
The amusing case of tech libertarians - djrobstep
http://mattbruenig.com/2015/06/06/the-amusing-case-of-tech-libertarians/
======
rkapsoro
To get a better idea of how the ideas of open source (and free software)
reconcile with those of libertarianism, consider that basically all such
licensing regimes involve consent and contract on the part of the authors and
their community of users and contributors. Classic libertarian values are
voluntary, organic collaboration over centralized, coercive, command and
control. Even the GPL is predicated on this.

Indeed, a symbiotic relationship that has developed between the world of open
source and the proprietary projects of the tech giants startups and startups,
all driven by the enlightened self-interest of all the actors involved, big
and small.

As for the more dogmatic GNU-style Free Software movement, it makes a couple
of (erroneous, in my view) assumptions about a inherent coerciveness of "non-
free" software, and builds their entire philosophical vision out from that
idea. However, the continued eclipse of the GPL by more "liberal" BSD/MIT-
style licenses seems to demonstrate that those assumptions are increasingly
failing to validate.

It's interesting to note that Eric Raymond, author of the Cathedral and the
Bazaar, and one of the key collaborators that developed the term "Open Source"
and the ensuing definitions, is a pretty staunch libertarian. He's written
extensively about both topics at
[http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/](http://www.catb.org/esr/writings/).

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noonespecial
I don't lean libertarian because I think I'm John Galt and want to "stop the
motor of the world". I lean libertarian because I want to have access that
motor at all.

I want to stand on the shoulders of giants, not ask giants for permission and
I don't care at all if the system that allows for this is called "marxist",
"capitalist" or any other "ist" you might dream up.

~~~
GFK_of_xmaspast
Aren't stood-upon shoulders of giants literally the reason why Atlas Shrugged.

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beaner
I'm not sure the author actually understands what libertarianism is. What is
un-libertarian about open and free software? The whole ethos of libertarianism
is around mutual, non-forced, consent. Free and open software absolutely
represents this. Socialism and communism are sharing by force, which open and
free software is the opposite of.

In fact I don't think there actually are any sociopolitical ideologies which
say making things and giving them away for free is something that is wrong or
shouldn't happen, so I'm really not sure who or what the author is trying to
call out here.

~~~
tzs
> I'm not sure the author actually understands what libertarianism is.

I'm almost convinced that _nobody_ understands what libertarianism is,
including libertarians.

Almost invariably if libertarian X explains libertarianism to me, and after
thinking about it I come up with some objections or questions and X is not
available, so I find some other libertarian, Y, and bring up my questions, I
find that Y is a different kind of libertarian and his flavor of
libertarianism doesn't include the features I objected to.

Just look at the sidebar of /r/libertarian on Reddit. It contains a "Types of
Libertarianism" section which contains links to sub-reddits for various
libertarian types. It has agorism, anarcho-capitalism, christian-ancaps,
geolibertarianism, libertarian left, mutualism, market anarchism, minarchy,
objectivism, and voluntarism. (I realize this is not necessarily fully
accurate...objectivists do not consider themselves libertarians).

I'm pretty sure that on almost every issue I've found some type of
libertarianism that fits very well with my views (much better than the
Republican or Democrat party platforms do), but is way off of my views on
several other issues I find important.

I think this happens because I think libertarians (at least many flavors)
construct their rules backwards from the way I think they should be
constructed. They take an axiomatic approach, coming up with some general
principles that they feel are self-evidently correct. Then they deduce the
rules of society that follow from those axioms.

A good example of this is Rothbard. His "The Ethics of Liberty" is a wonderful
examination of the consequences of a small number of general principles. He
follows those principles wherever they lead, and gets to some points where he
admits the outcomes can be terrible. For example, parents not legally required
to care for their children--they cannot actively kill them, but if parents
decide they don't want their newborn baby they can just ignore it until it
dies. He thinks that this would not happen too often, because instead of
letting the baby die, the parents could sell it on the free market to someone
who wants to raise a child. (Children are a theoretical pain in the ass for
many flavors of libertarianism, not just Rothbard libertarianism).

I take terrible outcomes as a sign that we didn't get the axioms right. We
should be starting with the kind of society we want to have, and then pick our
axioms to be a minimal set of general principles that generate that kind of
society, rather than picking the axioms and then accepting whatever society
arises from them.

~~~
c2the3rd
This is true of any "-ism", especially ideologies.

Every person will give a slightly different answer as to what it is.

------
kijin
The author falls into the false dichotomy between libertarianism as the far
right and socialism/communism as the far left. (There's a link above the title
that leads to another article by the same author that equates the GPL with
communism.)

There are indeed a lot of right-wing libertarians in today's tech scene, but I
also see a lot of left-wing libertarians here. If you have warm fuzzy feelings
about Universal Basic Income, for example, you might be a left-libertarian.
Left-libertarians support a strong social safety net to establish a safe
minimum, as well as a relative lack of regulations on what you can do once
that minimum is reached.

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csentropy
What a stupid article. The author just proves that he has no clue what
libertarianism is. His entire argument is that free and voluntary contribution
spontaneously done by a large number of people under no coercion or threat of
violence created something useful and wonderful. Ok genius. THAT is the
essence of the market and the antithesis of the state (market does not need
money to change hands, FYI any physical or psychological utility is enough).
Non-aggression is the bedrock of libertarianism. Thanks for proving the
libertarian argument. Now stop writing clueless blogposts and go read a book.

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cyphunk
how communism is presented and held en mass today seems to be as a bunch of
people hating richness. how libertarianism is presented and held en mass seems
to be people that hate non-trivial social demands that are created by any
central authority. neither represent the actual theories or meaning behind
communism or libertarianism.

if one assumes a purist theory of communism (something more akin to unionism)
and an impure version of libertarianism (something closer to market neo-
liberalism) -- then the article rings out. In any other combination the point
of the article becomes debatable.

while I understanding that both communist and libertarian theories were about
a lot more than being a grumpy white man, attempts to closely tie modern era
decentralization movements to these nearly antiquated theories feels at many
times to be a thing white men do to justify their grumpiness. The article
didn't go there (it carefully only uses the word "communistically") but much
of the discussion on the article does.

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JesperRavn
Might want to tone down the smugness of the title.

~~~
LyndsySimon
I see no need for that - it was the very smugness (and the lack of basic
understanding of libertarian tenets) that I found to be amusing.

