Comment Re:Where does 'free' end? (Score 1) 480
Yes, they are... just indirectly. That's kind of like saying I'm free to charge whatever I want at our cookie stand.... only my super secret grandma recipe has to be shared with all the other cookie stands. Now, you've forced grandma to give up her family secret and now we as a family have lost value. We can't charge $5 a cookie for the best-cookie-ever, only $0.50 because Timmy next door is selling our recipe too. Society gains, maybe... at our expense.
So far, nobody's coming after Grandma's recipes... but why not? You're coming after mine (software)
The effort I put into a work has value, and it is not unethical to charge you a fee if you want to benefit from my work by using it. Sure, maybe someday you want to use my printer with some new OS you're playing with and you can't and that pisses you off... but I don't see why that's much different than saying that by buying a printer you should have the rights to the entire design and be legally able to build your own and sell them. Sorry... that wouldn't work, would it?
By saying non-free software is unethical... he's saying the novel, unique parts of what make my work valuable should be freely given away to everyone to copy and use as they want... just like Grandma's cookie recipe.