>>In fact, what could be more evil?
>>it's nothing short of mental genocide.
>
>Really? Spending hundreds of hours organizing a conference so people can get together, have fun, make or renew friendships, and learn something is evil and mental genocide? I guess I must be the VFP equivalent of Hitler then. Perhaps I should be sent to prison for my crimes with the other evil people: child molesters, murderers, rapists, etc.
>
>Rick, you really have lost it (or perhaps never had it).
>
>Doug


Doug, this morning someone asked me to summarize my philosophy on Visual FreePro and the Liberty Software Foundation. This was my reply. I offer it here for perspective and (perhaps) education:

Visual FreePro is my attempt to offer unto the world a software development platform and vehicle (Liberty Software Foundation) that's flipped over from the traditional models of protecting intellectual property. And not just by offering up source code, but throughout the entire Visual FreePro VXB++ (xbase) software design, including its new virtual machine and the RXML file structure (like XML, but also includes binary data).

Visual FreePro has as its focus: sharing one's work, exposing all aspects of the software written within (and not just via raw source code, but also in the executable), allowing others to receive and build atop your work, and the work of others, thereby creating a tightly knit community of Visual FreePro software developers where the central purpose is to help each other to write better software by using the wide expertise of the various Visual FreePro developers who have taken the time to develop and debug the hard parts, making those solutions then available to everyone as new base components of input (with or without source code) so the many others who possibly don't have the skills to author those features can still use them (because they now more or less become simple tools available to wield).

In short:
The Liberty Software Foundation and the Visual FreePro project, these are my attempts as a Christian to bring Christianity into software. It's a practical application in software of loving your neighbor from a desire to share and help and grow them up, along with yourself, and that desire being exceedingly beyond any personal desires to have a fat wallet by hoarding and shutting people out as is seen in the business-centric models. Visual FreePro aims to help everyone grow in talents, abilities, produced products, and not in money.

Visual FreePro was fundamentally designed to help people everywhere grow in the areas of software development. And the Liberty Software Foundation's aim is to be an enabling vehicle where other developers who share similar beliefs can come and offer their wares to the masses likewise. There is a planned donation mechanism which allows everything Liberty Software Foundation releases to be completely free of charge (source code, runtime executables, documentation), free to give to your neighbors, friends, everyone at work, etc. And in this way we are giving our skills and talents out to the masses, for everyone to receive and download. And through the donation mechanism, we allow those who have an internal desire to give back to also do so. And in this way, everyone is giving, and no one is demanding, and no one is taking. What we (LibSF software developers) offer up is available free to all, regardless of whether or not they give anything back. And as Christians we are taught that it is a blessing to be a blessing, so that even if we do not receive donations, we are still receiving gain because of the growth and use of our products helping so many people.