Software proves socialism works

Often we’re told that socialism can’t work and people are just being unrealistic in wanting ‘handouts’ from people who do the real work.

However, with the recent news of the PHP vulnerabilities, one the most successful business sectors which makes most of the money and, to be honest, is likely currently masking economic downturn is entirely run off the same concepts of socialism.

The whole of the software industry is held up by volunteers and other people simply giving away their work for free and sharing it for the greater good of the community. Something as important as maintaining timezone information is maintained by one man, Paul Eggert. Your phone, computer and certainly the servers you interact with rely on a single man to prop up these businesses.

There’s a website that covers people like Paul who keep the internet working for everyone. Every tech company that believes they’ve made something essential to the world relies on free labor. The community, sharing and thinking of the greater good has enabled great wealth and (in some cases) the betterment of society.

So, if socialist ideas have worked out so well for software. How can it not be worth at least trying it for every other aspect of society? After all there are software companies that probably could not exist at all without sharing. So, we have created more wealth with socialist ideals. What else are we missing out on by running businesses that focus solely on shareholder or personal wealth?

If socialism is terrible, then surely, software companies should be writing all of their own software rather than relying on handouts. Especially when those handouts are from people who are not themselves wealthy.

It is a weird contradiction that the software industry has a high level of libertarian thinkers who are also entirely dependent on socialist ideals to prop up their lives.

As much as tech people like to think they’re the smart one and made it on their own, they are entirely dependent on handouts.