[vertex-four]

Wealthy, great architects make their fortunes on bespoke work. Even the plans they sell often have to be changed for each location - it's uncommon that the exact same building can be replicated in different locations over time, due to local planning constraints, preferences of their clients, new regulations, and so on.

[barking]

Great software developers deserve to make their fortune too and should be free to do so in a manner that suits both them and their (consenting adult) clients without name-calling from developers with different philosophy/orientation.

[vertex-four]

Copyright is a legal fiction - it doesn't exist except by force of the state, and there's plenty of evidence that it has a large variety of downsides. I think it's entirely reasonable to argue for alternative methods of providing benefit to society that don't rely on having the state threaten people for you.

Or, in other words - the default state of things is that copyright does not exist, not that it does. It's on copyright proponents to prove that we have a better world with it than without.

Great software developers already largely make their fortune doing bespoke work for clients with a need for it. So do great lawyers, great doctors, great system administrators, great technical writers, and so on. This isn't a new idea.

[barking]

All software isn't line of business bespoke jobs for mega corp. Family business sometimes need software specific to their vertical market but can't afford to employ someone for a year to do it.

[vertex-four]

Indeed, but who's making their fortune selling software to family businesses? If you're going to make "a fortune"... sell to people who have money. You can make a living though, quite happily. If there's a pile of small businesses which all need more-or-less the same software, set up a crowdfunding campaign and advertise it wherever they hang out. Sell a support contract. Sell a training course. When someone wants that one extra feature, quote them for it.

Or even better, grab some other people with knowledge of the domain and go find capital so you can do what the other businesses are doing, but better, because you're backed by deep knowledge of the software that runs your company and the other companies have no clue and no money.