Slightly OT: is free software development indirectly subsidized?

[Man-Chicken]

On Saturday 03 February 2007 21:28, D. Michael McIntyre wrote:
> For me, personally, it's less about freedom per se, and more about giving
> people in poor countries good tools they can afford, so they don't have to
> steal.  I know a lot of people who make less a month than I make a week,
> and they're not even in the REALLY poor countries.

That's cool.  For me, I used Free Software even before it was as convenient as 
it is now (1996, all you folks who know IBM XGA, you know what I'm talking 
about).  It was about freedom then, it's about freedom now.  It's that 
freedom that enabled me to learn to program, even though I wasn't 
particularly poor.  Since I was able to study and participate in free 
software, I was able to develop marketable skills that I now use to support 
my family.  All this without ridiculous licensing fees and restrictive EULAs.  
We also need to remember the ideals that enabled the GNU/Linux systems we 
know and love to this day.  It's not economics, it's freedom.

That said, there are many cool reasons to support Free software, and you 
definitely mentioned an excellent one.

-- 
~ Man-Chicken <><
(A)bort, (R)etry, (I)nfluence with large hammer.
The number of the beast - vi vi vi