Being Blind to Majority of the Software on the Internet

I wonder how much of this discrepancy is driven by the motive of the person writing such software. I remember how amazingly crappy the Roxio CD burning software was, mostly it was tool to sell labelling supplies and CDR blanks. Pretty much all the open source I've used was written by someone who really wanted to write it rather than achieve some alternative objective by making it available.

I can agree wholeheartedly. At this point, if software is freeware, I don't see as reason as to why it shouldn't be open source in this day and age. While there are probably numerous reasons, it's certainly created a mindset of suspicion, regardless of how valid that suspicion is.

There are a fair amount of things that are better when they're not free. I remember spending a half hour or so wading through free credit report offers online to find one I could pay fifteen dollars for.<p>Why? In that case no one's doing it for fun do they have to be making money somewhere to pay for the ads. I'll take the devil I know over the devil I don't.<p>With open source you know why it's free - the least altruistic possibility is there's a user whose main motivation is solving the particular issue you have, and that it's open in the hopes that someone can improve it. With freeware, who knows.

I honestly can't think of one proprietray program I've paid for (and I have bought some expensive software) that exceeds the quality or reliability of the free, open source programs I use.<p>Sometimes I feel like I've been duped by every vendor I've paid for software. It sounds terrible to say that, but honestly the open source stuff just blows the commercial stuff away. Alas, open source is just not possible for all software needs; it only covers so much.

It's things like this which make me want to create a free, opensource, fully featured but well designed version of the various software programs I occasionally need to use. Something without gimmicks, easy to use, doesn't have a super-flashy interface.<p>Audials Tunebite and all the Roxio tools are a mess with all non-standard interface items. Do I click this to get a menu of options or is it a button? I can't tell! Is this element disabled or is it just not activated because my mouse isn't hovering on it? What is crash number 0x0000###? Why did it randomly close?<p>And then there is FileZilla. I like that software and encouraged its use at my employer. I've had ZERO trouble with the server and the client. But the interface could be a bit simpler, and a nice template packaging for corporate installs would be nice. Too many buttons, outdated buttons, and extra options are problematic. Anytime I see someone struggling with some other ftp client I always steer them towards FileZilla (since it is now company policy, thanks to me), but there are some things that could be cleaned up.<p>Unfortunately, I'm not a C programmer and I currently don't have the time or energy. Wife, puppy, condo -- you know the drill.

My theory is that there is a direct correlation between the quality of free software and the likelihood that developers directly or indirectly use the software for their work. The exception is utilities, but for non-dev business tools, commercial applications tend to be better than free software.

Open source software also means that you won't be trapped with some dead-end software when the developer goes out of business or changes their business model.