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Now you're complaining that FSF is not OSI.

I'm expressing reservations about picking one word as a slogan and wielding it as a weapon until you lose sight of the fact that the word isn't as important as the rich plethora of ideas behind it.

Freedom was always the most important priority for the free software folks, from 1983 when Richard Stallman announced the GNU Project, to now. In 1998 the OSI launch was announced by Eric S. Raymond, because he "realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with free software in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape."

My point is that if you don't like FSF because they're "picking one word [freedom] as a slogan and wielding it as a weapon", than just join the OSI and be happy, instead of complaining about FSF having different attitude than OSI (which is quite obvious, otherwise the OSI would have not been founded). You're not going to convince GNU people to stop talking about freedom after 20 years (ESR knew that 4 years ago).

If I have a complaint, it's that people draw a distinction between FSF and OSI based on nitpicking over why "free" is different to "open", when the basic concepts are pretty much interchangeable.

How can people not draw a distinction between FSF and OSI based on free/open difference, if that distinction is the very reason why OSI has been started?

Those definitions (and the motivations behind using them) are the main difference between FSF and OSI. That is why free software and open source software can cooperate so well. I use, write and promote free software, not only because I like high quality software, but because I like freedom in the first place. For me the high quality is a very nice side effect, but not the whole purpose. People who use, write and promote open source software, put the quality and practical advantages over the ideological and ethical aspects. We all can work together, because it's usually the same software released under the same licenses.

Read the free software definition and the open source definition. Compare the list of free software licenses with the list of open source licenses. People behind OSI are doing pretty much the same as people behind FSF, the only important difference is in the motivations. And that is why I said that "you're complaining that FSF is not OSI", commenting your:

Uh, I count 31 instances of "free" or "freedom" in that interview. [...] Perhaps the FSF could consider coming up with a new angle. [...] There are other words, and other concepts that represent the FSF's ideals. Open. Shared. Community. Perhaps we could embroider some of those words onto our flag for a while, just until the Freedom Fad blows over.

I hope it's clear now.

Now you're complaining that FSF is not OSI.

I'm expressing reservations about picking one word as a slogan and wielding it as a weapon until you lose sight of the fact that the word isn't as important as the rich plethora of ideas behind it.

Freedom was always the most important priority for the free software folks, from 1983 when Richard Stallman announced the GNU Project, to now. In 1998 the OSI launch was announced by Eric S. Raymond, because he "realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with free software in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape."

My point is that if you don't like FSF because they're "picking one word [freedom] as a slogan and wielding it as a weapon", than just join the OSI and be happy, instead of complaining about FSF having different attitude than OSI (which is quite obvious, otherwise the OSI would have not been founded). You're not going to convince GNU people to stop talking about freedom after 20 years (ESR knew that 4 years ago).

If I have a complaint, it's that people draw a distinction between FSF and OSI based on nitpicking over why "free" is different to "open", when the basic concepts are pretty much interchangeable.

How can people not draw a distinction between FSF and OSI based on free/open difference, if that distinction is the very reason why OSI has been started?

Those definitions (and the motivations behind using them) are the main difference between FSF and OSI. That is why free software and open source software can cooperate so well. I use, write and promote free software, not only because I like high quality software, but because I like freedom in the first place. For me the high quality is a very nice side effect, but not the whole purpose. People who use, write and promote open source software, put the quality and practical advantages over the ideological and ethical aspects. We all can work together, because it's usually the same software released under the same licenses.

Read the free software definition and the open source definition. Compare the list of free software licenses with the list of open source licenses. People behind OSI are doing pretty much the same as people behind FSF, the only important difference is in the motivations. And that is why I said that "you're complaining that FSF is not OSI", commenting your:

Uh, I count 31 instances of "free" or "freedom" in that interview. [...] Perhaps the FSF could consider coming up with a new angle. [...] There are other words, and other concepts that represent the FSF's ideals. Open. Shared. Community. Perhaps we could embroider some of those words onto our flag for a while, just until the Freedom Fad blows over.

I hope it's clear now.

I have never heard of this codec, but it seems to me that this is more or less what the LGPL is intended for. Take a quick look at the LGPL and note this section:

For example, on rare occasions, there may be a special need to encourage the widest possible use of a certain library, so that it becomes a de-facto standard. To achieve this, non-free programs must be allowed to use the library. A more frequent case is that a free library does the same job as widely used non-free libraries. In this case, there is little to gain by limiting the free library to free software only, so we use the Lesser General Public License.

(Emphasis mine)

Seems to me that the people at VP3 would like as many people as possible to start working with their codec, allowing it to gain ascendancy over other codecs so that someday they will be able to make money selling their own "enhanced" version. Not a bad deal for GNU, because we get something badly needed. I hope that we start to hear more about this codec being used in some interesting projects in the future now that it has become more available.

Worse has been seen in this case, quote:

A set of URLs on www.gartner.com are "the Microsoft site";
Microsoft "sponsors" this "site", and paid unspecified fees to Gartner Group related to the content...

Talking about my boss's single most trusted source of information.... *shrug*

Advocating for free software when you are not a programmer and have no job or future job on the line completely removes any validity of the desire of freedom you obtain via free software. If you advocate commercial and free software (Open Source(TM) way) you are simply advocating for gratis software; not freedom. The freedom obtained via GNU free software is only useful to those who know the language the software is written in and have a desire to learn the software architecture to make use of the source code. Anything else is just bandwagon bullshit, or political spin (Open Source) to get no-cost (gratis) software.

What do you do or plan to do for a living? I will make sure I advocate whatever you produce become completely free with no-strings-attached.

I'm not saying you should not enjoy and use free software. What I'm saying is please don't advocate free software (or the Open Source version of free software) unless you have a proposed plan that allows all the programmers you put out of work to make a living. I have found that there are generally nice programmers working for Microsoft. Very knowledgeable too. Please stop the unnecessary bashing of Microsoft. Yes, they have done things which hurt others, etc. etc. It's ancient history and is no longer significant. I want the old free software community back--the one that rarely mentioned what Microsoft was up to and was truely interested in the freedom aspect of software (and the coolness of what was being done w/ the software).

My point: GNU is about freedom of software, not the cost associated with the software.

The other side of the "OSS" movement, Open Source(TM), is not about freedom of software (or the GNU definition of "freedom"). Their agenda is to get business to open up to free software, but they are not advocating for freedom of software. They have a very "loose" ideal compared to Richard Stallman's. They believe that free software can or should mingle with proprietary. If you believe in the freedom aspect of GNU then you will find the reasoning of Open Source(TM) absurd because it does not guarantee or obtain future freedom of software. Therefore, the only value in advocating Open Source(TM) is for the no-cost aspect of free software. This is the only reason businesses open up to free software--it lets them get the benefit of using it without having the burden of contribution. Businesses love the BSD license even more (which Open Source(TM) camp advocates also) because it lets them include the free software into proprietary software (which Microsoft and probably others have done). On the other hand, if Open Source(TM) camp could have it's way, then all software would be free, just as Richard would have it. They are taking a round-about way of advocating for freedom, yet their pragmatic methods may end up hurting the free software (GNU) movement more than helping it. They indirectly excuse business for being a free software leech and not contributing.

Freedom is good, being a leech is not. If you have nothing to contribute, at least contribute by staying out of the discussions involving free software. There is no nice way to put it. The freedom gained is for programmers only--the no-cost of free software is merely a side-effect. Don't confuse the no-cost side-effect with what GNU and even Open Source(TM) are truely about. If you are advocating for no-cost software, then please simply state so. Do not masquerade behind legitimate movements such as GNU when all you really want is software without a price tag. Think hard now. What freedom do you, personally, truely gain from free software? The only one apparent to me, is you can redistribute that software, or sell it like Red Hat. It's a freedom, yes, but not what GNU is about.

Hollings said that "any device that can legitimately play, copy, or electronically transmit one or more categories of media also can be misused for illegal copyright infringement, unless special protection technologies are incorporated."

We'll just have to tell Congress that "any device that can legitimately hit a baseball can be misused for illegal murder. How do you think MLB would react if the state legislatures tried to outlaw the game of baseball?"

One bright spot for free software advocates: Any software that implements the standards must be "based on open source code." Hardware copy-protection schemes can remain proprietary.

I'd assume that a rational judge would consider "open source" to mean what the community thinks it means. So unless the standards require hardware (which Silicon Valley will vehemently object to), the GNU/Linux system may still be able to decode SSS^H^H^H CBDTPA encoded material.

The fact that the modules are AL instead of GPL may have an effect on Tilly's case, particularly this sentence (not from the license itself but from Perl's distribution notes):

The bottom line is that this is a kinder and gentler version of the GNU license -- one that doesn't infect your work if you care to borrow from Perl or package up pieces of it as part of a commercial product!

The fact that the modules are AL instead of GPL may have an effect on Tilly's case, particularly this sentence (not from the license itself but from Perl's distribution notes):

The bottom line is that this is a kinder and gentler version of the GNU license -- one that doesn't infect your work if you care to borrow from Perl or package up pieces of it as part of a commercial product!

Allow me to explain.

Alan Cox; Richard Stallman; Bruce Perens; Wichert Akkerman; Miguel DeIcaza.

What do you see in this list of names? Are there any African-Americans on it? Absolutely not, none of those names sound like one a self-respecting black person would have! No Maurice, no Luther, no Lil' Kim. There are many other lists such as this, you can see one here. Flip through each page, do you see anything other than white faces? Of course you don't, because Open Source and its adherents are ardent racists and they absolutely forbid access to the sacred 'kernel' by any person of color.

Lets look at another list, this time a compendium of the companies using Linux. Are there any black owned companies on that list? Nooooooo. How about these companies? They all have something to do with Open Source software, any of them owned by an African-American? No again. Here is an extensive collection of photographs from a LUG (Linux User Gathering) meeting, more can be viewed at that link. What is odd about these pictures, and every other photograph I have ever seen of a LUG meeting, is that there is not one single black person to be seen, and probably none for miles.

More racist overtones can be found by examining the language of Open Source. They often refer to 'white hat' hackers. These 'white hats' scurry about the Internet doing good, but illegal, acts for their fellow man. In stark contrast we find the 'black hat' hackers. They destroy the good works of others by breaking into systems, stealing data, and generally causing havoc. These two terms reflect the mindset of most Linux developers. White means good, black means bad. Anywhere there is black, there is uncontrollable destruction and lawlessness. Looking further we see black lists that inform other users of 'bad' hardware, Samba, an obvious play on the much hated Little Black Sambo book, Mandrake, which I won't explain except to say that the French are notorious racists. This type is linguistic discrimination is widespread throughout the Open Source culture, lampooned by many of its more popular sites.

It is also a fact that all Unix 'distros' contain a plethora of racist commands with not so hidden symbolism.

It can hardly be coincidence that the prime operating system of choice of the 'open source supremacists' - Linux, features commands which are poorly disguised racist acronyms. For example: 'awk' (All White Klan) , 'sed' (shoot nEgroes dead), 'ln' (lynch negroes), 'rpm' (raical purity mandatory), 'bash' (bring a slave home), 'ps' (persecute sambo), 'mount' (murder or unseat nubians today), 'fsck' (favored supreme Christian klan). I could go on and on about the latent racist symbolism in Linux, but I fear it would take weeks to enumerate every incidence.

Is there a single unix command out there that does not have some hidden racist connotation ? Suffice it to say that the racism pervades Linux like a particularly bad smell. Can you imagine the effect of running such a racist operating system on the impressionable mind ? I don't have to remind you that transmitting subliminal messages is banned in the USA, and yet here we have an operating system that appears to be one enormous submliminal ad for the Klan!

One of the few selling points of Open Source software is that it is available in many different languages. Browsing through the list I see that absolutely none are offered in Swahili, nor Ebonics. Obviously this is done to prevent black people from having access to the kernel. If it weren't for the fact that racism is so blatantly evil I would be impressed by the efforts these Open Sourcers have invested in keeping their little hobby lilly white. It even appears that they hate the Japanese, as some of these self proclaimed hackers defaced a web site with anti-Japanese slogans. Hell, these people even go all the way to Africa (South Africa mind you, better known as White Africa) and the pictures prove that they don't even get close to a black person.

Of course, presenting overwhelming evidence such as this is a bit unfair without some attempt to determine why these Open Sourcers are so racist. Much of the evidence I have collected indicates that their views are so deeply held that they are seldom questioned by the new recruits. This, coupled with the robot-like groupthink that dominates the culture allows the racist mindset to continue to permeate the ranks. Indeed, the Open Source version of a Klan rally, OSDN (known to the world as Open Source Developer's Network, known to insiders as Open Source Denies Negroes) nearly stands up and shouts its racist views on its demographics page. It doesn't mention the black man one single time. Obviously, anyone involved with Open Source doesn't need to be told that the demographic is entirely white, it is a given.

I have a sneaking suspicion as to why their beliefs are so closely held: they are all terrible athletes.

Really. Much like the tragedy at Columbine High School, where two geeks went on a rampage to get back at 'jocks', these adult geeks still bear the emotional scars inflicted upon them due to their lack of athletic ability during their teen years. As African-Americans are well known for their athletic skills, they are an obvious target for the Open Source geeks. As we all know, sports builds character, thus it follows that the lack of sports destroys character. These geeks, locked away in their rooms, munching on stale pizza and Fritos, engage in no character building activities. Further, they interact only with computers and never develop the level of social skill that allows normal people to handle relationships with persons of color.

Contrasted with the closed source, non-geeky software house Microsoft, Open Source has a long, long way to go.

Join me in my next article where I will lay bare the rampant anti-semitism in the Open Source community.

This is only the public unveiling of a technology that has been under development for some time, probably as part of the Cairo project. Our first glimpse of it was actually in the first Halloween Memo of 1998, whence it was referred to as 'Storage+'.

Eric's summary from the relevant section:

"I'm told by a former Microserf that the references to "Storage+" here and in the executive summary are much more significant than they seem. MS's plan for the next few years is to move to an integrated file/data/storage system based upon Exchange, completely replacing the current FAT and NTFS file systems. They are absolutely planning on one monolithic structure, called "megaserver", as their next strategic infrastructure. The lock-in effect of this would be immense if they succeed. "

This is only the public unveiling of a technology that has been under development for some time, probably as part of the Cairo project. Our first glimpse of it was actually in the first Halloween Memo of 1998, whence it was referred to as 'Storage+'.

Eric's summary from the relevant section:

"I'm told by a former Microserf that the references to "Storage+" here and in the executive summary are much more significant than they seem. MS's plan for the next few years is to move to an integrated file/data/storage system based upon Exchange, completely replacing the current FAT and NTFS file systems. They are absolutely planning on one monolithic structure, called "megaserver", as their next strategic infrastructure. The lock-in effect of this would be immense if they succeed. "

Intelligent citizens, industry professionals and academics will read, understand, and probably agree with this article.

This is also the sort of writing that could really color the public debate if average Joe Citizen had any reason to value the opinion of Bruce Perens over Craig Mundie.

But why should they?

What does the average person know about Perens? What do they know about the Open Source Initiative? Correct me if I'm wrong, but probably very little. What does the average person know about MicroSoft? That they build the software that runs on every computer that they sit behind every day.

There's a bit of a credibility gap.

Craig Mundie could conceivably be any employee with the MicroSoft backing, and he would get press and general public recognition that Perens doesn't.

Pro-Open Source writers are often honest and, while not unbiased or impartial, are at least driven more by a cooperative and edifying spirit than a monopolistic one. If the general public had more reason to trust them, the articles they write would more effectively influence public opinion.

Think about how can this community help people like Perens while he's busy trying to help us.

and since when is "Open source" an OS?

The "open source operating system" is the OS that runs on a network whose machines run GNU/Linux, BSD, AtheOS, FreeDOS, and other operating systems whose kernel, shell, and included applications are OSI Certified open source software.

ObDRM: None of the OSI Certified operating systems place the kernel or GUI under a digital-rights-denial system (unlike retail Windows XP). Windows XP does have one advantage, however: in the cartoon world, it can turn a laptop into a jetpack. (Read More...)

There is certainly a subset of users using Linux, developing interesting applications, and whatnot, but they are reportedly a sad minority.

On the other hand, hope can be found in the relative poverty of respectable organizations in China - they can't really afford Microsoft software, and are therefore more likely to look at free software for open, legitimate purposes.

On the gripping hand...But I ramble.

The advertising clause was removed from the BSD license three years ago. If you want to use the license you should use this template.

Besides, if you happen on a file with the old license that is copyrighted to the University of California, the advertising clause is null and void.

I think you can thank one Vinod Valloppillil for exposing the larcenous behaviour of the Microsoft Marketing Dept. - and thier influence on Microsofts coding practices - for this one. Much news about Microsoft has transpired since then, and most of it very, very bad for them.

/imagine: a half bald, bawling marketdriod with a pile of his own bloddy hair at his feet, more in his fists at the side of his head, shouting "NO! We could of owned it all! NOOOOOOO!". Now smile. :-D/

IMHO, it was the leaking of the Halloween Documents that had the most devestating effects on Microsoft. Those very same documents also give reason to still be guarded with our support.

The timing of this is also suspicious with .Net on the way. From what I've read, most big comanes are telling Microsoft that .Net is OK, but thier keeping all thier data. Ergo, what if Microsoft wants to use Kerberos authentication from your server, whatever it is, to allow .Net services in? It may be needed for thier business model to actually work. Hmmmm.

To paraphrase a famous Trojan :
"I fear Microsoft even when they come bearing gifts".
I'm pleased, but will still be very wary all the same.

Soko

That may well be the case. Look back at the famous Microsoft "Halloween Memo", which contains a discussion of how to reduce the value of the "wire protocol" (i.e. TCP/IP, HTTP) in favor of putting value into the "services and implementation".

From that memo:
MSMQ is a great example of a distributed technology where most of the value is in the services and implementation and NOT in the wire protocol. The same is true for MTS, DTC, and COM+.
... Make Integration Compelling -- Especially on the server.
... The rise of specialty servers is a particularly potent and dire long term threat that directly affects our revenue streams.

So it's an established strategy of Microsoft to come up with ways to mahe HTTP less important. The key issue here is that if the value is in an openly documented protocol, anyone can interoperate with it. If proprietary software, preferably protected with intellectual property rights, is required to interoperate, those annoying "specialty servers" (by which they mean HTTP-based web servers) just go away.

• Bruce Perens, Free Software Evangelist.
• Larry Rosen, Attorney, Executive Director: Open Source Initiative
• Eben Moglen, General Counsel, Free Software Foundation.

• We don't get everything we want, but we've done pretty well.

  Bruce

The 'Open Source Definition' isn't the be all and end all of what is and isn't open source

Yes, it is. It is the definition, oddly enough, of Open Source. By the people who invented the term, the Open Source Initiative. The MPlayer list license not on the OSI list of approved Open Source licenses, and many licenses with similar restrictions have been refused approval for the list. MPlayer is not Open Source as it doesn't meet criteria 2 of the definition. If it applied for OSI Certification, it would be rejected.

Read the Open Source Definition sometime, specifically criteria 2. Mplayer isn't Open Source, and has never been

The Wine project might be well served by imitating Sleepycat and their dual-licensing model for Berkeley DB.

Berkeley DB started as a small embedded database library which only supported hash tables and btrees. Since it was written for BSD Unix as a replacement, it was released under the BSD license. After a few years, it was widely used, but it still only offered access methods. When Netscape wanted more features, such as transactions, disaster recovery and multiple-user support, Sleepycat Software was founded to further develop Berkeley DB (on the strength of a licensing deal with Netscape).

The new version of the software was released under the Sleepycat license, an OSI-approved license which allows Open Source applications to use Berkeley DB, but (unlike the GPL) appears to be compatible with any Open Source license. For proprietary applications, Sleepycat offers a more traditional licensing option to companies who don't wish to distribute their source code. Revenue from such licensing funds additional development of Berkeley DB, to the benefit of all. (For example, Berkeley DB 4.x adds replication and high-availability functionality that surely would not exist without the funding received through this dual licensing.)

Perhaps the Wine project should follow this example? Wine could be placed under a license like Sleepycat's, which would allow Wine to be freely used by Open Source projects (whether GPL or not), and proprietary companies could pay for a license which allows proprietary use. Funding from such licensing could be used to further develop Wine, to the benefit of proprietary and Open Source users alike.

BSD or LGPL licensing allows proprietary companies to profit from the hard work of the Open Source developers without giving anything back. Sleepycat's licensing model forces them to give something back, either by contributing more Open Source code back to the community, or by paying cash for the privilege of avoiding that -- which could then be used to fund development that would benefit the Open Source community.

It's a win-win situation, and it would ensure that contributors don't get exploited. It could also lead to funding that might greatly accelerate the development of Wine, even more than relying on companies like Corel to contribute back changes they've made to the codebase.

I'm not a contributor to Wine, but I'd suggest they consider following Sleepycat's example -- it appears to work well for them, why not for Wine?

This really galls me. A simple Google search will reveal a massive number of references to "open source" prior to March 1998. This stinks of revisionism.

Read the History of the OSI:

The "open source" label itself came out of a strategy session held on February 3rd 1998 in Palo Alto, California. The people present included Todd Anderson, Chris Peterson (of the Foresight Institute), John "maddog" Hall and Larry Augustin (both of Linux International), Sam Ockman (of the Silicon Valley Linux User's Group), and Eric Raymond.

(...)

We realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with "free software" in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape. We brainstormed about tactics and a new label. "Open source," contributed by Chris Peterson, was the best thing we came up with.

Next time please do a little research before you state that something "stinks of revisionism", because if this what you comment are the exact words of people who you advocate, it can look really stupid.

In my post, I haven't said anything which the Open Source Initiative doesn't agree with. The text you commented was written by one of the OSI creators and advocates. Still, you're not satisfied.

I hope you get the point now. What else can I say... To paraphrase your words, This stinks of ignorance.

Please, think about it.

This really galls me. A simple Google search will reveal a massive number of references to "open source" prior to March 1998. This stinks of revisionism.

Read the History of the OSI:

The "open source" label itself came out of a strategy session held on February 3rd 1998 in Palo Alto, California. The people present included Todd Anderson, Chris Peterson (of the Foresight Institute), John "maddog" Hall and Larry Augustin (both of Linux International), Sam Ockman (of the Silicon Valley Linux User's Group), and Eric Raymond.

(...)

We realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with "free software" in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape. We brainstormed about tactics and a new label. "Open source," contributed by Chris Peterson, was the best thing we came up with.

Next time please do a little research before you state that something "stinks of revisionism", because if this what you comment are the exact words of people who you advocate, it can look really stupid.

In my post, I haven't said anything which the Open Source Initiative doesn't agree with. The text you commented was written by one of the OSI creators and advocates. Still, you're not satisfied.

I hope you get the point now. What else can I say... To paraphrase your words, This stinks of ignorance.

Please, think about it.

This really galls me. A simple Google search will reveal a massive number of references to "open source" prior to March 1998. This stinks of revisionism.

Read the History of the OSI:

The "open source" label itself came out of a strategy session held on February 3rd 1998 in Palo Alto, California. The people present included Todd Anderson, Chris Peterson (of the Foresight Institute), John "maddog" Hall and Larry Augustin (both of Linux International), Sam Ockman (of the Silicon Valley Linux User's Group), and Eric Raymond.

(...)

We realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with "free software" in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape. We brainstormed about tactics and a new label. "Open source," contributed by Chris Peterson, was the best thing we came up with.

Next time please do a little research before you state that something "stinks of revisionism", because if this what you comment are the exact words of people who you advocate, it can look really stupid.

In my post, I haven't said anything which the Open Source Initiative doesn't agree with. The text you commented was written by one of the OSI creators and advocates. Still, you're not satisfied.

I hope you get the point now. What else can I say... To paraphrase your words, This stinks of ignorance.

Please, think about it.

This really galls me. A simple Google search will reveal a massive number of references to "open source" prior to March 1998. This stinks of revisionism.

Read the History of the OSI:

The "open source" label itself came out of a strategy session held on February 3rd 1998 in Palo Alto, California. The people present included Todd Anderson, Chris Peterson (of the Foresight Institute), John "maddog" Hall and Larry Augustin (both of Linux International), Sam Ockman (of the Silicon Valley Linux User's Group), and Eric Raymond.

(...)

We realized it was time to dump the confrontational attitude that has been associated with "free software" in the past and sell the idea strictly on the same pragmatic, business-case grounds that motivated Netscape. We brainstormed about tactics and a new label. "Open source," contributed by Chris Peterson, was the best thing we came up with.

Next time please do a little research before you state that something "stinks of revisionism", because if this what you comment are the exact words of people who you advocate, it can look really stupid.

In my post, I haven't said anything which the Open Source Initiative doesn't agree with. The text you commented was written by one of the OSI creators and advocates. Still, you're not satisfied.

I hope you get the point now. What else can I say... To paraphrase your words, This stinks of ignorance.

Please, think about it.

http://opensource.org/docs/history.html

Freedom #3; freedom to redistribute with modifications. See, for example, the SISSL, which is accepted by OSI but does not allow one to redistribute changes that aren't compatible with the standards setting body. [See section 3.1.] Or the revocation clause in the APSL, which is one of the three reasons the APSL isn't free.

All of that said... the point you're trying to make, Russ, is a sound one- the basic OSI philosophy is not incompatible with that of the FSF. But the FSF's philosophy is a superset of the OSI's- it isn't just 'see the source', which the OSI cares about, it also includes 'have freedom to use the source once you've seen it'- which the OSI doesn't care about, and which is why RMS dislikes them so much.

[up front: I'm a Ximian employee; I don't think that makes any difference to this point but I don't want to be accused of hiding it in an article about Miguel.]

Freedom #3; freedom to redistribute with modifications. See, for example, the SISSL, which is accepted by OSI but does not allow one to redistribute changes that aren't compatible with the standards setting body. [See section 3.1.] Or the revocation clause in the APSL, which is one of the three reasons the APSL isn't free.

All of that said... the point you're trying to make, Russ, is a sound one- the basic OSI philosophy is not incompatible with that of the FSF. But the FSF's philosophy is a superset of the OSI's- it isn't just 'see the source', which the OSI cares about, it also includes 'have freedom to use the source once you've seen it'- which the OSI doesn't care about, and which is why RMS dislikes them so much.

[up front: I'm a Ximian employee; I don't think that makes any difference to this point but I don't want to be accused of hiding it in an article about Miguel.]

Okay, I'll call you out. Which of RMS's four freedoms is not present in any OSI-approved license?
-russ

So open source rejects your ideals of freedom, and has done since its foundation? Someone better notify the press :)

The Jargon Lexicon open source definition:

open source n.

[common; also adj. `open-source'] Term coined in March 1998 following the Mozilla release to describe software distributed in source under licenses guaranteeing anybody rights to freely use, modify, and redistribute, the code. The intent was to be able to sell the hackers' ways of doing software to industry and the mainstream by avoiding the negative connotations (to suits) of the term "free software". For discussion of the follow-on tactics and their consequences, see the Open Source Initiative site.

From Why "Free Software" is better than "Open Source":

In 1998, some of the people in the free software community began using the term "open source software" instead of "free software" to describe what they do.

While free software by any other name would give you the same freedom, it makes a big difference which name we use: different words convey different ideas. The term "open source" quickly became associated with a different approach, a different philosophy, different values, and even a different criterion for which licenses are acceptable. The Free Software movement and the Open Source movement are today effectively separate movements, although we can and do work together on practical projects.

This article describes why using the term ``open source'' does not solve any problems, and in fact creates some. These are the reasons why it is better to stick with "free software."

(...)

So open source rejects your ideals of freedom, and has done since its foundation? Someone better notify the press :)

The Jargon Lexicon open source definition:

open source n.

[common; also adj. `open-source'] Term coined in March 1998 following the Mozilla release to describe software distributed in source under licenses guaranteeing anybody rights to freely use, modify, and redistribute, the code. The intent was to be able to sell the hackers' ways of doing software to industry and the mainstream by avoiding the negative connotations (to suits) of the term "free software". For discussion of the follow-on tactics and their consequences, see the Open Source Initiative site.

From Why "Free Software" is better than "Open Source":

In 1998, some of the people in the free software community began using the term "open source software" instead of "free software" to describe what they do.

While free software by any other name would give you the same freedom, it makes a big difference which name we use: different words convey different ideas. The term "open source" quickly became associated with a different approach, a different philosophy, different values, and even a different criterion for which licenses are acceptable. The Free Software movement and the Open Source movement are today effectively separate movements, although we can and do work together on practical projects.

This article describes why using the term ``open source'' does not solve any problems, and in fact creates some. These are the reasons why it is better to stick with "free software."

(...)

Open source rejects his ideals of freedom.

Uh, no. I see you have bought into Stallman's propaganda. Please tell me what part of the Open Source Definition doesn't meet the Free Software Definition.

Stallman doesn't like Open Source for two reasons:

1) It dilutes his power,
2) It doesn't use the confusing word "free", which Stallman clings to with religious fervor, and
3) It dilutes his power.

It's not a "slashdoters definition" - it's The Open Source Definition - defined by the guys that made up the term and popularised it. One of the conditions for considering source truly Open is that the license does not discriminate against people in particular fields of endeavor - which means that "for non-commercial use only" is not Open.

- Sam

If you read the license you'll find that the code is licensed for "non-commercial purposes only", so it's not open source in the sense of the OSD.

I'd rather have them publish the source code than not, but I'm disappointed that it's mislabeled as an "open source" release, when it's not.

It's really too bad the Open Source trademark was rejected, because tactics like this lead to a lot of genuine confusion about what open source software really means.

1. According to RMS, if I write code that links with a GPL'd library (say, readline), my code must be GPL'd
   
2. Now suppose I write, in a clean room, an exact duplicate replacement for readline (say, greedline) from reverse engineering.
   
3. I offer to license to UNIX vendors for $10,000,000
   
4. Now I can write non-GPL code with readline hooks and distribute it
   

For those unfamiliar, you can read the LGPL at the following URL:

http://www.opensource.org/licenses/lgpl-license.ht ml

Bullshit. You can work for a university and write free code. We do it here and have no problems. Of course, I release everything under the BSD license. No. I won't tell you what I work on as the university doesn't endorse it.

you seem to be confusing open-source with copy-lefted.

But thanks for explaining, anyway. :)

I work for the DoD (Department of Defense) and recently attended a Web Content Vulnerability seminar at the NSA's Cryptologic school, and one of the points they stressed was how open-source information can often yield more useful intelligence than classified information.
[...]
In the Bazaar, as I read it, alot of open source information is being shared.

Well, yes, but I think any presentation from the NSA will get these terms mixed up, due to no fault of their own.

From http://www.opensource.org/advocacy/faq.html:

The term "open source" has a technical meaning in the intelligence community; it refers to publicly accessible intelligence sources such as newspapers.

Their code base was not all GPL

Seriously, we have the source to every bit on the device. And I mean Open Source. It did take some effort to get the X11 sources, and source for the PMON boot loader, but we have them all. I know this because Brian Webb, who isn't an Agenda employee, rebuilt everything from source to support my snow ABI, which is not binary compatible---if it wasn't rebuilt, it wouldn't work!

We're still working on automating the rebuild. Right now, doing this rebuild is a manual process, but I think we're a few weeks away from having a big "make World" that will spit out a cross compiler and then a romdisk image.

Now, if you're fretting about PDAs with components that aren't Open Source, go check out the Zaurus. Its Java implementation is proprietary. (If you want to write apps for it, they have to be GPL'd unless you're a Troll licensee; I guess some people see that as a positive thing.)

and the device was expensive

I don't remember an NDA on their developer pages.

(I wish people would stop moderating articles with "overrated/underrated" just to avoid metamod; the parent is at score 3 with no moderation reason. And the parent msg is substantially incorrect.)

And just how many closed source distributions of FreeBSD are there? NetBSD? OpenBSD?

Why would Microsoft want to do distribute a closed source version of *BSD? I was refering to the BSD License, not the OS.

How many closed source distributions of kerberos are there? I know of one: Microsoft Kerberos. Like the lead of the article says, BSD license allows MS to "Embrace, Extend, [and] Extinguish" OSS initiatives.

Here's a link to the license for those interested in reading it:

mit-license [opensource.org]

The Mono runtime is released under the LGPL.
The compiler is released under the GPL.
The class libraries are released under the X11 license.

The X11 license is a free software license (http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html#X11 License.
It is also an Open Source license (http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.ht ml

All of it free software.

If they were not `truly free software' we would have bigger problems (someone would have to start a reimplementation of X11, telnet, Kerberos, Expat, LibXML, Mesa GL, ftp, Tcl/Tk, BIND, DNS, and anything else released under the X11, the Ousterhout or the BSD licenses, because they are in essence the same thing).

Miguel

Miguel.

Here's a simple solution for the contentious $$ aspect -- require that royalties assessed under a RAND license must be expressed as a percentage of the sale price of the item using the licensed tech.

This reminds me of another software difficulty: software which is available for free (and often available in source form), with license terms that forbid distribution for fee or other consideration. After all, does "sale price" include the media price? Shipping and handling fees? What about aggregate media? That opens another can of worms.

A better solution would be that the patents would be licensed Royalty-Free for implementations covered by a license meeting the Open Source Definition requirements. This would allow flexibility for open-source implementors while preserving the proprietary products value chain. The only major complaint from patent holders I can think of with this approach is that open source may outcompete proprietary products, drying up the royalty stream.

The Open Source Initiative: Approved Licenses

But I still am tempted to get an MSX-Box if only to handle my DOA addiction.

And would you be happy to know that you are supporting the Evil Empire in the process? Do the only thing that makes sense - boycott the slimy evil-doers.

If they were truely objective in their reporting, they would have had a hyperlink to opensource in their report.

It's what they don't tell you that gives em' away.

--power to the new mind hackers