[applfanboysbgon]

Yes. Pay for software from independent developers and small businesses. The entire reason big tech is where it is is because nobody wants to pay for software, and big tech is the way to make money off of "free" software. Software developers need money to eat, so this is the inevitable result of demanding everything for free. Actions meet consequences.

[Cthulhu_]

While this is the idealist point of view, if you earn 100K a year from open source work - and that's already the top 0.1% if not less of open source developers - and a company comes around to buy you out for $10 million plus a 300K / year job (for example)... open source etc just can't compete.

[limagnolia]

Well that is why it is open source. It doesn't matter how big the company is behind it, you can use it without the company that owns the name, and even use a different, small tech company for support.

[sph]

“Be the change you want to see in the world” and other stories powerless people tell themselves to sleep.

I pay for independent software, point is, only big money can afford to hire employees to work on free software, because they don’t make money from selling software but from being a monopoly. Free software will always win, which is not a bad thing of itself, but it also means that Big Tech control over the software world is inevitable.

The entire free software ethos indirectly opened the door to the Big Tech monopoly. There is no FAANG without open source, there is no open source without FAANG.