Zanoi.net

Software and users rights

“Imagine, if you will, for a moment, a society in which mathematics has become property, and it’s owned by people. Now, every time you want to do anything useful, build a house, make a boat, start a bridge, devise a market, move objects weighing certain numbers of kilos from one place to another, your first stop is at the mathematics store, to buy enough mathematics to complete the task which lies before you. You can only use as much arithmetic at a time as you can afford, and it is difficult to build a sufficient inventory of mathematics, given its price, to have any extra on hand. You can predict, of course, that the mathematics sellers will get rich. And you can predict that every other activity in society, whether undertaken for economic benefit or for the common good, will pay taxes in the form of mathematics payments.”¹

Eben Moglen, professor of law and legal history at Columbia University, uses this example in his speech Software and Community in the early 21^st century. Most people would not be content with such a world. However, we all grow up accepting exactly this, but for software instead of mathematics. Every program a normal computer user has on his computer comes with restrictions the user would not accept for other things in life.

Software is similiar to mathematics in that it does not cost anything to copy. A “copy & paste” is free of charge. In economics, this is called zero-marginal cost. Because of the zero-marginal cost (and with the help of the Internet), sharing software with one person is as much work as sharing it with the whole world. In contrast, physical products cost work and money to reproduce. By taking software and making it copyrightable, patentable burning it on a CD and putting it in a box, companies are trying to force an economic model for physical products onto something whose underlying economic model is that of mathematics. Since software companies are charging money for something that has zero-marginal cost, they can have huge profit margins. In contrast, mathematicians get paid for the work they do, not for every copy made of a mathematical formula they create. We would not force an economic model for physical products onto mathematics, so why do we force it onto software?

Putting software into a box conveniently allows companies to add restrictions to the use of the software. When a user opens the box and installs the program (s)he agrees to the restrictions supplied by the company. The user agrees to not owning the program (s)he just paid for² and that using it for anything outside a few defined purposes is not allowed³. This would be similar to a company producing chairs and prohibiting their customers to use them for something other than sitting on them. Chairs are useful for reaching things that are up high, for throwing or as firewood. Such uses would not be allowed if we had the same rights for chairs as for software. Similarly, we would not accept restrictions on the use of mathematical formulas to a few specific cases or make it illegal to read out loud from a book. We would not accept these restrictions for anything else so why do we for software?

Furthermore, when “buying” a program one does not receive the programs source code. This is the equivalent of “buying mathematics”, and not receiving a formula, but merely the result of the calculation. This not only makes it impossible to know why and how a result is produced, it also makes it impossible to know what a program does and does not do. For example it is not unusual for programs to, without the knowledge of the user, send information to a company. Having the source code is necessary to know that a program does not spy on its users. Without the source code, one can never be sure that a program does not spy. We would not accept this in the physical world, so why do we accept it for software?

All programs have many small faults, called bugs, that either did not get caught during testing or the developers did not have time to fix. Despite a fault not being profitable to fix for the company that created the program, it can make the program unusable for a user. However, usually a user is not legally allowed to fix the problem or pay someone else to fix it. The same applies to program functionality. Unless the company derives a direct economic benefit it will not include a specific functionality in the program. And again, no matter how critical it is for a specific user, (s)he is not allowed to improve the program or pay someone else to improve it.

Moreover, if a company stops releasing security updates for a program they expose the users to the rapidly evolving world of viruses and malware. The reasons for the company to stop shipping security updates can be many. The company could be bankrupt, or trying to force users to buy new versions of their programs. However, eventually every program becomes unprofitable and the company will stop releasing security updates, leaving the users stranded.

Even if it were permitted to improve programs it would not benefit the average user. This is because most users cannot program. For every user to benefit, those with the time and skill should be allowed to share their improvements.

When something breaks it can normally be repaired by its owner or (s)he can pay someone to repair it. Why do we throw away this principle in the digital world?

Many IT companies have built their business models on preventing users to have access to their own data. By obscuring how documents, music, pictures etc. are saved, no other program will be able to open the files. Users then have no choice but to always buy their programs from this one company. Not only are users prevented from accessing their own data, but there is also absolutely no guarantee that future historians will be able to understand these obscure files. It is now possible for companies to use the law to enforce this system. With the help of patents and anti-circumvention laws one can make it illegal for any other program to open the files. However, there is a solution: open standards. By documenting exactly how a file is saved and not making it illegal for others to read such files, every program will be able to open any file. This would result in a world where programs compete in quality, not in locking down their users data. Since users would be able to switch whenever they wanted, companies would have to satisfy user demand in order to stay in business. It would also allow historians to read our files a hundred years or more from now.

Currently it is mostly still possible to read even the most obscure file formats and save them to file formats that are open standards. However, it is getting increasingly difficult or impossible.

It should not be possible for companies to prevent their users to switch to another program. Thus, if a company starts to lock down their users data, it must be possible for other companies to jump in and continue development of a program in order to make sure that the data is not locked down. We decided long ago that we did not want a few powerful people to control access to essential information in society. So why do we throw away this principle in the digital world?

It is possible to get rid of all the mentioned problems, dangers and unethical business practices. They all disappear if a program keeps to four simple rules. For software to be without all of the mentioned restrictions and their consequences, a program must guarantee the user the following:

1. The freedom to run the program for any purpose, in order to be able to sit and stand on the chair.
2. The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs so that a fault can not make the whole program unusable.
3. The freedom to share copies of the program so that there will not be charged money for something that does not cost money to duplicate.
4. The freedom to share improvements with others in order for everyone to gain from the improvements.

These four freedoms are part of the Free Software Definition, written by Richard Stallman and published by the Free Software Foundation. Software that gives the user all of these freedoms is called free software (or software libre, since the word libre, unlike the word free, cannot be misinterpreted to mean “gratis”). If a program is free software, none of the described problems can occur.

It was normal for programs to be free software for decades before some companies began to force a different economic model onto software. In the last years the use of free software has exploded. The Internet is built on free software and most of the worlds biggest companies have built their infrastructure on it. The free software browser Firefox has in the past years had enormous success all around the world, and the GNU/Linux operating system, which also is free software, is used on everything from mobile phones to most of the worlds fastest computers. In the past years GNU/Linux has also gained a lot of growth with normal desktop users.

Despite the enormous success of free software in many parts of the IT-industry most desktop users do not have a single free software program on their computer. However, this cannot be due to lack of alternatives. Instead of Word, Excel and Powerpoint there is LibreOffice, instead of Internet Explorer there is Firefox and instead of Windows there is Ubuntu Linux. Free software alternatives exist for every program a normal user needs. These programs do not just give the user all of these important freedoms, some are even of better quality than their restricted counterparts. Many other parts of the IT-industry have already seen the inherent advantages of free software. It would benefit desktop users to do the same.

People are used to live with restrictions on software they would never accept for other things in life. Free software exists to make these restrictions impossible. Through his/her choice of programs, every user makes a decision about which kind of future (s)he wants for software and users rights. Or, as Lawrence Lessig, director of the Edmond J. Safra Foundation Center for Ethics at Harvard University and professor of law at Harvard Law School, puts it:

‘Indeed, in an obvious sense, Stallman’s work is a simple translation of the freedoms that our tradition crafted in the world before code. “Free software” would assure that the world governed by code is as “free” as our tradition that built the world before code.’⁴