[kde-community] Request to join the Kde incubator for GCompris

[Thomas Zander]

On Wednesday 19. February 2014 12.58.57 Agustin benito bethencourt wrote:
> I must confess though that I am worry about the association between:
> * proprietary platforms = commercial
> * free platforms = non commercial
> 
> that might be implied from this model.
> 
> But the business models is a discussion that we need to solve within KDE.

To be frank, I could not disagree more.

The open source as well as the free-software movements are about freedom, and 
I believe KDE supports that as well.
The beliefs of freedom are not at all hurt by someone taking that FLOSS and 
packaging it for a fee. There is no incompatibility there.

Or, specifically, any commercial activity people do with free software, 
provided they honor the licenses, should never be a problem.
KDE is not about socialism. Commercial actions are specifically allowed by our 
licenses and I feel its a bridge too far to even imply that its KDE that can 
have a say about how a person asks for compensation of his/her time.

Practically speaking, the concept of filling the void of good Windows packages 
is something that is open to economic markets (i.e. Capitalism). With a severe 
shortage of people doing the work, there is an opportunity for those that want 
to do it for a price.
Its economy 101, everyone benefits when this is allowed by default. Forbid 
commercial activity and certain things just won't get done.

I believe even hinting that KDE should manage business models or commercial 
incentives on using Free Software is bound to kill that.
-- 
Thomas