On 08/02/11 12:14, Michel Bauwens wrote:
so does IBM and at the same time, it is also strengthening the free software commons.
On the premise that there are no commons without commoning, IBM does not strengthen the software commons. Rather, IBM converts the (re)production of the *resource* that software commoners have created/established into a matter of wage labour. Command over wage labour - and the means of production required to capitalise on it - are thus used to subsume control of what was previously a commons, - a process also known as enclosure. This is the first step. They claim ownership, by acquiring decision-making powers, by claiming de facto leadership of the organisation (and future direction) of the resource. Software - like most things - is movement, and IBM moves it in a direction away from common ground. Due to way in which the GPL sits on the fence, this is possible without the immediately apparent destruction of the commons. Hence, for the uncritical observer it might appear as if IBM are adding to the commons, but their interaction with the commons actually results in the minimisation/marginalisation of commoners in the development of the commons: they are rendered marginal: they may still play with the code, i.e. the resource, but their commoning is ever less significant in the development of the resource, while waged labour and corporate planning increasingly determines the trajectory of the resource. No commons without commoning, no IBM involvement without enclosure. Unless, of course, we say that IBM is such a nice trustworthy outfit that like our Open Source friends at Google "do no evil"(TM) and who would never help computing another holocaust. m