Message-ID: <bnews.sri-arpa.988> Newsgroups: net.emacs Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!RMS%MIT-OZ@MIT-MC X-Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!RMS%MIT-OZ@MIT-MC From: RMS%MIT-OZ@MIT-MC Date: Wed Apr 20 03:53:08 1983 Subject: Software Sabotage Posted: Sun Apr 17 23:42:00 1983 Received: Wed Apr 20 03:53:08 1983 Each time the commercial marketing of Unix Emacs causes someone to forego it due to price, or to be unable to use it as he would have liked to due to license restrictions, society as a whole has been sabotaged a certain amount. Gosling does deserve a considerable reward for having written a useful program, but sadly he deserves to lose a lot of that as penalty for sabotaging its use now that it is written. Don't let yourself be sabotaged! Meanwhile, if you are thinking you may be stuck with paying these prices, and you don't belive in doing something illegal even if it is good for the world, you still have an alternative. An editor is being written in NIL. It's at an early stage but it's far enough along for its implementor to use it to edit as he adds to it. A Unix that can support shared programs is coming from Berkeley. NIL for Unix is being worked on (and for VMS is already available, and public). Since this will be a true Emacs rather than a semi-ersatz one, it will be far better than Goslings. This editor is supposed to be publicly available. So just hold on a while -- help is on the way. Sooner if you can help with the work. Note: I am amazed to hear of programs being "destroyed" by being public domain. Are Gosling and I on the same planet? I suspect most of the Arpanet community would much prefer if Unix Emacs were public domain. Note 2: Is Gosling going to pay out a share of the royalties to all of you who contributed extensions when you were under the misapprehension that you were working for the common good? -------
Message-ID: <bnews.sri-arpa.1009> Newsgroups: net.emacs Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!reid%Shasta@Sumex-Aim X-Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix!reid%Shasta@Sumex-Aim From: reid%Shasta@Sumex-Aim Date: Sun Apr 24 07:31:48 1983 Subject: Software Rot Posted: Tue Apr 19 07:41:00 1983 Received: Sun Apr 24 07:31:48 1983 From: Brian Reid <reid%Shasta@Sumex-Aim> The way that software rots is not so much being in the public domain; the original Emacs and TEX are good examples of software that is in the public domain and is not rotting. The way that software rots is to lose central maintenance, or more precisely centrally-coordinated maintenance. If James were willing to spend a lot of time maintaining Unix Emacs and distributing it, then its being in the public domain or not would not be terribly relevant. But he isn't, and it is a true fact that the lack of central maintenance causes software to rot. I believe that it will benefit a larger number of people to have it become a commercial product. Though the set of people who will get access to it might change somewhat, and perhaps lose a few current members, I claim that the total number of users in the universe will increase, not decrease. My only complaint was about the price.
Message-ID: <bnews.sri-arpa.1010> Newsgroups: net.emacs Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix! James.Gosl...@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA X-Path: utzoo!decvax!harpo!seismo!hao!hplabs!sri-unix! James.Gosl...@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA From: James.Gosl...@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA Date: Mon Apr 25 04:48:19 1983 Subject: Re: Software Sabotage Posted: Tue Apr 19 13:59:00 1983 Received: Mon Apr 25 04:48:19 1983 Satotage? I contend that there are more people who don't use Emacs now because of it's present distribution mechanism than won't because of it's price. The total lack of support and maintenance has turned away many people. I get sent tapes and it takes literally months for me to return them. That turns off far more people than price. Universites are unusual cases. Besides. Prices are made of rubber, they can easily change. James.
Message-ID: <bnews.sri-arpa.1038> Newsgroups: net.emacs Path: utzoo!decvax!decwrl!sun!megatest!fort...@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA X-Path: utzoo!decvax!decwrl!sun!megatest!fort...@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA From: James....@CMU-CS-VLSI.ARPA Date: Fri Apr 29 23:44:37 1983 Subject: Re: public domain destruction Posted: Thu Apr 21 09:52:00 1983 Received: Fri Apr 29 23:44:37 1983 The destruction is not so much from going into the public domain but from the loss of any central coordination. When a program evolves by having a lot of different people put in their own "favorite hacks" or "quick patches" it ceases being coherent and dissolves into a bag of used band-aids. For example, many people sent me mail saying that they'd like to see Twenex style filename completion implemented. It seemed to me like a good idea, but I didn't have the time to do it. Over several months I recieved at least half a dozen different implementations of filename completion. Their quality ranged from OK to wretched. These could have become half a dozen different variations of Emacs, none of them similar to any other. And they all suffered from misunderstandings of either the philosophy or structure of Emacs. Continued fragmentation of this sort causes programs to crumble. [The filename completion that was finally implemented was about 5 times faster than the best of the implementations sent in.] I can't continue to look after Emacs since I recently ceased to be a grad student and have to get on with the rest of my life. Getting volunteers from the community of university hackers wouldn't work either. A long term, full time commitment is needed to keep a system like Emacs alive, and I hope that Unipress will provide that. James.