Rethinking free and open source and its role in the movement against capitalism - “Copyfarleft and Copyjustright”
https://www.metamute.org/editorial/articles/copyfarleft-and-copyjustright
This is an interesting paper and something like this should be explored. Although, I would shift the anti-capitalist analysis to the labor theory of property and shift some of the critique of property to employment contracts.
Is there a clear business model? It seems like the goal is to make it free for collectives and non-profit use, and then collect fees from for-profit companies. The CC-NC-SA has an obvious business case because not everyone has the capability to set up and use the software, but it’s popularity can create a secondary market for people to pay for other people to host it for them -> leading to revenue. Basically the Freeware model with the addition of the source being open. With art it creates a carve-out for copyright that allows free sharing, but once the art is used in a commercial context, the artist should get a cut of the revenue.
But if there’s a secondary market of collectives providing that service without the need to pay, wouldn’t they out-compete a privately owned service that pays for the software? Why would a privately owned service fund a software company that doesn’t want them to exist? Likewise, why would a corporation use an artist’s work that was shared under this license?