As part of your campaign, you were an advocate for small and medium business (SMB). I agree with this philosophy, since such a large number of people in the United States are employed by SMBs, and since such a large portion of our economy is based on SMBs.

In the computer industry there is something known as Free Software, which is software that guarantees the availability of the source code for the software solution to the end user. This allows the end user to make a business decision about whether they wish to use the software the way it exists, or take steps to change the software to have it meet the end-user needs.

Sometimes these changes are simple fixes to issues in the software that the creator of the software has not had the time or inclination to fix. Sometimes these changes are extensions to the software that would allow the end user to use the software in ways that would be impossible without the extension. In every case, the end user could make a decision based on their economics and business, rather than be restricted by the capabilities or economics of the software provider.

People will state that you cannot make money with Free Software. This is simply not true. Although some of this software is written by people in the course of doing their jobs or hobbies (systems engineers, musicians, weather analysts, etc.) and then contributed to the software community, much of this software is written for a fee, as a service of integration, consulting, and maintenance, rather than as a product. Computer system companies such as IBM, Hewlett Packard, and Sun Microsystems have seen that freeing up their software allows more people to buy their hardware and services than closed-source, proprietary software can allow. Software-only companies such as Red Hat and Novell prove that Free Software techniques can employ people and make money. Companies such as Digium, which work with a free software package known as Asterisk, is relatively young yet employs hundreds of people directly and thousands more around the world installing and tailoring their Free Software for customers.

I believe that closed-source software is impeding our movement forward. In the early days of closed source it did reduce the expense of hand-crafted unique solutions, and replaced that with the commodity software of the PC revolution. However, like a lot of revolutions, the PC revolution outlived its usefulness, and now the companies that produce behemoth amounts of this closed source code struggle to meet the needs of marketplaces consisting of billions of users. The closed-source, proprietary model does not scale.

The problem is that with a given number of engineers for a small number of end users, you can create a product that meets 80-90 percent of the needs of 80-90 percent of these end users. This means that you have a functionality gap of between 19 percent and 26 percent what people need. For a small business this is somewhat manageable, but for a larger company (or government) this becomes a gap representing billions of lost productivity dollars, which is unconscionable. In addition, as the company’s customer base increases, and the base’s range of product needs expands to include people of many languages, cultures, and diverse needs, the closed-source, proprietary model breaks down completely, and the functionality gap becomes a huge, world-wide expense.

By using Free Software, small consulting and integration companies can spring up, working directly with the end customer tailoring the software to meet their needs. These small consulting companies can employ many highly paid specialists, with a much lower overhead and quicker ability to adapt to the needs of the individual customer than the larger manufacturer of software. These small companies would fit right into your plan of generating jobs for the middle class and channeling the money spent to working people. Your tax breaks for small business would encourage these companies to expand and improve, rather than lay off people.

You used the Internet wisely during your campaign. I know that you used Free Software in setting up your websites, sending your email, showing your videos, and in other ways. You have experienced the quality of the software, the ability of the software to change to meet your needs, and the value of having control over the software and the way it works.

I ask that the government put stipulations on software research financed by public funds (or even largely financed by government funds) that the results be patent free, published, and Free Software. The public has paid for the research once with their tax dollars. Why should they have to pay for it again?

Software research done for the military should be Free Software whenever it is not an issue of national security.

Universities that receive federal grants and funds should not be teaching “software products” in their courses. They should be teaching software principles. I believe these software principles are best taught through the use of Free Software.

I ask that the government consider using Free Software in new projects, new offices, and military uses. The question asked by the purchaser of software for the public good should not be “should we use Free Software”, but “why can’t we use Free Software?” As you know, when the government uses a specific set of software for their own use, the suppliers to the government often use the same software. For the government to embrace the concept of Free Software would mean that thousands of SMB companies could spring up delivering and tailoring this software to the needs of U.S. businesses.

There are other reasons for using Free Software, and examples of how Free Software allowed innovation when closed-source, proprietary software would not.

I would be happy to meet with your new Chief Technology Officer or any of his staff to discuss this further.

Sincerely,

Jon “maddog” Hall, Executive Director
Linux International