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I couldn't find the Apache 2.0 license on the FSF license list. The only "official" remark seems to be the following email thread which says:

Whether or not they are considered compatible by the FSF is an opinion only they can make, but given that a derivative work consisting of both Apache Licensed code and GPL code can be distributed under the GPL (according to *our* opinion), there really isn't anything to be discussed.

Maybe it was a bit premature to announce this license without waiting for OSI approval and requesting feedback from the FSF. Of course the Apache group can do whatever they want without asking for approval and blessing from other Open Source and Free Software groups. But it would have been nice to try to cooperate a bit more.

One million dollars split between 500,000 people is what??? TWO DOLLARS!!! Well, at least we'll be able to pay that annoying paper boy...

For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that you have.

You may charge a fee for the physical act of transferring a copy, and you may at your option offer warranty protection in exchange for a fee.

It sounds like your goal is to get them to respect your license. Approach them with firm honesty and you may get what you're looking for. If that doesn't work then YOU have whether you want to fight it with lawyers. The cheapest way out would be to assign your copyright to the FSF and let them (as the legal copyright holders) handle it.

Sorry but you're wrong. (scroll down two screens or so)

This has been the license for coming up to 2 years now.

I wonder what licence Microsoft uses when they buy FSF.

There are two circumstances in which a company can buy out a solvent company: 1. if the bought company agrees to the deal ("friendly takeover"), or 2. if the bought company is publicly held and the buying company has cash to burn ("hostile takeover"). The FSF is a 501(c)(3) charity, and it does not agree to being bought by Microsoft, SCO, Unisys, or any other large publisher of proprietary software. In fact, can charities be publicly held? And even if Microsoft were to take over FSF, it wouldn't be able to revoke the GNU General Public License that covers the copyrights on its already published software.

..but why should we bother arguing.. ..The only people who's problems are not solved are the big non-technical corporations - and they don't matter much

Governments don't matter much?

No government should pay a monopoly for black box proprietary software.

What about those two backdoor logins that were found in IIS a few years ago. They both had NSA in the usernames, which led people to speculate that they were added by order of the US govt. If I were in the US, I wouldn't be happy, but even moreso for non-US governments. Government should require complete source code and the four freedoms.

I respect RMS for his work and some of his views, but I think that his notion that only OSS is right contracdicts his beliefs. By saying everybody should shun non-FS he's limiting their freedom of choice is he not.

No, that's just silly. If I tell you that shouldn't spend so much time on Slashdot I'm not limiting your freedom of choice, I'm trying to convince you to change your viewpoint. RMS is just trying to spread his view point. If RMS is elected to government and starts passing laws forcing the use of Free Software, I'd agree with you, but not quite yet.

(And your statement that RMS's belief is "only OSS is right" suggests it time to re-read "Why 'Free Software' is better than 'Open Source'". RMS does not promote OSS and feels that OSS is a regrettable step backward.)

I have always seen FS/OSS as choice rather then a need. I introduce people to it and leave them to choose if they want to use it or not. I think the FS should promote Freedom of Choice when using software, and point out the advantages of choosing FS rather then promoting using only Free Software to promote freedom.

Perhaps you'll find the beliefs of the Open Source Initiative more in line with yours. This is a key reason that Free Software and Open Source Software are slightly different (if often allied) camps. The Free Software camp (to the extent you can point to such a beast) has always placed a high value on the morality of the situation.

If we use the FSF's mode of describing things as a point of reference, this is probably an open source project, but not a free one. If it were a software project, it would violate the very first of the freedoms the FSF considers essential (look here) in that it restricts who may use it for what purposes. Whether or not they can meaningfully impose that restriction is a separate issue.

the one thing that the FSF said made the original BSD license non-free was...

They have never said that the original BSD license was non-free. If you look here, you'll see that it is listed in the section titled, "The following licenses are free software licenses, but are not compatible with the GNU GPL."

The advertising clause of the original BSD license was just a bad idea. I think ultimately the Regents were persuaded to drop it, not because of pressure from the FSF and its supporters, but because of pressure from businesses (especially small businesses and consultants) who found the advertising clause unduly onerous. Giving credit where credit is due is one thing. Being required to list 50 names in a small classified ad is another.

Finally, the GPL does require that credit be given. Just not in advertising material. "You may copy and distribute...provided that you conspicuously and appropriately publish on each copy an appropriate copyright notice..."

Also more here

Just curious about this, but has anybody ever been sued for a GPL violation?
AFAIK, it's never gone to court.

If nobody ever gets in any trouble for using GPL code in a closed project, then isn't it reasonable to assume that it'll happen more often?
I'd have to assume it'd be a gamble for both sides... would you really want to be the first company to test out the GPL? And even if you won, is that really the kind of PR you want?

And who is supposed to hire the lawyers on behalf of a free project? And don't tell me FSF will just handle everybody's legal troubles pro-bono...
I believe they will, if you sign over the copyright:

"...only the copyright holders are empowered to act against violations. The FSF acts on all GPL violations reported on FSF copyrighted code, and we offer assistance to any other copyright holder who wishes to do the same."

And failing that, don't forget that a lot of companies have significant interest in GPL'd software (think IBM, Novell, etc). If the GPL really ever came into question, I imagine you'd see more than a few significant financial contributions from third parties.

Even if you do not alter the GPL'd source, you must provide the source when distributing binaries, or alternatively include a written offer to provide it on demand.

See item 3 of the terms and conditions. An exception is given for non-commercial distribution, but that doesn't apply here.

Robert J. Chassell was a founding Director and Treasurer of the Free Software Foundation. The FSF was founded to support the GNU Project which restarted the movement towards free software and open sources. The GNU/Linux operating system and associated applications are the outcome of these efforts by the Foundation. Chassell writes and edits. He is the author of An Introduction to Programming in Emacs Lisp, co-author of the "Texinfo" manual, and an editor of more than a dozen other books. He graduated from Cambridge University, in England. He flies his own airplane, enjoys astronomy, and has an abiding interest in social and economic history.

Chassell is especially good at introducing the concepts of free software to audiences who have little or no previous experience with the technology.

Chassell can address the following topics:

• He can explain how your legal rights to copy, study, modify, and redistribute software encourage people to work collaboratively and profitably.
• He can describe the way freedom shapes the technology of software to make it accessible and empowering for both programmers and users.
• He can discuss the various business models used by companies to make profits with free software, both in rich and poor countries.
• He can speak on the ethical implications of free and restricted software, and how to arrange matters such that acting in a cooperative and law abiding manner is without doubt the best action, for legal, moral, and practical reasons.
• He can walk an audience of lawyers, and others who enjoy legal discussion, through the GNU General Public License paragraph by paragraph, and compare that license with other, somewhat different licenses.
• From his own experience, he can describe the history of free software from its beginning in the GNU Project through the rise of the phrase "open source" to the present flowering of GNU/Linux.

Chassell speaks English, and has experience speaking to crowds for whom English is a second language.

Activities other than copying, distribution and modification are not covered by this License; they are outside its scope. The act of running the Program is not restricted, and the output from the Program is covered only if its contents constitute a work based on the Program (independent of having been made by running the Program). Whether that is true depends on what the Program does.

When developers talk about "using" source code, they usually mean 'using the source code in their own programs'. This is not the same as "using" the software, in the common interpretation.

The GPL promotes Free software development, because you are only allowed to create Free applications with it.

That's another GPL misconception. The GPL does not prevent anyone from selling GPL'd work:

program is free software if users have all of these freedoms. Thus, you should be free to redistribute copies, either with or without modifications, either gratis or charging a fee for distribution ...

In other texts, RMS explicitly encourages the sale of GPL'd code. The key point about putting work under the GPL is that those who distribute it (for no fee or for a price) cannot prevent the recipient from also selling or giving away copies.

"If any of this is true, I would hate to see SourceForge caught in the middle of something that could hurt them or its users."

SourceForge mention that their system is a good way to donate money to organisations such as the EFF.

It's worth noting however, that both the Free Software Foundation, and the Electronic Frontiers Foundation accept credit cards directly, without any sort of intermediary.

As for Debian, there's the Software in the Public Interest site, which is setup to handle donations to Debian, or to other Free Software projects.

If you have more time than money, consider the Help Wanted pages at SourceForge and Savannah (currently unavailable)

Here's another common myth... "You can't sell open-source software". Not true! In fact, the FSF encourages people who distribute free software to charge as much as they want.

Larry Lessig, Eldred counsel and all-around bad-ass, put aside his obligations for the morning on his visit to Japan to pen this response (typos retained for the grammar nerds):

More SCO fud, this time insulting the constitution

I apologize for the silence, but weve been in Japan this week announcing iCommons in Japan. (More on that soon). But after reading this extraordinary document by Darl McBride of SCO infamy, I could resist canceling this morning meetings to respond.

From the start of this pathetic lawsuit, Eben Moglen of the Free Software Foundation has argued that there was nothing behind the SCO claims. His arguments are persuasive. But if you want a clue of just how clueless this case is, consider the constitutional arguments made by SCO.

McBride's argument is grounded in the Constitution. (Well, close to the constitution. He quotes the text of the constitution to be:

Congress shall have Power [t]o promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, open-source advocates argue against copyright and patent laws, and whatever measures they take to by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

Actually, the framers didn't say anything about "open source advocates.")

As he rightly is argues, the Constitution requires that Congress only grant copyrights where those copyrights "promote the Progress of Science." Thus, if Congress granted copyrights in a context where they didn't "promote progress" one might well ask whether such a law was constitutional (e.g., a law that extended the terms of existing copyrights, but let's leave that aside for the moment).

But the key move in the McBride-FUD is his claim that proponents of free software and open source software are somehow against copyright.

He claims that "GPL is exactly opposite in its effect from the 'copyright' laws adopted by the US Congress and the European Union"; that "Red Hat has aggressively lobbied Congress to eliminate software patents and copyrights"; that "the issue is clear: do you support copyrights and ownership of intellectual property as envisioned by our elected officials in Congress and the European Union, or do you support "free" - as in free from ownership - intellectual property envisioned by the Free Software Foundation, Red Hat and others?"; that "SCO argues that the authority of Congress under the U.S. Constitution to "promote the Progress of Science and the useful arts" inherently includes a profit motive, and that protection for this profit motive includes a Constitutional dimension"; and that "We believe that the "progress of science" is best advanced by vigorously protecting the right of authors and inventors to earn a profit from their work."

Let's take each of these claims in turn:

"GPL is exactly opposite in its effect from the 'copyright' laws adopted by the US Congress and the European Union"

Despite RMS's aversion to the term, the GPL trades on a property right that the laws of the US and EU grant "authors" for their creative work. A property right means that the owner of the right has the right to do with his property whatever he wishes, consistent with the laws of the land. If he chooses to give his property away, that does not make it any less a property right. If he chooses to sell it for $1,000,000, that doesn't make it any less a property right. And if he chooses to license it on the condition that source code be made free, that doesn't make it

He (Mr. McBride) says the GPL is against the constitution. How?

He goes on to quote a case which from the text he is quoting appears to be about extending the time that copyright applies to an item that is copyrighted and when it falls into the public domain.

How does this case apply to the GPL which is at the end of the day a licence? I would contend that it has little or no relevance whatsoever to the case in hand.

If anyone's interested I found this site contains useful information about the case Mr. McBride quotes.

Of course, anyone who is enlightened knows that the GPL in summary states a) I own my work and I keep my copyright, b) you can copy my work freely, c) if you modify my work it's ok ... but most radically of all d) if you then want to distribute this modified work then you can, on the same terms i gave you the original work. Ok it's a bit more complex than that.. but you probably get the gist of it.

Mark.

The FSF Savannah server has been hacked. The statement indicates a similar attack vector as the exploit against the Debian systems. However, it had been hacked nearly a month ago and was not detected until December 1st. For those that are not familar with it, Savannah is the FSF version of Sourceforge, hosting both GNU and non-GNU Free Software projects. It has not yet been determined whether any of the projects' source code has been modified. Read the full statement for details. One thing is certain though, with Debian, Gentoo and now the FSF being exploited in the same month, the open source/free software community is clearly under attack.

Have you read the right to read? I think rms was indeed VERY visionary in that one, since that seems to be where things in the proprietary world are evolving.

They're not being paid.

Firstly, you must clear your speech since it makes little sense. There's no middle ground between GPL'ed code and commercial end programs: look at RedHat EL... lot's of GPL'ed code, 1800 EUR per box of CD's sold. Looks pretty commercial.

What. You. Probably. Mean. Is. Proprietary/Non-Free end program. That is evil, you wish to hold your fellow humans under your hold.

Secondly, I think you are confusing zero-price with freedom, when you're speaking of 'free'. You want to have source code you can use for gratis, but you couldn't care less about the users of said software.

Free Software is not necessarily gratis, but is so frequently, and the maintainence costs are about as much as ou are unskilled.
Free Software is software you can run for any purpose, study and modify, and distribute copies, modified or not.

Since the GPL fullfills this 4 freedoms it is Free Software. It adds a restriction on copying though, those who receive copies, modified or not, must have no less freedom than you had.

Software licensed under the BSD does not make sure that happens, and as such eventually someone will be forced to use some software which is non-Free, which is a great evil imposed on that person.

Both are Free Software programs, but one of them makes sure _all_ users will still have those 4 freedoms.

If you think that is bad, then I can only pity those who pay for your lack of social conscience.

I am forced to support GPL software through taxes and tuition fees. I am forced to work in a draconian work environment (lots of overtime with little chance of redeeming my stock options) because of the GPL. So yes, I am bitter about it.

Well, I just checked the FSF's pages, and couldn't find any reference to how much, if any, tax money they get. Of course, that doesn't mean they don't get any, only that I couldn't find what, if anything, they say about it. They did say that most of their funds come from selling copies of things that everyone is free to copy. I also remember Richard Stallman (RMS) getting a MacArthur genius award, or something like that, which would provide quite a bit of money to use as he pleases. A wild-ass-guess on my part would be that he would put a significant part of it into the FSF.

I'm also not aware of any tuition fees that go to the FSF, or to Free Software, in general. Perhaps if you could provide me an actual example of a University requiring its students to provide their code (besides class projects) to the FSF, there might be an argument. Not much of an argument, as far as I'm concerned, but an argument.

As far as your work environment is concerned, I'm sorry that you don't appear to be happy about it, apparently because of the compensation, or lack thereof. I also get the sense that you would have a lot of your attitudes in common with Darl McBride, CEO of SCO, but I could be wrong. If the job is so unrewarding for you, why do you stay? My life got a LOT better when I decided that making gobs of money was just not a priority for me. Perhaps in your next job the fine print in the contract will be something more to your liking. Good Luck in finding happiness! :-)

But no I couldn't make a profit simply by selling the stuff cheaper because I bear no resemblance to a charity. Buying software from the FSF is like buying a $100 subscription to PBS and getting a free t-shirt.

If you think they are in violation of the GPL, then you should read the advice on FSF's site and if you've already followed all their suggestions, then send the documentation you have of the problem to license-violation@gnu.org.

Sigma cannot satisfy Section 3 of the GPL by simply providing the source on the internet. They must be prepared to provide it by mail as well, if requested by someone who received the binary. See: GPL FAQ.

Yes, that's exactly what I had in mind - thanks. Take a stock kernel, write your own drivers specific to your widget, and release a binary.

In this case the kernel would be GPL, but stock. You can get it anywhere. Your drivers would be non-GPL. They're your own business. Aren't they?


Stock or vanilla kernel is a red herring. The GPL requires those that distribute binaries (i.e. the linux kernel - vmlinuz) provide either the source code with the "product" (the thing with the binary executable code), or a written offer to customers to provide source at a reasonable cost (cost of media/shipping typically, or free via the Internet) of all GPL licensed code including the linux kernel.

Based on such a weak understanding, I suspect you need to at least some essays at FSF's web site before releasing a product. Things get tricky with binary loadable modules distributed as object code with a source code wrapper, that are added into the linux kernel.

Thank you, Strandenko (I will echo your link).

hacker:
If you had taken the time to read an essay by RMS himself or the general philosophy of free software, you'd know the very slight differences between the two movements - a difference which is made ever more important with software designed to protect freedom of speech by use of cryptography. I beg you to take the time to read the essay linked in mine and Stradenko's comments.

As part of the FSF's GNU project, in order to preserve the ethical implications of the project, the preferred nomenclature is Free Software

No, but most of the highly paid, highly skilled ones are. Microsoft may not pay any taxes, but rest assured the highly skilled professional programmers who work for them sure do. That's billions of dollars of taxes that we would lose overnight if open source became the status quo.

2. The vast majority of programmers, even at Apple and Microsoft, do not have any significant amount of stock, nor do they get a royalty every time one of their software programs is sold. Spending $400 on a brand-new copy of Microsoft Office doesn't help put food on the table of Microsoft's programmers, it helps put cash in the bank that they use to buy up small companies.

Suuure. And those millions of dollars that MS spends buying those small companies dissappears, does it? And the billions of dollars Microsoft pays out to its programmers every year also just dissappear into thin air, huh?

3. Free software developers are not trying to take away SCO's right to create proprietary, closed source software. On the contrary, SCO is trying to take away the right of Linux developers to create open-source software.

The stated goal of the Free Software Foundation is, and I quote: to provide free software to do all of the jobs computer users want to do--and thus make proprietary software obsolete." This sounds exactly like they are attacking the basic premise of capitalism as it exists today in the software industry. It is clear they are trying to undermine and destroy the very thing that makes this country great: the free market. I, for one, do not intend to let them get away with it. I will be supporting SCO whenever possible, and I will be lobbying my member of congress to ensure that closed source, job creating and job sustaining software, is backed first and foremost before any so-called "free" software.

What better title can you have than that?

I too think that Prof. Moglen's article's title "SCO: Without Fear and Without Research" is a fine title.

But the Slashdot thread title "OSDL Releases New Paper on SCO's Claims" steers the reader's attention to the wrong movement. I find it interesting that in this instance, the chief counsel for the Free Software Foundation is writing about the GNU General Public License (which both predate the Open Source movement by many years) and yet his work is credited to the so-called "Open Source Development Labs" (OSDL).

The Open Source movement stands for a different philosophy than the Free Software movement. Perhaps people who submit articles for Slashdot don't commonly know who Eben Moglen is, what he does, or what movement's interests he represents.

Where is it documented that people have the "right" to copy and distribute software and that they are being denied this "right"?

Right here.

RMS wrote an article about free software in schools just a few days ago. Of course it's only about doing the right thing, so basically it tells schools they should teach children to be good citizens, even if that means they will be less prepared for the "real world". And I think he's completely right.

What do I care if all the children in the school get good jobs, if they're going to ruin the world when they're there? I'd rather have many of them have good jobs (software doesn't make that much of a difference, and I'm not even sure if free software would be getting them less or more jobs), and they're going to help make the world a better place to live.

No, but software that doesn't support users freedoms is a bad thing.

You can charge all you like for Free Software, you just need to understand that I can make changes to it and redistribute it with those changes.

The FSF charges for software. https://agia.fsf.org/

On www.fsf.org/voucher.html the FSF talks about "Microsoft money". They already got some of that: On www.gnu.org/thankgnus/2003supporters.html the "Microsoft Giving Campaign" is listed under "Contributors ($500 to $999)". Anyways, I hope they get much more of it via the voucher campaign.

And the GPL.

That goes against the open source definition clause 3 and 7. Clause 3 says

The license must allow modifications and derived works, and must allow them to be distributed under the same terms as the license of the original software.

The rights attached to the program must apply to all to whom the program is redistributed without the need for execution of an additional license by those parties.

In order for these freedoms to be real, they must be irrevocable as long as you do nothing wrong; if the developer of the software has the power to revoke the license, without your doing anything to give cause, the software is not free.

We all know which backwater these litigation crazed reptiles (aka music industry executives) were bred in. Kill them now, before they get a chance to breed.

You have to understand: it's not that music industry executives always reproduce at that rate. It's just that Australia doesn't have any natural predators to counter-act the growth of the entertainment industry. Here in America, for example, our high population of lawyers and politicians ensures that there will always be _someone_ who wants to eat a music executive.

The FSF and the GNU project actually encourages commercial interests and business models in the free software arena. Funny that Debian, from the description of the previous poster, seemingly cannot tolerate that, but has to do such statements.

I'm afraid you're not aware of what Open Source Software/Free Software is. Please read the definition of Open Source software: "Open source doesn't just mean access to the source code."

And of course Free Software.

Never flamed about Qt license in the past? ;-)

I don't know. But I for one signed up as an Associate Member of the FSF after hearing about the subpoena.

EFF != FSF.

Uhh, the issue is only in doubt if you think SCO has more than a snowballs chance in hell of winning. Because it does not, SCO will go away and this mess will quickly be forgoten, but the confusion SCO is trying to create may remain.

That confusion is worth $20,000,000 to Microsoft and it's a big deal. It's important for the public to know that there are entire operating systems of free software available and that this Linux thing is not just a flash in the pan that can be destroyed by a sinble lawsuit. While the Linux kernel is a large and important project, it's just another replacable component. Indeed the size of the kernel itself makes the SCO suit silly. Any single module that SCO could find infringing could be rewriten in a matter of days.

Here, lemme set you straight, young'n. Follows from the FSF's front page:

'The GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete Unix-like operating system which is free software: the GNU system. (GNU is a recursive acronym for "GNU's Not Unix"; it is pronounced "guh-NEW".) Variants of the GNU operating system, which use the kernel Linux, are now widely used; though these systems are often referred to as "Linux", they are more accurately called GNU/Linux systems.'

Now, do you truly understand? Hie theeself off to that webpage and absorb some knowledge, before crowing on about exactly that which you do not possess.

dd if=/dev/hda1 of=/dev/hdb1

For anyone thinking "that won't work on Windows", you can get a linux boot CD at the Linux-BBC project, or get them with a FSF membership. Or use knoppix if you want a full installation on bootable CD.

Oh yeah, and stop reccommending Windows for corporate desktops.

Electronic Frontier Foundation, The Digital Speech Project and Public Knowledge (to which I found a link on GNU website recently) are certainly worth visiting, not to mention our good friend Google. The problem is that while we all know that the so called "HDTV broadcast flag" [eff.org] makes exactly as much sense as the Security Flag from RFC 3514, this is not always the case with the average drunk Joe "General Public" Sixpack, who ironically is in fact the most important target we all should make sure those papers are carefully read and understood by, because he represents the target audience of Businessweek, not Slashdot.

It never said it was "Free Software", it said it was "Open Source".

A Good Read about Free Software vs OSS.