Re: What should be open/free? (Was: Low-end Office 11 won't do

Hi Andrew,

On Sun, 13 Apr 2003 AndrewWatt2000@a... wrote:

> Implicitly, it seems to me that by putting "our" data into a data container
> which belongs to Microsoft (as it happens to be in this case) we are creating
> what I (provocatively?) might term "jointly owned data". The data, held in
> Microsoft format, has more value (to us, to our customers) than raw data.

With the greatest of respect, this is possibly quite the most ridiculous
suggestion I've heard in a long, long time!

Consider: if I buy a spade from GardenCo to dig my garden because the
spade is more effective than using my bare hands, am I implicitly entering
into a "jointly owned" relationship with GardenCo, who now have some
notional ownership over the freshly dug soil?

I don't think so.

So, then, why should the data I create with a tool bought from Microsoft
belong at least partly to them?

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