Businessweek Recommends License Switch for Linux 548
MadFarmAnimalz writes "BusinessWeek has an article about the perceived threat of patents to linux, citing the SCO case, the opening of OSRM, and the Munich situation as evidence for the veracity of their conclusion that Linux isn't safe. Their solution? Relicense to the BSD license or the Mozilla license. On a positive note, the article's author does link to RMS' article Why Software Should Not Have Owners; good to see Stallman being quoted and linked to in a publication Like BusinessWeek."
No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
The licenses mentioned (patent clauses in GPL acknoweldged) deal with copyright and not patents which although people easily confuse are completely different legal areas.
In other news.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Less incentive to develop (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:1, Insightful)
btw, ask why *BSD developers "slave away" at developing these OSs.
All your software are belong to us! (Score:5, Insightful)
But how would changing licenses help? (Score:3, Insightful)
Changing licenses won't prevent the use of litigation to suppress open source tools which do the same things as commercial products.
Not even an article (Score:5, Insightful)
Microsoft should switch to the GPL.
Hey, someone submit this to Slashdot. Here's an idea for the text. "Slashdot has an article suggesting Microsoft should switch to the GPL."
Why don't they mention FreeBSD, OpenBSD, etc? (Score:5, Insightful)
Or is it simply because they've never heard of it due to lack of marketing?
No can do! (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, then the BSD licensed stuff would be copied back into the GPL'd fork, as is allowed.
Result - A full-featured GPL'd version, and a non-GPL'd version without all the features that it can't include as it would be a violation of the GPL.
In other words, why bother? It ain't broke - don't try to "fix" it.
Logistics (Score:4, Insightful)
Sounds like a headache and a half to me.
idiot (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:1, Insightful)
And the freeddom to use the code in closed commercial applications makes it *even more free* than restricting it to only other open source projets.
Re:So let me get this straight... (Score:5, Insightful)
James
Lamest.... article.... ever.... (Score:5, Insightful)
and in light that this author decided to publish an outdated article - he continues to talk about how IBM is being sued for copyright infringement, while the hunter is now the hunted in the SCO vs IBM case with IBM arguing (very well) for partial summary judgement that IBM is 100% in the clear on Linux while its SCO who is now clearly in violation of copyright law...
but mostly because his very first premise is utterly false - "How does software owned by everyone and by no one survive in a world where copyrights and patents shape the legal landscape?"..
this article is lame...
Dear Mr. Wildstrom.
The GPL has NOTHING to do with your precious IP or ownership of software. The GPL is ONLY about two simple things - distribution and use. Just like EVERY SINGLE OTHER software license.
It is obvious you do not understand this. I suggest you read the two [groklaw.net] latest [groklaw.net] court documents from IBM, who are doing two things you claim the GPL does not allow...
1. claiming ownership of their GPL licensed software and
2. are asking the courts to prevent a copyright infringer from reditributing their software without their permission.
The easiest way to understand how the GPL works and why it works is to read those court documents - because its heart is exactly what the GPL is about - controlled distribution of owned software by the copyright holder.
As my history teacher was fond of saying to the kids that wrote their papers the night before as they watched The A-Team - "please grasp the concept, then rewrite your paper".
Bad understanding of the GPL (Score:2, Insightful)
The GPL is actually very clear - derivative works of a GPL licensed work must also be GPL, otherwise you have no license to redistribute. It hasn't gone to court because if you claim the GPL is invalid, and redistribute something, then you are guilty of copyright infringement.
"Some people argue that the GPL as a whole isn't even enforceable.... "
Thats correct, it isn't, since the GPL only grants you rights. How can you enforce a license has no restrictions but only grants users redistribution rights that they otherwise wouldn't have?! Copyright law, however, is enforceable.
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:5, Insightful)
it may be true for a minority of people who want to kill, but it means that EVERYONE loses the "freedom" to feel secure against random deadly attack.
taking it further, the most free society is one with no laws whatsoever, but in such a society freedoms can be easily lost.
the GPL is like "Civilisation for Software" - it may mean you lose some freedoms, but in return the freedoms it gives are protected.
Re:hail (Score:2, Insightful)
The GPL Ver. 2 is great and works today; but we always need to ask ourselves if it is ready for tomorrow. Maybe we'll need to migrate to a version 3, or maybe we'll need to migrate to BSD. The point of this article, IMHO, is that we need to keep questioning whether the GPL is still working for us.
(posting as AC to protect my karma)
Defeating the point of Linux (Score:4, Insightful)
The logical complications of changing the license to BSD would be a nightmare. Individual committers could file suit against FSF, or whoever might "own" the newly licensed code, to get a court order for their code to be removed if it's not licensed under the GPL.
Of course, somebody else could just fork Linux under the GPL again.
Re:Leave me alone (Score:2, Insightful)
It doesn't work like that. I think it takes a silver bullet or something.
In any case the article evinces the same basic flaw in perception that we see over and over again, no matter how many times you explain it to them they will persist in thinking of Linux as a product.
Not to mention the fact that they rarely even know what the hell they're talking about, e.g. the statement that SCO acquired the UNIX trademark. When you see uninformed shit like that in an article you know that the article is, well, uninformed.
Move along, nothing to see here but media hack.
KFG
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
The real beauty of the GPL is that it encourages collaboration and sharing with the side effect that forking is discouraged. GNU/Linux is becoming the commodity OS precisely because of the GPL.
GPL affects patents issues (Score:2, Insightful)
If Linux is still not sold as commercial software, patents should not be an issue. Copyrights affect free and commercial software; however, patents only affect commercial software. Some business-people must have got their confusion when businesses like Red Hat, Debian, Yellow Dog, and more started to package Linux with commercial software and distributed it; it looked like commercial software. The GPL avoids patent issues, but that confusion makes it an issue. Some businesses want to find excuses that makes it an issue that their patents are valid in non-commercial software.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Switching from the GPL to BSD or another license would actually reduce the protection. It doesn't provide any incentive to license the patents for all users. Who do you think is going to develop all of this software if only big companies are able to distribute it legally? We'd be back to proprietary software and proprietary licensing.
Bruce
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:3, Insightful)
It's only "*even more free*" in the short term. As soon as some punk improves it and closes the source the whole thing becomes much less free.
Which I imagine would be particularly irritating if they took something you'd written, added a function that you really wanted but didn't have the time / ability to code, and then deprived you of the right to use their modifications of *your* work without paying them a fee.
Stem
Simple BSD allows rape (Score:4, Insightful)
The BSD license allows you to use the code without ever having to give back. Exactly the way business uses it.
The only thing you need to know about BSD is that Microsoft favours it.
Re:Leave me alone (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sorry if our licenses arn't corporate friendly.
Re:GPL affects patents issues (Score:5, Insightful)
Sorry, but this is not the case. In the U.S., patents even effect use. Use is clearly given by the law as one of the acts for which the patent holder can bring suit. You are liable for patent infringement by software that you write and use privately in your own home.
Yes, it's a broken system. We have to fix the law.
Bruce
This is a very poor article (Score:3, Insightful)
Secondly, the author argues in favor for the BSD or the MPL licenses as it would clear up ambiguities and be less restrictive. Obviously, he doesn't say how. If he did then the statement would make no sense. Again a non-biased person would question how exactly they would benefit from switching their software to those licenses. The truth of the matter that the author neglects to mention is that it doesn't. It does benefit business that would like to use the code for free. The aspect/goal being to not submit any changes to the benefit of the community that provided said company with the code in the first place. Seeing as this is Business Week I concede to that view point.
The article in and of itself is a horrible piece of advice for business especially the nimble startups. I love Linux and Open-Source but I love money more. This article advice would do nothing to further your business or protect you at all. Even after all of this I'm not biased. If Microsoft could provide what open-source did even at a small fee I would pay. This isn't the case and for small to medium companies it just doesn't make sense. Also, if I was a software shop and could use some open-source to further my business for more money I would.
I could play into that whole "I'll sue you because you're violating my patent" but then I would of probably paid SCO a $699 license fee and or bought Microsoft software. Still, my risk is the same. So if this is about Business; then Business Week and the author of the article have done a poor job in telling me how exactly to save or make money. There are too many cases of people/companies profiting off of free software than not. Simply, someone who is non-biased and comes across this article has been disserviced.
If someone starts a magazine company that provided useful Business information with NO bias I'll subscribe.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
There'd be no Linux at all.
Same old story... Come late to the party, then know all about how it's done.
Privatization wet dream (Score:5, Insightful)
Instead, Businessweek, being what they are, is in the business of fantasizing about free giveaways to large companies. Sort of the Enron model of capitalism. What could Businessweek readers like more than a massive donation of free programming efforts into the private coffers of big business? Well, I suppose they like massive corporate welfare even more (the Haliburton model); but they'd certainly be happy to accept the free money of "privatized" Free Software.
The patent issue is OF COURSE completely irrelevant here. Or maybe BSD-licensed software would be slightly more vulnerable to patent suits. But the difference is small, in any case. The main patent danger is big companies spending a lot more on lawyers than Free Software developers possibly can--and quite independent of the "merits" of patent claims, getting injunctions against Free Software.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Say you wanted a different version of Linux that did something differently. So you make the changes, however much they are and you donate them back to Linux.
But the Linus doesn't have to accept those changes. Or he can pick and choose which portions he thinks are good.
But since you donated your modifications back, you are free to use those modifications to release your own version.
In a manner of speaking, there already is a fork of Linux. Except it's a fork that is built into the current release instead of a completely separate fork. I'm talking, of course, about SELinux from the NSA.
What switching to the BSD license would really encourage is everyone else, for example, Microsoft, to be free to use the code for their own commercial purposes.
By switching to the BSD license, Microsoft could release their own closed and proprietary version of Linux. For example, they could use the Linux code to enhance Windows and make it able to run any and all Linux programs available.
Re:No protection (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:All your software are belong to us! (Score:5, Insightful)
In this world, if you get something for free (as in beer), you should be able to do anything you want with it. They can't understand the idea of nonmonetary compensation. The idea of, "You can use it, but if you try to do anything else with it you have to let us use your version, too." comes across as some sort of wacky bait-and-switch. The whole thing gets broken into two parts:
1. It's yours. Take it.
2. No, wait, WE WANT YOUR SOUL! SOUUUULLLS! RARRRRRRRRR!
(Of courrse, it doesn't help that MySQL AB really does try to do the above.)
I'm sure it's frightening for lots of business folks. They don't like it when they can't pretend to understand what's going on.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Assuming the company is distributing its open source derived software, the GPL requires public disclosure of the original open source software and any derivations, which would give patent holders evidence of infringement.
The BSD license, however, lets the company distribute their product without acknowledging any open source content. They can keep all their code secret. This places a greater burden on the patent holder to prove that a patent is being infringed at all.
I think this is the "protection" the article refers to.
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:5, Insightful)
It's actually a very different, very critical point: if there were no GPL, Red Hat, Novell, and others could very well release their own binary-only kernels/utilities and the Linux world would fragment like the Unix world. It's the GPL that's holding the Linux community together.
For instance, say that SuSE gets 90% of the Linux "marketshare." They then start introducing changes in the kernel and standard software stack which other vendors (hardware/software) rely on, due to their market dominance (sound familiar?). However, we note that, in order to be Linux and use the Linux kernel/software stack, they must release the changes back to the world under the GPL. Thus, Red Hat, Gentoo, Debian, and others all can stay 100% compatible with SuSE despite SuSE setting the de facto Standard. If SuSE comes up with Licensing 6.0 and tries to coerce their users into it, the users have much less of a barrier to switching away to other Linux distros because of this compatibility! Thus SuSE's power is checked despite monopoly position.
Now, there is fragmentation in the Linux community due to different distros relying on different software, and having slightly different systems and configurations. This can be mitigated, however, by following the Linux Standard Base, and we must encourage our distros to follow the standard and work to develop the standard to prevent this fragmentation. It should be a fairly easy problem to fix, of a much different order than the problem with the binary unix compatibility fragmentation.
ABSOLUTELY CANNOT SWITCH TO BSD LICENSE (Score:4, Insightful)
I think the BSD license if just fine. That isn't the issue. The issue is that in order to relicense the kernel under BSD, so much code which could not be relicensed would have to be ripped out that you would not have a kernel left.
So, while I can't say whether or not, generally speaking, the suggestion to switch licenses is an unwise one, I can definately say that it's a totally ignorant suggestion. Saying "relicense linux" is like saying "delete linux".
Re:All your software are belong to us! (Score:3, Insightful)
And of course:
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
As opposed to what, picking a development model that forces distributions to fork? 2.6 is the active development kernel, and distributions are now responsible for putting together a stable kernel.
This will cause more situations similar to what Red Hat has done with their heavily customized 2.4 kernel. Distributions will have their own heavily patched kernels that can no longer be easily migrated to the current vanilla versions. There are several distributions with the resources to do this by themselves, and the smaller ones will probably band together to do it as well. If that's not a fork, it's the closest thing to it and will probably lead to a fork in the future.
It's not the BSD license that encourages forks. There were (are) two factors:
-Commerical forks can get specs on hardware that open source ones can't. Since they can't give the code of the driver back to the community, they must fork.
-The BSDs (not the license, but the OSes) are designed as complete operating systems, with a userspace and a kernel in one package. This encourages forking because it's less modular than Linux.
It's not the licenses that do it, it's the unique position the BSDs are in. There are BSD licensed projects which do not fork, such as Python, which uses a license similar to BSD. By similar, I mean it explicitly says you can fork, keep the code secret, and sell the results. Python hasn't forked because there's no motivation for people to do it.
Re:Not even an article (Score:3, Insightful)
Not the most likely thing to happen, but still a lot more likely than Linux switching to a BSD license. Don't forget that for Linux to switch license, every single contributor must agree. One person already said he wouldn't accept it. Neither will I. The code I have contributed so far is only a few lines, but I'm sure enough people will disagree with this suggestion, that if you remove all the code we have contributed, what remains will not be a working kernel.
Besides, I don't see how the license could have any influence on patent issues. No agreement between author and end user can remove your obligation towards a third party patent owner.
Re:Despite this, BSD is still here. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Simple BSD allows rape (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Less incentive to develop (Score:5, Insightful)
This whole thread seems based on the premise that you actually could, in some way, relicense Linux under the BSD license. This isn't as easy as you might think.
Relicensing checklist:
It's widely considered that even Linus Himself could not push through a license change. No need to worry about a corporation doing it.
If you want something under the BSD license, you might want to use BSD.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
As opposed to buying forked software (say Mac OS X) and then having to wait for the developer to fix bugs in the portions of code that are binary only.
In other words, the help is not in prevention of forks, but rather in making it easy to merge them back.
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
James
My favorite line (Score:5, Insightful)
Hardly a model of clarity? It's one of the few license agreements that IANAL can understand without legal help!
Here's another precious quote:
Where "some people" == "Darl McBride", apparently.
Sean
Re:Simple BSD allows rape (Score:5, Insightful)
I write just about everything under a 3-clause BSD license. Do you know why? Because when I write something and give it away, it's really free to do whatever you want with (except of course claim it's your own).
While some people think it's "rape", there are many of us who write code, that picked a BSD license because we want anybody to be able to use our code without restrictions other than claiming it's their own. So software can be a true gift without any "strings" attached. So it isn't "rape".
Just the opinion of a programmer who writes BSD-licensed software...
Re:No protection (Score:1, Insightful)
No, we like to get money from Microsoft so that we can take part of their agenda.
Regards,
Joe Goebels
PR BusinessWeek
Re:Privatization wet dream (Score:5, Insightful)
I wrote a rebuttal to this on a mailing list (Score:5, Insightful)
Linux is burdened with too much intellectual-property uncertainty for
many companies to embrace and develop it further
This entire column is complete bollocks as I will now explain. (FLOSS = Free Libre and Open Source Software - remember folks, brush and FLOSS
daily!)
The open-source movement has had a remarkable run of success that has seen software such as the Linux operating system and the Apache Web server emerge as major challenges to Microsoft (MSFT ). However, the movement is now facing a crisis. At its heart is a question that has been around from the very beginning: How does software owned by
everyone and by no one survive in a world where copyrights and patents shape the legal landscape?
The same way it's always done - by being more reliable, more agile, better maintained and better supported. I'm also not sure how the author thinks that open source is not copyrighted - all of it is by definition.
then owned by AT&T. Intellectual-property questions about Linux came to the forefront after the SCO Group (SCOX ), which acquired the Unix
trademarks, launched a series of lawsuits against alleged infringers of its rights.
Incorrect - SCO does NOT own the trademarks to Unix.
POTENTIAL INFRINGEMENTS. The central case, a 2003 suit against IBM (IBM ), an important corporate promoter of Linux, has degenerated into
a messy contract dispute with no intellectual-property issues left on the table. SCO's threats to sue companies that use Linux have almost entirely evaporated.
Because they were and are lies. But the author is mistaken. There are "intellectual property" issues aplenty left on the table. IP - which is a lazy and meaningless term that conglomerates at least three kinds of entirely different sets of laws on intangible rights - is going to bite SCO severely because IBM is now suing it for distributing Linux without a license.
But now another problem has surfaced. Open Source Risk Management, a new outfit that indemnifies its customers against infringement claims, found in a review of Linux code that the operating system potentially infringes on 283 patents. Although IBM declared it would make no
effort to enforce its 60 patents involved, some are held by Linux foes, including 27 by Microsoft.
Patents granted in its infinite stupidity by the US patent office. Maths should not be patented.
The potential patent infringements pose no immediate threat to Linux. Such disputes typically take years to resolve, and courts rarely issue
injunctions against alleged infringers. But the uncertainty is taking a toll. In the most significant response to date, the city government
in Munich, Germany, has suspended a massive transition of desktop computers from Microsoft Windows to Linux, pending clarification of
the patent situation (see BW Online, 8/9/04, "Will Legal Fears Freeze the Penguin?").
Munich is going ahead.
But open-source proponents also have to get their own intellectual-property house in order.
Again - what is meant by intellectual property here? Does he mean copyrights? All FLOSS is copyrighted. Does he mean trademarked? The
brands that matter are trademarked. Does he mean patented? Sorry but the vast majority of FLOSS developers don't really care whether the US
allows the patenting of maths or not. If he's talking about "ownership" then he's wrong. As the SCO episode demonstrated, every single line of Linux can be accounted for - unlike many closed-source vendors.
The development of open-source software is increasingly dominated by corporate interests that, one way or another, want to use Linux,
Apache, and other open-source products to make money.
No - it's the other way around. Businesses have to decide why and how they are going to use open source software to survive. Plenty already have decided to use it to make money and give b
Re:And of course... (Score:5, Insightful)
James
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
wrong problem, wrong solution (Score:3, Insightful)
A step in the wrong direction (Score:3, Insightful)
All of the examples cited by businessweek are problems which come up because Linux represents a new way of doing things where the abuse of the copyrights and patents system is the problemn. Linux remains a growing and evolving product because it IS under the GPL license and not the BSD/Mozilla/etc licenses.
Companies want to think in terms of: "If we know something the competitors don't, we have an advantage. Let's screw our competitors and make all the money ourselves." That kind of thinking goes against the idea of OpenSource and the GPL due to the requirement to make source available in the event that the original source is modified.
Linksys tried to pull that stunt when they first started and faced a backlash. Companies see this backlash, this reversal of the command chain where the customers are telling them what they can and cannot be doing to be a threat and a risk.
The GPL code is what keeps Linux open and free for all to enjoy. If the licensed changed, then you will begin to see variants of the Linux Kernel which only one company supported because it was modified to work in a certain way. No review of that kernel is possible anymore because the code is locked and the customer is now, once again, at the mercy of the company for patches, security updates, and fixes.
I'm sure that businessweek and the respective folk who think it is the way to go think that way in all honesty believing it will make Linux better... but this is only because this makes it better for them and them alone.
The GPL license under which Linux is licensed is the solution to the current problem with Copyrights and Patents abuse by large companies in not honouring the spirit of the Copyright and Patents agreements: The eventual release of the rights to the public domain.
Linux is available to both businesses and the public, but is maintained and controlled by the Open Source community AND the Business community. Perhaps _some_ businesses don't like that kind of shared control...
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
I still don't see a problem. The original code would still be free. Just because Microsoft releases a proprietary version of a free OS doesn't mean anyone is obligated to use it. Anyway, that's essentially what Apple did with BSD, built a proprietary OS on top of an open source infrastructure. In the main, I'd say both Apple and BSD benefited from the arrangement. And if you don't like Apple's extensions, generic BSD is still available.
They already did that with the TCP stack from what I understand. They incorporated the BSD stack in their code and their use of it is not open at all.
So they did, and they were perfectly entitled to. So what damage accrued to BSD or TCP users as a consequence?
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
Market position and monopoly play a more important role here. Microsoft would happily take Linux and then patent all competing distros out of existence.
In the main, I'd say both Apple and BSD benefited from the arrangement
It's clear that Apple kept their head above water but I'm not so sure that BSD was affected one way or another. BSD won its free pass when AT&T was sent packing.
The GPL is like garlic. (Score:4, Insightful)
Many would surely like the GPL to be lifted so they could steal all the code and then make the authors pay for their own (then incompatible) code!
The reason i dont like the BSD license is that i would have a hard time coughing up dough to buy a product i had a part in and that the one who took the code made incompatible with my original code, deliberatly! I dont like its "please rimjob me twice" kind of message.
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
If MBA's had been involved in Linux from the beginning, there'd be nothing to discuss. There'd be no Linux at all.
Same old story with the suits. They like to pretentiously spew so much bullshit from their gullets, like they know what they're doing in this boardroom pissing contest, that someone needs to follow them around with a shovel. They're the same suckers that automatically write checks as pavlovian responses to software obfuscatedly described with catch phrases like "scalable", "robust", and "e-commerce", and think they know better about what software to implement than the IT personnel. Lay off a huge chunk of the workforce, prematurely quit when the company is worse off than when they got involved, yet still get that seven-digit golden hand job as part of their contract. I bet Businessweek thought Enron was a good idea.
Re:ABSOLUTELY CANNOT SWITCH TO BSD LICENSE (Score:3, Insightful)
"This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, OR (at your option) ANY LATER VERSION"
If another later version of the GPL was published and used, which was more in-line with the BSD license, would the desired effect not be possible?
Re:No protection (Score:5, Insightful)
Then you have blinders on.
The problem isn't that the original code is free, or isn't free, or that MS's version is or isn't free. The problem is that THERE IS A FORK THAT WILL NEVER BE ALLOWED TO MERGE BACK.
A major point of Free software is to reduce the amount of wheel reinvention. Everybody gets to see and use everybody else's code. BSD-to-commercial forks provide a major impediment to that.
So what damage accrued to BSD or TCP users as a consequence?
MS TCP-users were not able to take advantage of the advances to the BSD stack, and are now stuck with a crippled version. This is the whole point.
Re:All your examples are OK w/ GPL (Score:3, Insightful)
Of cause they can all use GPL code too, so what. Does that make the BSD license evil? Not a bit, BSD code is also free, is also written by open source hackers. Tell me again why BSD code is evil, and this time back it up with reasoned well thought out arguments if you can. Or is it that you only recognise one style of freedom, automatically condemning anyone who doesn't share your world view?
And how exactly are they supposed to support your accusation? BSD is attacked equally in two of those documents, and completely ignored in the rest. Have you actually bothered reading them yourself?
Fact: GPL is not evil
Fact: BSD is not evil
Get over it!
The debate in a nutshell (Score:2, Insightful)
A) People who do not code, or whose code consists of a single buggy PHP module done last weekend, claim that the BSD license is a "license to rape, pillage, and steal."
B) People who actually code for a living will say "use the license you want, and I'll use the license I want."
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
Believe me, none of these guys have a national allegiance worth mentioning. How do you think all these Corps are governed by Bermuda and Costa Rica, anyway? Of course, shareholders (you and me) are part of the problem, too. Gotta have a return on our own investments, and won't stand for anything that works towards the long-term economic health of the nation, if it affects dividends or short-term pricing.
Re:hmmm, that's cruel (Score:3, Insightful)
A library is simply a convenient way to reuse code by having a set of functions that can be called from other separate programs. If you don't want to agree to the stipulations of the GPL, you're free to write your own library. Your last statement doesn't even make sense. No one forced the library author to write his library in the first place; without it, the application writer would have to do it from scratch. Again, if you don't agree to the license terms, you're free to find another solution.
Lastly, you obviously didn't read the parent post I replied to. He stated that the GPL shouldn't be used at all because it's "too greedy", and that the LGPL should be used in its place for everything, not just libraries.
Re:And of course... (Score:3, Insightful)
Each licence has its own strengths. I think the GPL is a better licence to have in a competitive marketplace, because it can better defend against companies with unethical tactics. The BSD style licences are better suited to well-developed technology, where technical excellence is the main consideration, and competitive posturing is minimized.
Re:No protection (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:No protection (Score:2, Insightful)
For the umpteenth time, what stops them from re-implementing Kerberos as closed source software, and doing the same thing now? The GPL only prevents someone from using the actual code. It doesn't prevent anyone from re-implementing an idea as a closed source program. That's entirely outside of the scope of either GPL or BSD.
Re:Bruce - You made his point. (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, I think you are missing something. The court found that the univeristy work was infringing because it obliquely served a commercial purpose of the university such as attracting students. There didn't have to be a direct relationship and the non-profit status was held to be immaterial.
Analogously, as somebody who has upon occassion worked as a programmer, my private programming at home could arguably serve the purpose of increasing my experience, and thus my value as a programmer. Thus it would not necessarily be protected.
Indeed, if you read this report it says there is no educational use exception. It's not an exception for curiousity unless it's idle curiousity, entertainment, or (get this) philosophical inquiry. Note that philosophical inquiry used to include scientific inquiry, but the court certainly does not mean that in this case or they would have ruled otherwise!
Note also that the original comment in this thread is regarding Free Software and whether it is non-commercial for purposes of patent law and thus can infringe with impunity. The problem is that we can not make a case that Free Software is not intended for commercial use. Indeed, in writing the Open Source Definition, I very specificaly required that the licenses make commercial use possible. If asked to testify, I'd have to say that.
Thanks
Bruce
Re:No protection (Score:3, Insightful)
MBA's are not busu=iness experts. UI folks are engaged in a behavioral science, with blind-studies and metrics. MBA's saw the "Internet phenomenon", and with their "expertise" created the dot-com bubble.