| "It's weird to me that the Hacker News community doesn't think that sort of competition is good." It's not 'competition'. It's carnivorous, predatory. Consider shifting gears and seeing all of this through the lens of 'power'. There is no such thing as open/free markets when there is massive power asymmetry. Anything that a weaker entity produces, will be 'taken' by a more powerful entity via all sorts of mechanisms. The 'point' of IP/Open Sources liscencing can be whatever anyone wants it to be ... but consider this: if the 'game' is on a tilted field, then almost all of the economic value goes into the hands of those with the power to reap the surplus - not the creator. The 'owner' is who has power. The Kings didn't rule by arbitrary decree - their money came from owning all the land. It doesn't matter how hard you work, how hard you innovate, how much surplus you create - if the landlord says 'I want all of that' and you have no choice. Your Rent = All The Value of the Stuff You Create with a bit leftover for you to survive. That is entirely done through legal ownership - not through some kind of forceful cocercion. Control of distribution, access to financing, entrenched supplier / buyer relationships, barriers to entry, regulatory capture, economies of scale - all of that makes some systems unassailable without some degree of power. Purely through the lens of power - Open Source is like 'commoditizing' a tiny little part of the system, where the surpluses will get pulled in by the most powerful entity. In this case: Amazon. Anyone writing software and 'making it free' - that Amazon can use - is working for Amazon for free. Again: if you want to see it way. If you just like 'making stuff' that's perfectly fine as well. But - the moment you see this as a 'means to income' - then - it's a 'power dynamic'. This is why better/smarter IP laws should help smaller players. The whole point of these things is to try to enable actual competition - which is not 'feed David to Goliath' - its supposed to give David a chance. The 'changing of license terms' by some small vendors is the result of Amazon suffocating them - it's the power system finding it's 'equilibrium' - where the 'creators' are snuffed out - or 'better yet for Amazon' keep working for free. |
P.S. I think East India Company's history should be a mandatory lesson for everyone on the ability of a single company to take over a subcontinent. At its peak they had their own army, ruthless efficiency due to a largely meritocratic structure, and was successful in taking over multiple kingdoms.