background & some questions

1 . What is Linux?" according to Linux.com:

"Linux runs on a wide variety of hardware platforms, from huge mainframes to desktop PCs to cell phones."

"You can think of Linux as having two parts -- a kernel, which is the basic interface between the hardware and other system "Linux.com did not create and does not sell Linux. We simply write about Linux and other open source software. We're part of SourceForge, Inc., which also maintains SourceForge.net, Slashdot, and ITManagersJournal.com."

"No single company sells Linux. Because it's open source software, anyone can package Linux with some programs and utilities and distribute it. The different 'flavors' of Linux are called 'distributions.' "

2. In addition to basic info, there were some case studies mentioned that seemed to carry potential political and social implications in terms of effect of the Linux-based distro class already, not to mention enormous potential improvements of efficiency in communication whch can ideally foster intimacy in the connections. These were mentioned in the Feature Articles on Linux.com, and seem to address the positive attitudes and shifts in attitude in favor of open source software (OSS). Echoditto.com, a site that builds online communities for social networking that support many political causes using open source codes, is one recent feature article among many at this site.

3. Lawrence Lessig, a Stanford law professor and noted expert on the intellectual rights/property debate in new media,, maintains a blog as well as a wiki for people to discuss his thoughts. This review on The Keen Reader addresses some commonly held beliefs about wikis and OSS, mainly, this article disputes Keen's point that the internet is edited by "amateurs" and that Wikipedia is bad, plainly speaking. This is a great rebuttal to Keen's weakly constructed argument from his book The Cult of the AmateurL How the Internet is Killing Our Culture



now on to the main point:

is Linux a Democracy??

Linux distributions to my understanding are open source programs, meaning the code behind the program is accessible and that others may write in updates to the program and create later versions or other programs entirley. The entire system of Linux Distributions are considered "copyleft," that is they must remain open source in all later versions. A program that is modified or based on a program that has been copylefted may not later be copyrighted, according to this copyleft definition.

So on the assumption that the preceding is correct, my next question is about the population of Linux users and prgrammers., is the commmunity that uses linux based distributions the same as the community that modifies the distributions? If the groups are totally different, that is, the users and the creators, and there is no shared community between the two (community here being used in the sense of a virtual commmunity), then perhaps the system is meritocratic or oligarchic.


But If these groups belong to the same general virtual community or there are significant overlaps between the two groups, it would imply that the people who use Linux based programs overlap with the be the people who modify them. and that could imply that the entire communitiy is ruled together by the programmers, if one looks at Lessig's argument that in cyberspace, code is law. However the knowledge of these alternate open source programs//operating systems/etc require an interest and/or not technical profiency in computers on the part of the user; so, how much does the user of a linux distro relate to the creators of said distro? does the OSS enhance community between the creaters and the users of Linux distributions ? i wonder if it is parallel to Plato's theory of presented by Socrates in The Replublic, where the citizens of the democracy were divided into categories based on natural strengths and abilites, and those who were deemed capable as rulers (as opposed to farmers for example) were permitted to make or help make laws (this was considered justice according to Plato). nIf you compare this to a Linux distro, are the programmers the "rulers" and the artists or others who use the copyylefted programs simply not members of the rulers and members of a different category of citizens? or are they all creators and "rulers"? or are the communities of users and codewriters totally unreleated?

Also, I am curious about the interaction between the Copyleft movement and the Intellectual Property Rights movement/. Which is better? Does this depend on whether we are workin in a capitalist society or would this type of debate also exist in noncapitalist countries? What role does development have on a government's ability to enforce laws on cyberspace? (According to Lessig, not much....from whan I can recall anyhow. Read CODE AND OTHER LAWS OF CYBERSAPCE for the defininite breakdown.)