Comments on: Copyright & Capitalism http://copyrightcommerceandculture.com/2010/03/01/copyright-capitalism/#utm_source=feed&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=feed E59.1405, The Media, Culture, and Communications Department at the Steinhardt School of Education at NYU Fri, 18 May 2012 19:36:50 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Evan http://copyrightcommerceandculture.com/2010/03/01/copyright-capitalism/comment-page-1/#comment-544 Evan Wed, 03 Mar 2010 16:49:29 +0000 http://copyrightcommerceandculture.com/?p=982#comment-544 I'd agree that you need to have a particularly narrow definition of capitalism to call the motivations behind open source development "communist". Benkler's work that we read grounds his explanation of peer production firmly in market-based principles; he just acknowledges other markets beside the monetary one. Maybe the argument is that it's communist (though more likely socialist) to have a government mandate the use of open source software, but that's simply a purchasing decision. It's no less capitalistic then their previous decision to "mandate" that people use Windows by entering into a bulk licensing agreement with Microsoft. I’d agree that you need to have a particularly narrow definition of capitalism to call the motivations behind open source development “communist”. Benkler’s work that we read grounds his explanation of peer production firmly in market-based principles; he just acknowledges other markets beside the monetary one.

Maybe the argument is that it’s communist (though more likely socialist) to have a government mandate the use of open source software, but that’s simply a purchasing decision. It’s no less capitalistic then their previous decision to “mandate” that people use Windows by entering into a bulk licensing agreement with Microsoft.

]]>