Installed Gimp from fink after I realized that Mac Gimp costs money. The argument they provide is compelling:
As the MacGIMP project, RedHat and others have shown, it is possible for both models to exist in parallel: open source and paid software. Mac users who want to install a compiler and build the GIMP with all of its libraries as we describe here, can have the software at no cost. They are also free to contribute their modifications back to the project. On the other hand, companies who need to be ensured that there is economic benefit to assure long-term availability of the software can also be satisfied. The MacGIMP server isn’t going offline because it provides economic incentive to its owners to be available on a 24x7x365 basis. A special note for GNU software advocates: in order for corporate adoption of GNU software to occur, it is helpful for there to exist corporate entities who can stand behind the product to ensure their availability. You advance the cause by promoting successful business models for GNU software. – Mat Caughron
But running “apt-get install gimp” or “fink install gimp” on the terminal is not too problematic either. Maybe I will get used to the idea of paying others for the compiling and packaging of the software, even though the authors of the software are not getting any of the money (I assume).
I’ve bought an Apple iBook with OSX, and Quartz is also not free... Oh well.
#Software
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Hmm, the argument might be valid, but I fail to see how it applies to macgimp.
To compare Macgimp with Redhat is not honest IMHO as Redhat puts significant efforts and resources in the development of its distriution. Even now for 179$ you get support, product update, documentation, etc and redhat still supports Fedora and many other open source developments (gcc for instance). Compare this to 49$ for a CD when the effort seems limited to provide an up to date binary... ok building can be tricky but how many hours are devoted to this?
Also it says that paying ensure long term availability, which I think is more “it ensures availability while money comes in” which is a bit different. Moreover the macgimp site does not offer any guarantees to their customers (in fact I didn’t find any description of what it provides). For instance Microsoft or Industrial board manufacturers commits themselves to support their products for a given period.¹. Without such a policy you can only hope that the company will continue to provides its products just like you hope the gimp developers will continue their efforts.
On the other hand macgimp is not ultimately bad:
“The MacGIMP project provides the latest GIMP for Mac OS X in a packaged CD format. The! MacGIMP project installs the GIMP in _opt_local/bin. MacGIMP efforts are led by Mat Caughron. Last year he helped the GIMP developers with a donation for their developers conference.” ²
And it’s not a bad thing that someone asks money for his work. (but I feel that the price of macgimp is quite high, maybe I could buy a mac and propose the gimp for 10$, 20$ for a cd..... 😉 )
– PierreGaston 2005-02-18 09:13 UTC
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Yes, the interesting part is the discrepance between the effective value for his customers (time saved) and the effective value of his own efforts *per CD* and *in comparison with other Gimp developers*. 😄
– Alex Schroeder 2005-02-18 18:50 UTC