Battlefield 3 and free software
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Battlefield 3 is not open source, neither is it free. But it is an amazing product that really puts to work the most advanced graphics cards out there. A lot of work went into making it that way. That took a lot of effort time and sweat and tears. I cannot see how such an advanced computer game could have been built these days on a free software basis. The project would never have gotten off the ground. It is a commercial product that is trying to make a profit for its efforts and to do that it remained closed source and non-free.
Isn't this the sort of argument people use against free software? Doesn't it hold water?
Yes it is. It certainly wasn't true with so many other types of applications. I don't see how games would be different.
Related reading: When free software isn't better.
I am a member!
A lot or projects seem to be getting off the ground thanks to kickstarter. I'm not sure if we should be supporting kickstarter although it doesn't seem to be hurting free software any.
For those who don't know what kickstarter is. Kickstart is a web site where you can donate to projects to get them off the ground.
There was an privacy enhancing ISP that is attempting to get off the ground (I believe they raised about half the amount they were aiming for at the time I looked). That effort was started by a person who had worked with the EFF to fight National Security Letters. He has experience in the ISP business and credentials which seem to at least suggest an interest in fighting big brother.
There are quite a few other projects which have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars in this way. Some have been to port new games to GNU/Linux (although I'm not sure they were free software compatible).
There isn't much of any restriction on what you can propose and potentially attract funding for as far as I'm aware. So those funding do need to investigate who is proposing it. I wouldn't advise funding a project/effort/company without at least some investigation into those in charge.
The idea is thousands of people can donate small amounts (maybe $10-$1000) to get grass root efforts off the ground.
So the reason I'm mentioning this is because there are potentially ways to develop free software projects without restrictive licensing agreements.
I wish the Elveos project would take off. It's crowdfunding for free software.
Not that I think direct democracy would necessarily be the best helmsman for free software but such funding would certainly produce alot of useful code.
Anybody good with money and/or legal issues?
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