Pretty soon everything will be software-as-a-service, and can't be reverse engineered. They may even be able to detect attempts to reverse engineer and stop you.
Software might mean the complete destruction of private property as a concept.
> "Software might mean the complete destruction of private property as a concept."
I can see an argument made for removal of the concept of intellectual property as something that's legally protected. It sounds like you're wanting to say something stronger. What's the step into the material world?
This is already a serious problem. Look at the complaints against companies like John Deere. Once something is software controlled, you have a physical product with all the horrible things that are done in the software world, including draconian EULAs (enforceable or not) and patents on algorithms and basic math.
Sure, I can see how an argument could be made there. There's a lot of material goods that don't have software. Real estate, houses, food, just glancing around the room there are many things that don't incorporate software. How do you see these no longer being considered private property?
Well, deed restrictions (and property taxes) make it so that pretty much anything you can imagine can be "restricted" as you voluntarily enter into the agreement upon "purchase" of the property...
Its not much of a stretch to imagine common security/networking/etc type clauses in those restrictions as in many cases condo's sold in the US basically have similar situations where you agree to adhere to building wide decisions (on say which ISP services the building).
Then the servicing company comes along and starts to behave like John Deere and starts prescribing what TV/pc/whatever they will inter-operate with.
As you point out, there are already some limitations placed on other forms of private property. I don’t find this argument quite as compelling, at least with respect to the original premise of software destroying the concept of private property. There are restrictions which are independent and precede software, so one could suppose that software is currently the last vestiges of private property and SaaS and the like will finally complete the destruction of the concept of private property, but I’m not sure this has much weight with a lot of (or even most) people.
There are those who would argue that current encumberances have already destroyed private property; I think most people don’t find this to be the case, at least to the point of completely destroying it. We accept limits on freedoms and rights because we understand they need to be balanced with respect to one another. As absolutes they’re ultimately incompatible. Though this is now tending towards general ideology, so I’ll stop right here.
Software might mean the complete destruction of private property as a concept.