Why All Software Should Be Free

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Image source: pcmag.com

Hello! In this post, I will be discussing a pet peeve of mine. This pet peeve is almost as bad as mislabeling boxes as computers. It's the fact that many companies charge money for their software. When you think about it, you'll probably be able to figure out why it's bad to charge money for software. But if you're one of those people who thinks "development costs" exist, please continue reading.

As mentioned earlier, many companies, especially the popular ones, tend to charge money (and quite a lot at that) for their software. For example, Microsoft charges $69.99 PER YEAR for an Office 365 Personal subscription. That is way overpriced if you ask me. Of course, there is still a large amount of free software available, but the sad truth is that a lot of the best software costs money for no reason. However, this is not necessary, nor smart, nor advisable.

There are a variety of reasons why software should be free, but I'll discuss the most important one. I'll even put it in large print to really get the point across.

All software should be free because it doesn't cost any money to develop.

It's as simple as that.

Physical products, such as soda, bread, and pet food, aren't free (and shouldn't be either) because they cost money to make. The manufacturers must pay money to obtain the ingredients among many other things. If companies gave away physical items for free, they'd become broke and go bankrupt within weeks, maybe even days. They must charge money for physical products so they can continue purchasing ingredients to make more.

Software, on the other hand, is very different from physical products. Software is a digital product. It doesn't cost money to develop software, so therefore it should be distributed for free. And I'm not talking about the "freemium" garbage where they let you use a tiny part of it for free but make you pay for the important features. I'm talking about completely free.

To develop software, you need a few things. You need something to write the code in, such as a text editor. You need a compiler to debug and build the code. And you'll obviously need a computer and a power source. Of course, there's no point in developing software if you can't distribute it, so you'll need an internet connection.

Text editors and compilers are generally free (as they should be) and even come as built-in components of many operating systems. Computers do cost money, but many people already have one so it's practically free. The same goes with electricity and internet; they do cost money but many people are already paying for them, so no additional cost is being added by simply developing an app.

Therefore, software doesn't cost money to develop, so it is not necessary to charge money for users to install it. You're not paying for supplies or materials, unlike how Pedigree pays money for dog food ingredients. There are no costs you need to cover when you develop software.

And several companies are developing free software too, some even being open-source. Some examples of completely free software include VirtualBox, Visual Studio Code, Google Chrome, and Ubuntu, among many others. This should prove that charging money for software is pointless and unnecessary.

I believe I'll end it here. So remember, only something that costs money to develop should cost money to install. Have a good day.

And happy Fourth of July if you're from America or Philippines!

--ILikeSlugs


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