The Vision of the IPL

Where should computing be heading?

Before addressing that question, I would first like to ask: where should human society be heading? I have an ethical vision, which I shall be writing about separately (watch my main home page for that), but the quick summary is: goodness is to try to benefit everyone. This principle derives from a fundamental concept of the unity of the whole human race, and, indeed, of all of life on earth. (I know there are nits to be picked in this very brief summary of a complex subject, but if you want to debate them, I ask that you have patience until my web pages about ethics are completed.)

One consequence of this principle is that, in any business, we should try to offer our customers a useful, quality product at a fair price; we should pay for our business inputs a fair amount that is related to the intrinsic value of the commodity and its usefulness to us, and, finally, we may make a profit related to the degree to which we succeed in supplying quality products that benefit our customers.

Unfortunately, society doesn't currently work this way. Business at present usually considers it has the right to make as much money as it can without regard for ethical principles. I even heard one self-styled 'business ethics expert', whom I shall not name, state explicitly that ordinary people were quite mistaken in thinking that business had any other moral obligation except profit to its shareholders. We need to be aware of these pernicious ideas that are circulated amongst our business leaders, and take every opportunity to hold them to a higher moral standard.

There is great cause for hope, however, in that history has repeatedly shown that when the general moral consciousness of humanity is uplifted, the social system eventually responds and conditions improve. For example, only a short time ago, it was accepted form that governments could inflict any torture, no matter how horrible, on its citizens. When the general understanding of the average person grew to the point that this was understood clearly to be evil, western governments started to respond, and today torture is not acceptable in advanced western countries, and pressure is being applied internationally to stop its use elsewhere. There is, to be sure, a time lag, and principles get applied imperfectly and intermittently, but nevertheless, the maturity and wisdom of the people has been one, if not the main, determinant of the behaviour of society as a whole.

So getting back to computing...?

My vision is for the eventual creation of a software industry that is centred on principles of unity, mutual co-operation, and mutual benefit for those in the computing industry, their customers, and suppliers. (In the modern world, this means more or less everyone.) This will require some big changes, but then big changes have already happened in our industry.

A fascinating phenomenon has occurred in the programming field of late. We have, on the one side, the usual commercial operatives applying the usual commercial so-called 'principles', supplying mediocre operating systems and software and receiving incomes in no way related to the value of these products to the world, but on the other hand we have the free software community, which is supplying large quantities of good quality software, which is now starting to compete seriously with the commercial alternatives.

By showing how an alternative to the current unethical commercial standards can be made to work, the free software community has done far more good for the world than to merely supply a good product; there is now proof that the standard commercial model is not the only one that works to deliver reliable software.

The problem:

The trouble is that the free software model and the predatory commercial model are completely incompatible. The popular GNU licence, the GPL, makes it impossible for a programmer to make a charge for their program because it forbids any kind of restriction of redistribution. Therefore, even if a programmer charges for the first copy, their first (and only) customer can redistribute the software to the rest of the world for no further charge. Now there is nothing wrong with wanting to give away one's work; indeed, it is admirable, but the GPL is written so that it cannot mix with code under commercial licences, and so a permanent barrier exists between the commercial and the free software worlds. Under this scenario, a creative, nurturing, profitable, generous, and ethical software industry is prevented from developing.

The solution:

The IPL directly implements an open-source licence that is compatible with both free and commercial programming activities. Programmers may engage in projects that use the IPL whether they desire payment for their work or not. It places a moral imperative on commercial users by explicitly rejecting legal action as a means of enforcing the terms of payment for commercial use, instead using the approval or disapproval of the community as a moral force to encourage companies to adopt higher standards of behaviour than we have seen generally applied so far.

It works like this: the IPL grants a free licence for use of software for non-commercial purposes, but imposes a charge for commercial use. Under a normal commercial contract, a business would expect, if they did not pay their debts, to be sued, but the IPL rejects this legalistic practice in favour of action based on community approval. Each commercial user is obliged by the licence to publicise the fact that they use IPL-licenced software, and to describe how they have met their obligation to pay for its use. Provided they do this honestly, the licence indemnifies them against legal action for insufficient payment or failure to pay, but requires that they indemnify anyone who chooses to comment on their behaviour against any legal action on the company's part for libel or slander.

Why should this work?

Maybe it won't, or it might take a long time to work, although I don't think so, because the really big companies, who will be the major customers, will want good public relations and will try to more than meet their obligations. Our species evolved in small groups of no more than about 150 individuals, and everyone knew everyone else. If Gog repeatedly ate too much meat and never joined in the hunting party, people would comment on it and Gog would suffer the disapproval of his friends. Sooner or later Gog would have to start pulling his weight. By allowing our communities to disintegrate to the point where no moral force is acting, we have the worst of both worlds: excessive legalism, and a failure of that legalism to protect the weak against the strong.

We in the computer industry have a heaven-sent opportunity to make a voice heard. We know there are many, many people interested in developing open-source software, and we know the model works. If we put out significant projects in open-source that are also business-friendly, we have the means to convert the commercial software world to an open-source model. If, however, we stick with licences that are actively hostile to programming as a commercial activity, we keep the two worlds separate and business will continue to do as it has always done. The IPL is the way to get business to convert its entire operation to open source. That's a tall order, to be sure, and the most unethical companies will resist for a long time, but we are in a dynamic industry where an awful lot can happen in, say, a decade.