It is not difficult for Sistertech to take sides in ongoing disputes about open source software. Indeed, she must take sides for she finds it unconscionable that any true believer could make their sisters and brothers pay for that which should be free. The Document is clear. There are innumerable citations Sistertech could give. For instance, I Cor. 2:12:
Now we have received not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit who is from God, that we might understand the things freely given us by God.
Name me one thing you have that is not such a gift? Why your very life is a gift. But more to the point, ask yourself this: Is not your mind a gift from The One In Charge? The very least one should do is to admit that your intellectual work products , the ones which are good for you and useful to you and to others, are only “yours” because your mind and its magnificent abilities have been given to your freely, again I say, freely, by The One In Charge. (That pesky “problem of evil” bug, is outside of Sistertech’s area of expertise. You’ll have to check with the folks in the Theology and Philosophy Division on reconciling the goodness of the gifts from The One In Charge and the source of the harmful work product you come up with.)
Or I Cor. 9:17-18:
For if I do this of my own will, I have a reward, but not of my own will, I am still entrusted with a stewardship.
What then is my reward? That in my preaching I may present the gospel free of charge, so as not to make full use of my right in the gospel.
If the greatest “content” in the history of the cosmos was freely given, who are you to charge for your “content”?
And one may go back to Ps. 112:9 for evidence of the blessing that ensues when one gives freely:
He has distributed freely; he has given to the poor;
his righteousness endures forever;
his horn is exalted in honor.
And the proverbial (no pun intended) statement from Proverbs 11:24:
One gives freely, yet grows all the richer;
another withholds what he should give, and only suffers want.
Yes, The Document is clear, my friends. Open source and geekiness are most definitely next to holiness.