[Discuss] OSHW & Economics

Thu Nov 21 19:40:55 UTC 2013

I produce an OSHW board.  This board was purchased by many people including
one who turned out to be a interior designer for a major European luxury
automotive manufacturer.  He has hired me several times over the past 2+
years to produce major hardware and software variations on the board.  I
had the opportunity to bid on series development but the feature was
postponed...  All hardware and library software that I produced for this
company has remained BSD licensed; the only proprietary code is is the top
level Arduino sketch (and I essentially get to define what this "top" level
is :-)).

These solutions were presented to the CEO and board of directors as part of
internal concept car reviews.

We did it in about 1/2 the time and 1/10th the cost of a proprietary
commercial solution.  Even at 1/10th the cost, this work represented an
order of magnitude more money than I need to pursue whatever other OSHW
hobby projects I might envision for the next 10 years or so.

I have had several other people approach me for other work some I accepted
some not.

So OSHW is also advertising...

Cheers!
Andrew

On Wed, Nov 20, 2013 at 9:52 PM, Marketply <contact at marketply.org> wrote:

>
> > On November 20, 2013 at 2:42 PM Javier Serrano <Javier.Serrano at cern.ch>
> wrote:
> >
> >
> > I can only speak for our case at CERN BE-CO-HT. We were more inspired by
> > Free Software than by Open Source Software. The only reason we don't
> > call our stuff "Free Hardware" is that it's even more misleading than
> > "Free Software". The "free" in "Free Software" is of course about
> > freedom (not price), a subject which is not the main focus in Open
> > Source. Both stands are respectable, of course, and we feel at ease in
> > both families, but one thing is for sure: the choice of the word "free"
> > has caused endless confusion. Even if you are aware of what the "free"
> > in Free Software means, as I am sure you are, it's too damn easy to fall
> > into the trap of talking about "free beer" when criticizing Free
> > Software, as you just did in the preceding paragraph.
>
>
> We can change it from 'free' to 'freed' and problem solved.
>
>  It can't get confused as much for free beer. And much easier to tie to
> the liberty of using something.
>
>  'Freed' even has more advantages: it's seems more *active* when we read
> it, as if the mere labeling with the word is saying " *this has been
> freed, yet there await more software and hardware to be freed*". Like a
> conquered challenge! And a call to action for more! Freed software. Freed
> hardware. Technology freed open. Also freeing creative content.
>
>  The word is unifying across all of free culture. Including all knowledge
> in the public domain freed of law and restrictions.
>
>  OpenPlex is an (upcoming) open-source technology park that will use the
> word 'Freedware' to the effect of unifying all open technology: software,
> hardware, firmware under one open banner. A trademark for all people in the
> marketplace – buyers and sellers – to rest assured that freed goods are
> really true to their licenses (OSHW, GPL, MPL, MIT, Apache, etc).
>
>  And will invite the licensors to collaborate openly with its community
> (and drive compatibility between licenses?). As OpenPlex will strive to be
> the most transparent company in the world, distributed globally, sharing
> its knowledge in real time universally, and empowering its community to
> veto any major decision that people feel runs counter to the company's core
> principles.
>
>
>
> On November 20, 2013 at 3:48 PM Matt Maier <blueback09 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
>  Implicit in Stallman's argument (quoted above) is that a "free as in
> speech" program, once created, can be implemented by anyone at little-to-no
> cost. Giving away the IP rights to code dramatically reduces the "beer"
> costs for everyone else.
>
>
>  The free software project doesn't give away rights, they work under
> copyright law to license rights.
>
>
> On November 19, 2013 at 5:09 PM Matt Maier <blueback09 at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
> It doesn't actually undermine the goals of the open source community. If
> the problem solution is stable, then it's appropriate to mass produce it.
> However, mass production usually requires making changes to the design,
> which will not be supported by the community if they're not open sourced by
> the manufacturer. So, the community will continue chugging along.
> Individual inventors might feel slighted, or even taken advantage of, but
> "open source" specifically does not provide the same individual protections
> that "proprietary" does. The power and protection is based in the
> community, not in any one individual.
>
>  People who don't understand that are going to get their feelings hurt,
> but it's the same as misunderstanding anything else. If someone wants
> individual protection they should go get a patent, rather than try to
> squeeze personal rights back into "open source" when they were given up on
> purpose.
>   .....
>
>   Well...they probably don't call what they're selling "open source."
> Even if they did, the structure of "open source" prevents any attempt to
> use the law to stop them. The whole point of "open source" is that the
> inventor gives away most of the rights to their intellectual property,
> including the right to make money off of it. People who "open source"
> things shouldn't be surprised when someone else does exactly the things
> they were permitted to do.
>
>
>   No one in open source gives away rights. They enjoy the same full
> copyright protections as proprietary does. The license merely makes it
> easier to share the copyrighted material and specifically requires certain
> things like licensing any changes under the same license and including the
> source files. The license is legally binding.
>
>  If that is incorrect, someone please chime in.
>
>  Cheers!
>
> 😃,
>
>  Marino Hernandez
> (just a founder of Marketply <http://www.marketply.org>)
> 203-429-4205
>
> _______________________________________________
> discuss mailing list
> discuss at lists.oshwa.org
> http://lists.oshwa.org/listinfo/discuss
>
>
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