CCL:G: Filters

[Aaron Deskins <ndeskins|,|purdue.edu>]

 Sent to CCL by: Aaron Deskins [ndeskins#,#purdue.edu]
 M. L. Dodson bdodson*|*scms.utmb.EDU wrote:
> > This topic seems mostly to come down to a
> >  discussion of the merits of
> >  free-market capitalism versus socialism. Who does work better:
> >  profit-minded citizens or government paid workers? Of course it
> >  depends,
> >  but I think if Gaussian was never commercialized, then we all very well
> >  could have been stuck using Gaussian 86.
> >  
> >  
>  Why don't we all cool down a little bit and avoid words like
>  immoral and socialism.  The discussion might gain some civility in
>  the process.
>  
>  I'll only say that if you think open source is socialism, you have
>  missed the point about open source.  Think of peer review as a
>  
>  
  ......
>  I'm just trying to inject a little reality about open source into
>  this discussion which has been filled with a lot of misinformation
>  and almost complete lack of appreciation of the real user benefits
>  of the open source s/w movement (far beyond the cost of the s/w).
>  
>  
My apologies for use of the "S" word. There was
 no attempt to imply that
 open source software is to be equated with socialism; open source is  a
 great idea for many software packages. The discussion (as I saw it)
 however was not about the merits of open source software, but whether
 commercialization of computational chemistry software that may have
 involved government funding at some point is illegal, immoral, etc.  I
 am in the camp that believes that some commercialization of academic
 research is not necessarily a bad thing and in many cases beneficial to
 the most amount of people.
 Aaron Deskins
 Purdue University