(originally posted
here∞)
Posted by me on
another forum∞:
Speaking as an OSS developer of note (in my own mind), let's acknowledge that the analogy [thread was titled "open-source education"] doesn't really fit: information is still flowing one-way.
That said, it is of course a fantastic idea that embodies all that the university as a societal institution should aspire towards. I'm not surprised to learn that many of the beneficiaries are from overseas -- not only is technology booming in developing countries, but the educational infrastructure is largely missing (with some notable exceptions like IIT). And dare I say it, based on my experiences with grad students at Duke and immigrants at MS, I think they appreciate the opportunities we're afforded here more.
On that forum, usually a bastion of conservatism, this post was met with nods all around. Here at Ars, whose viewpoints I commonly consider more liberal, I'm shocked at some of the replies. (It's almost time to break out the dreaded "close-minded" word). I suppose the I should infer that freedom of information is only good when it doesn't affect your sector of the economy.
Consider if MIT invented a food replicator and tried to cure world hunger. American farming interests, used to having competitive advantage in this domain, would complain -- and they might even have a point, since MIT would be drawing massive amounts of energy mostly subsidized by government utilities. But we're talking about eliminating starvation, you say! Now consider that world ignorance is a bigger problem than world hunger; that knowledge replication can enrich without depriving its giver of any resource; that the stratum endangered by the flow of information is not that of the laboring farmer, but of the people with precisely the best opportunity to move up, or sideways, or wherever they feel.
All the world wants is not our Jobs, but our knowledge and abilities. They're already taking our jobs. But that has little to do with the subject at hand. I don't like seeing the US giving away things for nothing, particularly when they were made with a goodly amount of taxpayer money. Also, in general, I despise communism, of which this is an instance.
Bottle up the BSD source code folks; get ready to have your libraries check for U.S. passports at the entrance; time to add journal articles to our export restrictions. Beware, for communism is at your doorstep!
...and watch as the U.S. loses its ever-marginal dominance in the information market. Intellectual "communism" is what got us here.
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