Caldera CEO Says Linux Is Proprietary

Carnage4Life writes: "ZDNet has an article on Ransom Love's (Caldera CEO) speech at the Comdex/Spring 2000-Linux Business Expo. The high points of his speech include his fears that the Linux revolution may be silencing lots of others by its success; [the contention that] proprietary software isn't all bad (Sun's Star Office is his example); Linux is as much a proprietary system as any other since the GPL forces one to adhere to it's rules just as proprietary licenses do; a brief description of the road map of Caldera's Linux development in the future; and finally a few comments on what he felt was the too-strict demand by some open source licenses that all code should be opened." Some good points, but mainly a lot of unsurprising viewpoints considering Caldera's outsider position in the actual Linux Community.

Comments

A more apt definition:

[Brett Viren]

From Jargon File (4.0.0/24 July 1996) [jargon]:

proprietary /adj./

1. In marketroid-speak, superior; implies a product imbued with exclusive magic by the unmatched brilliance of the company's own hardware or software designers.
2. In the language of hackers and users, inferior; implies a product not conforming to open-systems standards, and thus one that puts the customer at the mercy of a vendor able to gouge freely on service and upgrade charges after the initial sale has locked the customer in.

Re:Proprietary

[The Man]

Unlicensed software? Yes it can be free, but it would be unprotected; anyone could steal it and then try to sell it as their own; closed source, no 'piracy' and all that.

Oh, like the BSD license?

The whole purpose of a license is to protect the software and the programmer; at least thats the way I see it.

I see it differently. The purpose of the license varies by licensor. Microsoft wants protection for their profit machine, Red Hat licenses in a certain way to maintain their standing in the community, the BSD projects license according to tradition and their particular beliefs, and the GNU project licenses according to a very specific agenda. I could go on, but the point is made: there are many different licenses, each of which means something a little different to each entity that uses it (as a direct counterexample, the BSD license provides no protection for the programmer whatsoever). If the programmer desires protection, there are many licenses that can provide it in different ways, but that's not the only reason for licenses.

Re: Distribution

[The Man]

The question of "distribution" was raised and debated at length back during the Corel Linux beta debacle. I recommend you read that discussion if you want the split hairs.

Re:What is proprietary anyway then?

[Ed Avis]

The way things are now you can't lock users into your distribution because anyone can take it, sell it, and support it without paying you a cent.

That's the way things are with Red Hat, Mandrake, Slackware, Corel, and so on. But it's not the way things are with Caldera and SuSE; they already stop people from copying and reselling their distributions.

Proprietary

[Bob McCown]

If you think about it, ANYTHING is 'proprietary', simply by its value of being unique. The english language is proprietary, because to talk to an english-only speaker, you cant speak french.

The problem comes in when the proprietary-ness is so far different than what everyone else is using, or breaks from some well-defined standard. (See Compaq or Packard Bell PC's for example).

Granted, Linux is different from Windows, and can be viewed as exclusionary, but we, as the Linux community are striving for something better, not to corral people to use our stuff, and ONLY our stuff.

My .02

-=Bob

Re:Interesting post

[mindstrm]

We didn't get where we are today by making money off OSS. OSS exists because of what it is.. not because someone can make money off it.

OSS sets a nice baseline, and those who want to sell software on the open market generally have to do better than OSS. That's MY ideal scenario. There will always be room for someone to do it better, faster.. but a good OSS baseline will
1) force informal standards
2) set a standard for performance/reliability.

Re:Proprietary and open-source are not antonyms!

[PigleT]

The hardest thing here was decided who had the best post to respond to. PigleT, you win.
*blush*, thank you ;8)

"Not controlled by obligation or the will of another."
This I agree with, lots. Definitely applicable in the software scene.

Regarding rights and giving service back: I don't particularly like either approach, myself. "Rights" are a bit like "take", service is a bit like "give"; I'd prefer "giving" (a generalised state of play) and "receiving" (as distinct from take - ponder it a little), and the idea that it's more important to you to have your code out and about in the wild for all to enjoy and play with (this might be a more initial motivating factor but even so, I think it fun).

On companies: "Their "rights" are not being protected here." Indeed, and whole Usenet threads / wars on communism v capitalism ensue as a result!

[StarOffice] I also work in a split windoze/unix environment, and you're right about interoperability - I'm all for being able to read everything but having the decency to write in a lowest-common-denominator. But right now there are not-very-many not-very-good open-source .doc readers or .pdf readers. It's all very well saying "write in an open format doc" but you risk a lot of pressure to comply when someone's paying you to cope with their abominations.
So no, porting another-msword-reader isn't a bad idea. What I think *is* a bad idea is (a) it still being closed like SO, and (b) it not using native GUI widget sets like gtk+ or qt (to taste), resulting in a bloated lump where the rest of linux is typical neat and nippy in comparison. Shall we distinguish between the build-up of GNU/Linux and the port-bloat-over from the commercial scene...?

FWIW I see open-source as saying "can do", contrasted in a quite polarised way with commercial "can't do, haven't written that, pay us lots to fix the bugs". As soon as open-source says "no can do" we have problems; this applies to MSWord-readers, PDF-readers, portable open-licensed XML/SGML GUI editors, and even popular well-developed web browsers (Big Hint(TM)!). Nice mentality but could always use a little work...
~Tim
--
.|` Clouds cross the black moonlight,

What is this guy talking about?

[ddstreet]

By its popularity (the suite has been downloaded more than 2 million times), Star Office has done more for Linux than just about any other application, Love said.

Most open source projects don't really care (or keep count of) how many 'downloads' they get, because open source success is measured in the quality, not quantity of a project.

Users who make changes to software such as the Gimp image manipulation software must publish those changes under various open-source licenses, but the mere fact that there is a license obliging users to share code means that someone has set proprietary parameters on the use of the software.

No, they do not have to publish the modified source code if the product is not distributed. However, if the modified product is distributed, then they must also provide the modified source code. If it's used in-house only the modified source code does not have to be released.

Linux has provided developers with open access, and that has made it more flexible and more suited for the challenges of Internet computing.

Ok...what exactly is "Internet computing" and how is it different from "non-Internet computing"?

Citing the rough and tumble of the market, Love called for an evolution of Linux from a diverse platform to products that businesses would buy to improve their productivity in specific tasks.

Do you mean 'evolve' Linux, or write more applications that businesses can use?

Love's road map for that evolution would take Linux from being a packaged OS to products that include a subset of all the OS features, products that make installation of the OS easier, and tools that make management and administration of Linux easier.

A true visionary, I wonder why nobody else already thought of this.

Caldera will offer a product that offers browser-based administration of Linux with a GUI, Love said.

Yes, browser-based administration, because browsers never crash. And of course using X just won't work, because, uh, well...actually it has always been a networked design. And using 128 (or higher) bit encryption via ssh is at least as good as a browser's encryption (without all the bloat of a browser).

"It's one thing to facilitate open access, but another to demand it. That's what you are trying to get away from."

What? Who's this guy talking to? Who's trying to get away from open access to source code? Micro$oft? Oh, yeah, they are...

I'm wondering if this guy really knows anything about the open source movement or Linux, because most of what he says is either incorrect or redundant. His description of the GPL's requirements is wrong. His vision to provide remote administration of Linux is easily accomplished using X (which we all use already) and can be encrypted with ssh for secure administration.

Note to Mr Love: Linux is GPLed. Deal with it.

[Noryungi]

What this little piece does not mention is that Caldera IPO tanked and was blasted into oblivion by the recent Wall Street free fall (aka: "The .com Bloodbath").

I think some of the points that Mr Love makes are actually simple common sense: yes, closed-source shops can release good software. Yes, the GPL is, in its own peculiar and "viral" way, a very restrictive licence... But what else is new there?

To me, this speech sounds like a bitter rant, from a CEO who has seen his net stockmarket (read: paper) value disappear overnight.

Face it Mr Love: the Linux distro biz is like any other market -- you need good products to survive. And don't even think about making Linux proprietary or Slashdotters and FSF gurus will line up to sue you to kingdom come.

Repeat after me: invest in open-source wisely. The penguin is your friend. Don't anger the community. Respect the GPL and nobody gets hurt... =)

Another speech like that is going to be a PR disaster for Caldera. Flame war at 11.

proh-pry-et-airy

[DGregory]

I didn't think that "proprietary" had anything to do with licensing. I thought proprietary meant "closed" as in "this is mine and you can't touch it"

From dictionary.com:

proprietary (pr-pr-tr)
adj. Abbr. prop., pty.

1.Of or relating to a proprietor or to proprietors as a group: proprietary rights.
2.Exclusively owned; private: a proprietary hospital.
3.Befitting an owner: a proprietary air.
4.Owned by a private individual or corporation under a trademark or patent:
a proprietary drug.

Hmmm under this definition, Linux is NOT proprietary. It's not private, not exclusively owned, not owned by a private individual or corporation under a trademark or patent...

These people are creating new definitions for the word, and trying to make Linux sound bad.

I hope he was misquoted, but I doubt it.

[nels_tomlinson]

This sounds like "ok, kiddies, we've used that opensource hype for all it's worth... time to get back to business as usual." As an earlier poster pointed out, the existence of a license does not make a product proprietary. This might be deliberate distortion by Mr. Love, but more likely, it's an example of our horrible education system at work. I suppose that this should give us all hope: you don't have to be well educated run a large company.

On a separate issue, his proposal to remotely manage systems sounds very interesting. Who cares how difficult Linux is to manage! For a low monthly fee, you to can be care-free and buzzword-compliant! (Three year contract and service charges mentioned only in the fine print...) The interesting part here isn't the possiblity of a new business plan, making money by administering small office and home systems remotely. The interesting part lies in the privacy and free-speech issues which might arise. Think about the recent flap in England about private restraint of speech via libel laws. If you have controversial material on a home-page on your own computer, might the remote sys-admin have to take it down to shield himself? Or just drop your contract, and not tell you the root password? If you hire out the sys-admin job, and the managing company finds something they think is porn on your harddrive, are they obligated to report it to the sheriff? Should they, even if the law doesn't require it? I recently heard of a mother being prosecuted for having pictures of her naked child developed. That's (the prosecution ... ok, the mother too) very weird.

Of course, hiring out the sys-admin job to Corel, or any company raises all sorts of issues about ownership and access. Here's one: of course it's your system, but the management software running under Linux is our propriatary code... if you don't renew our contract, we will have to remove it. It includes the password file. And we encrypted the filesystem. We won't format the drives when we leave, but we'll take the only software which can read them. It's all for your safety.
Here's another. A sys-admin company might use your email address book to search for new customers, and so on. It's your data, and they probably wouldn't use it in any way that could get them caught. But that leaves a lot of latitude.

I wonder how far this idea will go? If Linux administration gets just a bit easier, and the major distributions start including a home computer installation option which is reasonably secure out of the box, probably not too far.

Re:He doesn't seem to understand how it already wo

[Black Parrot]

> Oof course, the GPL doesn't require you to publish your changes if you don't distribute your changes.

Which brings up something I've been wondering about. What does "distribute" mean? If a corporate IT department hacks The GIMP and then puts the employees to work using it, do they have to provide those employees the source as well?

Hairs want to be split, you know.

--

If by proprietary you mean "not public domain"...

[ethereal]

Under his definition, any software with a license is "proprietary", so the only non-proprietary software is public-domain software. Thus, any restrictions == proprietary software.

Open source does not necessarily mean non-proprietary, Love contended. Users who make changes to software such as the Gimp image manipulation software must publish those changes under various open-source licenses, but the mere fact that there is a license obliging users to share code means that someone has set proprietary parameters on the use of the software.

Technically, there are no parameters on the use of the software, just on the distribution of modified software based on the original GPL'd software. For the majority of people who are software users but not software writers, the software is effectively non-proprietary - the file formats are open, code can be inspected for security, efficiency, and effectiveness, and unlimited copies of the software can be used for free.

"Some open-source licenses may go a little too far," he said. "It's one thing to facilitate open access, but another to demand it. That's what you are trying to get away from."

In the end, revolutionaries could do more to marginalize the operating system through zealous adherence to a misguided interpretation of the open-source movement.

What license is "demanding open access"? Is this a reference to the GPL, or is this just an attack on some GPL supporters who insist that all software should be GPL'd? Who has a "misguided interpretation" - is someone misinterpreting the GPL, or misinterpreting the ideals behind it? The article is practically a troll at this point - there are no justifications or examples for these accusations.

It seems to me that we settled for "good enough" proprietary software for a long time, but that didn't lead to the changes we are seeing Linux bring about today. Only the "zealous adherence" to open-source ideals has brought about the wave of changes that Mr. Love has found himself caught up in. After all, if he has all the answers on how open source is supposed to work, shouldn't he have helped start the movement a while back, rather than just jumping into it once it became profitable?

It's too bad the press quotes this guy all the time rather than one of the people who are really leading - of the well-known (whether deservedly or not) Linux figures, he suffers from foot-in-mouth disease the most often. Oh wait, I forgot, the real leaders of the open source community are too busy writing code and creating the software that keeps Mr. Love in business.

What is proprietary anyway then?

[mind21_98]

According to Caldera's CEO, proprietary is something with a software license.

Well, without a software license it's in the public domain. Once in public domain, the creator can't stop it (unless you're the MPAA ;)

Software licenses are necessary to assert the positions of developers and users. The licenses explain the limits of the users. In the GPL, the condition pressed on the users is that they have to release source code if they release another version of it. In many other software licenses it could be restrictions on copying it.

In general, this sounds very fishy. He may be backing down from Microsoft, but whatever he's doing it's not good for business.

Good points

[zpengo]

I wouldn't dismiss Love's statements based on Caldera's "outsider" position in the community -- often it is the outsiders that have the clearest viewpoints.

1. To say that Linux is silencing others because of its success is probably exaggerating things a bit, but on the other hand it's partially true. Linux has a public relations momentum that most other alternatives don't. It's Pepsi to Microsoft's Coke. I'm sure that BeOS and others wish they had even a part of what the Linux movement now takes for granted.
2. Is proprietary software all that bad? I would say no, as long as it is in moderation. People should have the right to make proprietary software if they so desire, as long as they realize the benefits they are missing out on. The strength of the Linux movement is that it is primarily open source and free-as-in-speech. Nevertheless, every movement needs some variety.
3. In a sense, the GPL is a strict and binding way to make things free and public. Does that sound contradictory at all? I'm not saying it's a bad thing, just that I see his point.
4. Is it possible that the demand for open source code is to strong at times? Personally, I don't think so. What makes Linux wonderful is that if you want to change something, you just dig in and do it. I disagree with Love on this particular point.

Proprietary and open-source are not antonyms!

[ltcordelia]

*sigh*
The hardest thing here was decided who had the best post to respond to. PigleT, you win.

"free" anything means a number of things, but I prefer Not controlled by obligation or the will of another. The open-source movement protects the investment of the first programmer, not his so-called rights. Programmer A invests his/her time into writing an app under the GPL. If Programmer B wants to take advantage of Programmer A's effort, s/he must provide their work back to "the community," thus providing Programmer A a nice return on their investment. Note that Programmer B did NOT get "free" code from Programmer A - Programmer B was obligated to provide service back to Programmer A.

Note that companies are getting around the GPL by creating new software based on GPL'ed components, and selling service to their customers. Since they are not providing binaries to their customers, they are under no obligation to release their modifications to "open-source" software.

This company is restricted from selling their software (Hmm, I wonder if they could give an NDA to their customers prohibiting the re-release of their source code?) by the GPL. Their "rights" are not being protected here.

AS to the value of StarOffice, note that many of us are forced to work in an MS environment, where management and other divisions frequently send MS-Office documents. Having an interoperable product, which is seamless to the other users, means I can run Linux where otherwise I'd be forced to run Windoze.

Information wants to be free