Re: a modest proposal - Debian needs more $

[<briand@zipcon.net>]

>>>>> "martin" == martin f krafft <madduck@madduck.net> writes:

  martin> --pf9I7BMVVzbSWLtt
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  martin> also sprach briand@zipcon.net <briand@zipcon.net> [2002.01.21.1735 +0100]:
  >> Debian should start charging for high-speed apt-get/dselect/whatever
  >> downloads from it's sites.  56k is free, anything faster you pay for.
  >> Then we can pay people to work on the not fun stuff that needs doing.
  >> 
  >> And people who download ISO's to sell should be paying a LOT.

  martin> do WHAT?

I should have been more specific - if you are going to be commercially
re-selling them.  Hmmm... That does pose a dilemma doesn't it. What's
commercial ? Well I find it hard to think in a vacuum which is why I
put it on the list.  I find it annoying that I can buy a Debian CD for
$3.00 + shipping.  It should be more.

And remember nothing is stopping anyone from taking my CD that I buy
and making copies of it.

  martin> uhm, go and read up on what free software means, and what Debian is.

Ok - I'm going to stay far away from the free speech/free beer
argument.  It does not have a definitive answer.

  martin> go and pay. contribute, donate. speak to me if you want to
  martin> know where to turn to. or any other developer. noone will
  martin> keep you from paying as much as you want for debian, and if
  martin> you want to pay $50 for everytime you apt-get -u
  martin> dist-upgrade, we aren't going to object. if you start
  martin> charging, i am leaving, and i guarantee you that most every
  martin> other developer will too.

I donate everytime I buy a CD.  Lately I haven't bought a CD because I
apt-get on DSL at midnight.  That's what got me thinking about it.
It's such a great experience I thought to myself - "it's just not fair
that I can do this for free".  Debian needs to pay for equipment,
T1's, etc...

So I pay - then we immediately get into the tar-pit of why should I
pay and no one else does.  Something of a "tragedy of the commons"
argument.

There is a similar situation in P2P.  .01% of the people upload,
everyone else downloads.

  >> I would like to see more effort directed at the "not fun" stuff in
  >> development, like error handling, documentation, testing, correctness
  >> of packaging.  People working in their spare time don't like to do
  >> these sorts of tasks and I don't blame them.

  martin> want to fund us? or hire me to fix all the bugs? i promise to fix at
  martin> least 5 bugs a day.

HA ! A drop in the bucket.  What about regression testing, boot floppy
testing, hardware config testing, documentation, code reviews for
security...

Plus you just made my point - more will get done if we can hire people
to work full time.  Why not generate that money from CD/ISO/connection
sales ?

The service/support does not seem to work well, e.g. postgresQL On the
other hand, it does seem to work well: Redhat, Suse.  Just looking for
another approach.  Maybe there isn't one and I'll just start writing
more checks and that'll be my answer.


Brian