Slashdot Mirror

mpawlo writes "Gnuheter reports that the Berkman Center for Internet and Society releases the H20 courseware software as open source. Two years and 1 million USD are invested in the software so far... The software has been tested at Harvard Law School, but should be suitable for other disciplines than law."

Swedish hacker-wannabee writes "Nick Moffitt is in an interesting interview at Gnuheter. Moffitt: 'I want to see a future where when I buy something, I own it. I don't want corporations and governments telling me how I may or may not use my own private property in my own home or among my friends. I want the ability to take apart my toaster or my alarm clock and see how they work, or combine them into something new. I don't think this future is possible without some serious effort on the part of hackers.'"

mpawlo writes "As reported by Greplaw, The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) together with Privacyactivism has released an interactive video game designed to educate players about their privacy and fair use rights. The game is focused on digital rights management technologies, online spyware, and data profiling servers. We have seen similar games in Sweden from the Anti-piracy Bureau and Flash movies from BSA in the US, however striking a different tune. Play Carabella." Cute idea.

mpawlo writes "ICANN President and CEO Stuart Lynn has announced his intention to retire from the position with ICANN effective around March 2003. Andrew McLaughlin also announced that he will be resigning as Vice President and Chief Policy Officer effective July 1, 2002. Andy Mueller-Maguhn has posted some unofficial notes from this weekend's ICANN board retreat."

mpawlo writes: "How much do you know about free software licensing? Time to find out! In a quiz presented by the Free Software Foundation you can test your abilities. How should Joan license her web browser?"

Johannes writes: "Swedish Gnuheter has a story on Nick Moffitt arranging with his X-headers in way that makes it impossible to read his email with Microsoft WebTV or Outlook Express. Moffitt states: 'The folks using Outlook Express have locked themselves into a limited subset of the information that can flow over the Internet, and are blaming me personally for not limiting my transmissions to that outlook-centric subset.' See also original email (in English). Immoral? Or just right?" Looks like Moffit's "Who, me?" attitude is tongue in cheek, but the creative header changes here are hilarious.

mpawlo writes: "As reported by Gnuheter, a new essay published by Bradley M. Kuhn and Richard M. Stallman carries the title "Freedom or Power?". The authors state something that we might have suspected from essays from Kuhn and Stallman before, but now is a little more clear, if still ambiguous: "However, one so-called freedom that we do not advocate is the "freedom to choose any license you want for software you write". We reject this because it is really a form of power, not a freedom." The essay is interesting in the light of an earlier essay published by Eric S Raymond. ... Tim O'Reilly started the debate with his weblog of July 28, 2001: My definition of freedom zero." Ed. note - FWIW, Stallman and Kuhn are right. Not necessarily in their advocacy of the GPL, but certainly in their description of whether licensing is freedom for the developer or power over others. All licensing stems from copyright law, a completely man-made creation whose sole purpose is to give the writer of creative works artificial power over what others do with those works. If you take the canonical description of freedom ("Your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins") and apply it to software, it's pretty clear that true freedom would not let one person control what another does with software.