I mean, I’ve seen worse arguments for socialism, but you seem to be painting an overly rosy picture. Yes, computers can reproduce software at zero marginal cost, but there’s still a considerable investment in the initial creation and ongoing maintenance. While I’m all for a world where programmers and engineers are able to fully devote themselves to open source projects, it’s not as simple as just making sure everyone has their basic needs met.
The incentive structures are complex, and money still serves as a potent motivator for many to push boundaries and innovate. Remember, open-source doesn’t always equate to high-quality or innovative, and proprietary doesn’t always mean restrictive or uncreative. A balanced ecosystem where both proprietary and open-source software can coexist might be a more realistic and productive approach. I’m afraid that balance isn’t too dissimilar from the one we have now, so I’m sort of forced to go with Occam’s razor here.
I certainly think open source under capitalism (work at the margins, engineers spread thin) will always be worse than open source under socialism (abundant workforce, lower stress, more time available).
As far as initial investment in the creation of the software - yeah, that’s programmer time. The point of my scheme is to lower the cost of programmer time because their needs are already met, thus lowering the cost of initial investment.
Hardware is a separate concern but I have a whole thing about how open source hardware tends to bring the hardware costs down to the lowest physically possible cost. Just look at 3D printers under patent ($25k) versus ten years after the patents expired and open source took over the low end ($250).
I’m not sure how Occam’s razor would suggest that the status quo is close to the ideal situation here. Those seem unrelated.
The incentive structures are complex, and money still serves as a potent motivator for many to push boundaries and innovate. Remember, open-source doesn’t always equate to high-quality or innovative, and proprietary doesn’t always mean restrictive or uncreative. A balanced ecosystem where both proprietary and open-source software can coexist might be a more realistic and productive approach. I’m afraid that balance isn’t too dissimilar from the one we have now, so I’m sort of forced to go with Occam’s razor here.