->Other [BUY]:,[AD]: ->Ads -- http://www.piclist.com hint: PICList Posts must start with ONE topic: [PIC]:,[SX]:,[AVR]: ->uP ONLY! [EE]:,[OT]: ->Other [BUY]:,[AD]: ->Ads