macrealist's Journal: GPL Monopoly?

After reading this article , I had to record some of my thoughts. Here a some basic assumptions I make:
1) A Monopoly is bad for innovation.
2) A free market is good for innovation.
3) Microsoft is a monopoly - both OS and office suite
4) Eventually, Linux and other "free" software will crush MS

The most controversial of these assumptions is that "free" software will crush MS, but I think unless something really big changes things, this will happen for many of the reasons that you state in your article. Plus, it is hard to compete as a business when your competitions is giving away an equivalent product for no cost.

My fear, however, is that "free" software winning is a VERY bad thing.

The foundations of our modern operating systems (and to an extent, our applications) have been based on code from an open "free" license (BSD Licenses) that liberal rights to the user of the code. Unfortunately, fewer and fewer of the open projects today are using such licenses, but instead are using the GPL. The GPL is a very restrictive "free" license that gives the user of a binary GPL application nearly unlimited rights, but the user of the GPL source very limited rights. Mainly, any application that uses code released under the GPL must also be released under the GPL. No exceptions. Don't like the GPL, don't use the code.

So given a trend towards "free" software, and a trend of "free" software towards the GPL, we are painting ourselves into a corner. The very nature of the GPL will create a virtual GPL monopoly on software. No new companies can enter the marketplace and compete because the cost of creating the software will never be returned when customers can get equivalent or better software for free. Eventually, the economic incentive to create software will disappear. The problem is that it is this economic incentive that is driving the volunteers of the free software movement. The volunteers are highly trained and experienced at creating software because they are able to make a living doing it, or, as in a students case, planning on making a living doing it. As the economic incentive dwindles, the number of volunteers, the volunteers experience and training also dwindle. The advantages of free software disappears, but the virtual monopoly is nearly unbreakable. Innovation slows, and we don't even notice.

I'm not Bill Gates, but this is what keeps me up at night.