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Open Source Is Bad [updated]
pjones writes: "This just in! Open Source is bad for companies and countries too. In a New York Times article (registration required), John Markoff reports that: "In a speech defending Microsoft's business model, to be given on Thursday at the Stern School of Business at New York University, Craig Mundie, a senior vice president at Microsoft and one of its software strategists, will argue that the company already follows the best attributes of the open-source model by sharing the original programmer's instructions, or source code, more widely than is generally realized." Singled out for particular rebuke and scorn are IBM and the famous GPL and its author Richard Stallman.
Who will be there to cheer Craig on?" See also ESR's dispatch on same. (Read below for update with time and place.)
Update: 05/03 01:55 PM by T : cananian points to this announcement on time and place. The upshot: from noon to 1:30 p.m, in room 1-70 of NYU's Kaufman Management Center (KMEC), 44 West 4th Street.
" It looks like the room will be tiny, so show up outside the building with signs in plenty of time to be seen! " Horseshit. The best thing you can do if you are at all interested in supporting open source is stay away from that meeting. Unless you are willing to RSVP, wear a suit and look and act like a business person. Then you MIGHT get into the room and you MIGHT get a chance to ask intelligent questions, or steer the audience to the real issues. Open source does not need demonstrators. Does not need crowd scenes and street actions. Does not need to look like a disruption of the good life as so many non-technical people think they know it. just my opinion...
Ok, I'll throw you a link:http://www.eskimo.com/~matth/hobby.html
A google search will pull up all kinds of analysis and commentary and historical perspective.
"Open Source Is Bad", huh? Well, reading that I would guess that the author is implying that Microsoft doesn't like open source. No, that's not true. Microsoft likes open source, very very much - after all, huge portions of their networking system come from open source. Microsoft does not like the GPL. Please take note:
open source != GPL
Much the same that rectangle != square -- a square is indeed a type of rectangle, but by no means is it the only type.
How many shares do you have of MSFT? 100? 1000? Hah! I wipe my ass with that many shares every morning. Let's face it, your total holdings in MSFT amount to basically dick. But I'm going to answer you anyway, just because I'm in that kind of mood.
Don't worry about that little adverse court ruling. We own the appeals court. And the Supreme Court. And fucking George W. Bush, for that matter. Judge Jackson's next judicial assignment will be in the Extreme Northern District of Alaska, rest assured.
And I wouldn't worry about Java either. By the time we get done with Sun, Scott McNealy will be lucky to get a job selling used cars...
Windows XP will succeed...thanks to our new program of "Mandatory Direct Marketing." Every computer user in the country will receive a copy of Windows XP, whether they ask for it or not. If they fail to pay for it, Guido, from our Collections Division, will be coming around to "persuade" them...
And once public opinion turns against those Linux and Open Source hackers (and it will turn against them, no matter how many legislators we have to buy), we can start shipping them all off to our new network of death camps. Did I say "death camps"? I meant "happy camps," where they can be properly reeducated and turn into nice little Windows users who will buy their upgrades when we tell them to.
In conclusion: We don't care. We don't have to. We're Microsoft. Give us your credit card numbers and shut the fuck up.
Sincerely yours,
William H. Gates III
Chairman, Chief Software Architect, and Prince of Darkness
Someone did that to a buddy of mine here at work a while back, and we had a few ideas on how to "deal" with it:
"Microsoft good, open source bad! Microsoft good, open source bad! Microsoft good, open source bad!"
Eric
--
Be who you are...and be it in style!
Sure. See Portable.NET
A commercial company with that many incompabilities between language versions would soon the out of business.
I presume you're discussing Perl, not Python -- Python is quite compatible between versions; the only major incompatibility-inducing changes in the last three revisions have been the removal of a feature which was both undocumented and deprecated. The improved scoping in 2.1 (despite the unlikelyhood of it breaking preexisting code) is toggleable at runtime... in short, the development team is being pretty damn cautious.
Now, Perl... well, perl just sucks. :)
Looks like RMS isn't too far away from this! :^)
Slashdot's first reaction to VMware
Lyx--though it's quasi-GPL, not GPL. (Even though it calls itself GPL).
Then again, if it could verify consent of every coder past and present, it *would* change licenses. The problem is figuring out patches more than a couple of years back . .
hawk
>because in some industries it would make the prices go up and down
>like a yo-yo,
whereas the price of gasoline doen'st do that . . .
>making it harder for the local population to sell their
>wares. Let's take fish for example. I don't think very many fishermen
>would like the idea of countries like Norway selling them surplus fish
>for almost nothing.
Neither would the Norwegian fisherman. This would drive down
the price on the rest of their fish, too . . . The U.S. has
government programs for the destruction of small fruit, and
industry requested regulations for size minimums for sale to
keep supply down. Nonconforming fruit is typically plowed under.
If these same actions were taken without the governmental order,
they'd go to jail . . .
>Just too sad the fish is merely discarded instead
>of being fed to those who are dying of hunger in the world.
If you can figure out a way to get it to them, go collect your
Nobel Prizes for Peace and Economics (and possibly chemistry and
physics). The countries currently suffering from starvation
ar not doing so because there is not enough food, nor even because
they haven't been given enough in relief efforts. The problem is
in distribution. Typically, it is either corruption in government
or rebel forces/freedom fighters/whatevers either taking it for
themselves (often by force) or obstructing the distribution (not
letting relief workers in). Quite frequently these countries
are exporting food while their citizens starve.
>Some cold
>hearts even make the argument that giving the fish to poor people
>would disrupt the world-market.
world market? It would disrupt the local market, too. But the
distribution problem is still there.
>Aside
Much better to let the world bank keep
>heir stranglehold on the poor countries, and fake useless donations.
Donations? World Bank? It make sloans, not donations.
>(Question: Why are countries poor? Because of imperialism and its
>extension in the 21th century: the world market)
Huh? Countries our poor because of corrupt governments used by
whatever the local elite is (whether landowners or communists) to
transfer the existing wealth to themselves or their benefactors
(army, corporation, relatives, whatever). Imperialism needs
trade, not a poor country around. Trade benefits both parties
(or the transaction wouldn't occur). A good profit-minded imperialist
will cause the creation of wealth in the colonial lands (Although
I'm not sure any place but Britain ever got this straight. I
still haven't figured out what France, Belgium, Portugal, etc.
thought they wer doing.).
hawk
Sheep? Between foot-and-mouth and slashdot, there are none left for Microsoft.
Dear Mr. Gates.
Please place my address on your "do not send junk mail to:" list. I run Linux on the computer I built myself, and I do not own any MSFT stock. Your constant letters are a waste of time and paper.
I am also certain that Judge Jackson will not be sent to Extreme Northern District of Alaska, as that would likely interfere in George W.'s plan to hand off that district to the oil companies for exploitation. He needs a judge in his pocket up there.
Sincerely *not* yours,
a free thinker.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Correction:
Strictly speaking, it is not what the oil *companies* are doing, it is what the Organisation of Oil Producing and Exporting *COUNTRIES* are doing (aka OPEC).
And if you want to hear MY opinion, it is the #1 reason for the current economic slowdown. It started with OPEC agreeing to constrain supply, with comments from members like Venezuela saying things like "America's economy is booming, and ours is sagging, it's time for us to get a piece of the pie."
And nobody in America, the World Bank, Federal Reserve, or Newsmedia, said or did one fucking thing about it.
The internet "economy" and ecommerce rely on one crucial non-computer factor: transportation and shipping. Raise the costs of oil, and the costs of shipping go up, and profit margins slump.
The California Energy Crisis (TM) (coming to a town near you) is largely due to OPEC's cutbacks as well. This also will have an impact on the success or failure of the "new economy".
I've said this since Reagan was in office presiding over "the longest economic expansion in history" (TM), it had NOTHING to do with tax cuts, liberalization of trade laws, the environment, God, or anything else, other than CHEAP OIL. George Bush (#41) understood it, and beat Iraq over it. It's all about CHEAP OIL. Nothing else.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
"Open source, as advocated by Sun, IBM, etc., says that you bought the hardware... here's the software that comes with it."
I don't know about Sun, but that's not the way I see IBM's attitude to Open Source. IBM's attitude varies from product to product, but let's take three examples:
1. Apache -- IBM noticed that their proprietary web server had a tiny market share, while Apache was wildly successful. Someone thought "hey, this is silly, if we become Apache developers, we can help mould it into something that we want, and we can sell it by adding proprietary sugar-coating and selling support" -- and that's what you get with the WebSphere range of products. IBM contribute greatly to the core, free, Apache -- but they also sell proprietary systems which hook into Apache to provide more functionality (e.g. their servlet engine, Commerce Suite etc).
2. Linux -- Someone at IBM noticed "Hey, this thing is *portable*. If we port this to all our server platforms, then we can develop server software once, and be able to run it on anything from a NetFinity PC, to an X-Series mainframe. We can offer our customers a true, smooth, growth path". We have yet to see what this means for AIX...
3. Jikes -- simple one this, a researcher develops something cool. It's not marketable as-is (although later it could become part of a "prettier" product) so it becomes great "Geek PR" to give it away.
--
This sort of technique works swimmingly against Microsoft's other commercial software competitors, but it isn't nearly as effective against Linux because Linux can be used without asking for permission from the accountants.
In every business where I have seen Linux used it started off as the basis of a skunkworks project. Linux was chosen because the project had little or no funding. That's the beautty of Linux really, all you need is an idea, and a little bit of time, Linux supplies the rest. It comes complete with an amazing set of tools, and there are plenty of folks out on the Internet that are more than happy to point you in the right direction. The documentation might be spotty at times, but there is plenty of example code to use, and chances are good that someone else has already written the difficult bits for you.
On several occassions I have seen Linux implementations finished before the "official" proprietary software based project that it was competing with was able to even get the necessary software licenses. And once Linux gains a foothold in the company it spreads like the plague. Accountants are not stupid. Part of the reason that Linux is doing so well in the server arena is that accountants know that you don't always get what you pay for. Microsoft's latest tactics will backfire fantastically. In fact, this particular speech will probably be ridiculed almost as much as Alchin's "Un-American" crack.
I hate to break up your utopian anti-capitalist dream, but the GPL fits into a captitalist society much better than you think. For example, Cygnus was profitable (and growing) for years before anyone had ever heard of RedHat. They used gcc as a battering ram to open the compiler market for them. Had they just been another compiler company they would have disappeared into the annals of time without a trace. Instead they gave away the compiler, and (in many areas) became the de-facto standard. This not only undermined the value of their competitors closed source compilers, but it gave them control (although very benevolent control) over a fairly large portion of the overall compiler support business.
If you think about it, GPL programmers are very much like lawyers. Lawyers aren't paid for creating new laws (well most aren't), but instead they are paid for their knowledge in applying the law. With Free Software the value isn't in the 1's and 0's themselves, but instead it is in the talents of those folks who know how to create solutions with the software. This is bad news for Microsoft (because they sell software), but it is good news for nearly everyone else (especially the freelance hacker and the software consumer).
All of a sudden I can offer my clients robust solutions without having to pay any Microsoft tax. I can even create custom proprietary solutions on top of already existing code (and charge money for this solution). However, if I am not careful one of my competitors will create a similar solution and release it under a Free License. His solution will then almost certainly become the de-facto standard, and his intimate knowledge of the new standard will become more valuable than my knowledge of a proprietary non-standard solution. In other words, at some point it becomes in my best interest to share.
The days when standards could be forced from pure market pressure alone are coming to an end. Even Microsoft with 90% of the desktop market is finding that they have to give software away to have any chance of affecting de-facto standards. The only reason that .Net even has a chance is because they based it on a whole raft of open protocols (complete with open source implementations). The only reason that we aren't all still using Netscape is that Microsoft gave away IE. And now with Microsoft's draconian new licensing scheme for Office XP don't be surprised if small businesses and home users start using StarOffice.
There are valid reasons to use either licenses.
The GPL FORCES external contribution. This IMHO is awesome for projects that want to progress ahead VERY quickly. With the GPL you release your code for FREE as in SPEECH, but not as in BEER. Because you ARE requesting a payment, anyone that modifies your code is required to give the modificatons back to you. There fore you "profit" from the GPL. ( I use the term "profit" lightly here )
If you really want to release your source for "free" as in BEER and SPEECH you should use the BSD License. With this license the user of your source can do anything they want with it. Including making money of YOUR work, and not giving you anything back. That's the FREE BEER part.
IMHO, if you are developing a product to compete with someone like MS your best bet is to use the GPL because it prevents MS from subverting your code. If they want to use YOUR code, they HAVE to give something back to you. The GPL FORCES cooperation. However it is not co-orced, MS can ALWAYS choose to write their own code.
On the other hand if you are trying to establish an industry standard, your best bet is the BSD License.. because other companies use closed source projects, and they will not be willing to "infest" their closed source projects with GPL source.
Well I would label your post as FUD.
What is it that the business flunkies don't see?
What is it that the engineers know better?
Have you stopped to consider that they have different perspectives?
There are a lot of highly skilled, technical people, like myself that see great advantages in what Microsoft has created and proposes to create. We're certainly not alone, in fact we outnumber the Open Source world at least 10 to 1.
However we aren't as vocal, either. There's no point. Our world is on top, we are having a lot of fun doing what we enjoy doing.
The Open Source world on the other hand is a lot like the Christian Right, losing the battle and shouting at the rain.
Out of curiousity, can you provide any examples of this "best software"?
I can't for the life of me think of any software licensed under the GPL which is anything more than adequate.
I know of a number of open source projects which are pretty good, but the really popular good ones like Apache aren't licensed under the GPL.
I keep asking this question, and nobody can provide a clear answer.
I actually did see a panel discussion two years ago which included Bob Young from RedHat and I think it was Ed Muth from Microsoft, and one other person I don't recall.
Mr. Young certainly tried to dominate the discussion at the beginning, but by the end Mr. Muth had made several extremely good points and really had a lot of people going "Oh, yeah, I guess I hadn't thought of that."
It was interesting.
Wow, you are really out of touch.
Like I said... out of touch.
but, as was also pointed out, ftp is not a tcp/ip stack.
- ...some people assume that if you say something bad about Java, that it means you must be cheering on Microsoft.
I'm not one of those people, but the topic of this thread is Microsoft.- The fact that there are Java work-alikes just highlights the fact that Sun refuses to release the Java source code for free(dom) use.
No, it highlights the fact that some people don't like the rules they have to follow to get Sun's source code. That's fine; some people don't like the rules imposed by the GPL, either (particularly Microsoft). That's why there are other licenses and duplicate efforts. WebMacro and Velocity are both free software, and they do exactly the same thing, but Velocity was created because (at one point) WebMacro's license conflicted with the APL.Sun's Java license has never stopped me from doing what I need to do, so I don't mind it. It did bother some other people I know, so you know what they did? They wrote their own damn Java implementation. I suppose they should have just wasted their time whining about Sun on Slashdot, instead.
- Why else would people have to produce re-implementations that end up forking the language in subtle ways?
Who did that? Oh yeah, Microsoft. No one else, though. Japhar and Kaffe have struggled to keep full compliance with Sun's published specification. In other words: You don't know what you're talking about.Like I said,"Thinly-veiled Java bashing."
Meanwhile, what standards body control the Linux Kernal? Perl? PHP? Is mod_perl part of any W3C standard? Sun's strict control of Java's definition is a feature not a hinderance. Sure Java has plenty of weak spots, but there are numerous of options for fixing them, none of which rely on a standards body deliberating.
Microsoft submits their crap to standards bodies to distract feeble-minded tehcnopundits like yourself. The fact is, their stuff is more proprietary than anyone else's and they'll do what they want with it regardless of any standards.
If Java is so "proprietary" how is it that there are several open-source implementations of it? Can you name one open source implementation of C#?
Sound familiar? It's the LGPL. And, unless somebody can turn me on to something better, it's the best compromise I've found between Stallman's holy grail of "pure" Free software and the realities of business computing today.
Maybe we can't share our finished products. But at least let us share the building blocks we use to build.
Well said. I always felt that BSDL was a black hole, from which no code ever returns.
We're not scare-mongering/This is really happening - Radiohead
This sig intentionally left blank.
I just don't get the BSD license. I have written both closed and GPL code, the former because I was paid, the latter because I could benefit from others improving my code. Writing code under the BSD license seems to be the worst of both worlds, as I would gain neither of the two benefits. When the BSD license works (and it does, in a number of cases), it is because the community is treating it like the GPL license and submitting changes to the source. So why not choose the license that makes that behaviour mandatory?
No -- its buy the first one for $10,000 ONCE, sell it to 12 people for $1,000, and boom : $2000 profit...but eventually the price will finally (and in good health) drop to 0...in any case, this is unlikely for any GPL software to have happen to it.
--
You know, you gotta get up real early if you want to get outta bed... (Groucho Marx)
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
As for RedHat being the only Linux brand (at least in the public's eye)? Well, others have written that the chance for that has come and gone and it isn't going to happen.
--
You know, you gotta get up real early if you want to get outta bed... (Groucho Marx)
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
Its not "money making" directly -- its what you DO with OpenSource software that can be money making. M$ doesn't fear that somebody else is really going to make money by making OSS...what they feare is the other factors you mention -- long term and market gaining -- things tht won't make money for others, but WILL take money away from M$.
--
You know, you gotta get up real early if you want to get outta bed... (Groucho Marx)
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
But that isn't something that can be re-sold...
--
You know, you gotta get up real early if you want to get outta bed... (Groucho Marx)
"But remember, most lynch mobs aren't this nice." (H.Simpson)
-- Joe
The GPL was designed to keep free software free. Basically it gives you all the freedom in the world, except for taking away that freedom from others. Okay, I think we all know that.
Now apply the same logic to the intellectual property within the software. Just because everyone can benefit from it doesn't destroy the intellectual property, it is just being shared.
The GPL protects intellectual property from being absorbed by one particular entity, whether it be a person or company or organisation. The GPL was designed to do this.
Proprietary software protects the IP of the individual writing it. GPL is less egoistic. But of course, it's almost a crime anno 2001 not to be egoistic.
Ahh yes, Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser... I must reread that series someday soon.
The real threat to future innovation and development does not come from Free code.
No, the real problem is when someone has come up with a brilliant idea, spent weeks/months writing it up in an application only to find out that he has "infringed" upon dozens of software patents in the process.
Now that is something that threatens future innovation.
--
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb15CB32EF3AF9C0E5D727
echo '[q]sa[ln0=aln80~Psnlbx]16isb572CCB9AE9DB03273snlbxq' |dc
Man, last time I post a straight faced joke on Slashdot. It is apparently taken seriously, marked "Insightful" and "Interesting". I respond to my own post, clarifying it as a joke. My clarifying post is marked down for being off topic!
There are many cool people at Stern and I apologise if i offended any of them.
Oh the other hand, I feel justified in taking pot shots at Microsoft and NYU. : )
...moderators, would you mind marking my post, the post i'm refering to, DOWN?
Know what I like about atheists? I've yet to meet one that believes God is on their side.
As an NYU student studying to get my BFA in Photography and Imaging at Tisch School of the Arts, I can verify nearly all people associated with that school down the block (Stern School of Business) are, in fact, bloodsucking money grubbers. Of course they are teaming up with The Borg. NYU is taking over Manhattan (specifically, the village and union square), Microsoft is taking over your desktop.
Or maybe i'm just jealous that I won't be making six figures after I graduate and paying back $40k in student loans. I'm an artist, I can starve.
Do you expect a university to have Linus Torvalds give a speech on economics to students who are paying nearly $35,000 to learn how to shake hands? No, these are students that attach WORD documents to emails, because "Microsoft is the standard." As far as they are concerned, the exchange of money is what makes the world go 'round. Every machine running linux is another Microsoft employee out of work.
Know what I like about atheists? I've yet to meet one that believes God is on their side.
To Bill Gates and Steve Balmer.
Stop this bullshit.
Now.
You've just managed to get the stock price back over $70 a share for the first time since Jackson nailed your corporate balls to the wall. You just managed to put out a pretty damn good operating system in the form of Windows 2000. And you're just getting started with .NET, which, yeah, is a Java ripoff, but it's at least a fairly solid idea.
And now, from all appearances, you're ready to shoot yourselves in the foot.
Windows XP? The operating system that'll break every time you install a bit of hardware? This is reminiscent of Commodore when they cut out a piece of their motherboard rather than let users install a part themselves.
FUD campaign against Linux and Open Source? Who are you kidding? Nobody's paying attention to your opinions on the matter anymore, and for good reason. Everyone knows you have a bias; everyone who's paying attention has seen the Halloween Documents; and too many big names (like IBM and Oracle) have embraced Linux, which is pretty much the OSS standard bearer.
This is going to smell like desperation on your parts, and this is going to drive your share price down.
Don't cost me money. Come to your senses. Soon.
ObJectBridge (GPL'd Java ODMG) needs volunteers.
Finding God in a Dog
There is a difference beteween the "personal computer market" and the "corporate software market".
The internet services that OSS does so well cuts into MSs coportate sector because the industry in general is moving to internet delevery of data. The new release of Samba will definitly have an effect on NT/2000 sales, especialy in the smaller office.
But, on the other hand, 'normal' consumers still all in all are using MS stuff at home.
Microsoft it making this argument from the perspective of (duh) a software company. And yes, OSS, and GPL software does very much undermine some practical aspects of IP.
But, the world is bigger then just software companies. Software is infastructure, and infastructure design must be open so that it can be inspected and independently verified. Putting 'freedom' and politics asside, software needs to be independently verified and approved for safety and reliability reasons.
This independent review could be done by something like a government agency, UL/CSA/ASA etc with a pool of 'anti-virgins' (in the reverse engineering sense), but moving to OSS satisifies this, and is the logical extreem.
Personaly, I realy dont care about having the source code, but knowing that my apps (well, the big, important ones) have had good independent peer review lets me sleep at nights. (well usualy, insomnia tonight...)
They released the source code to Notepad. I mean, if that isn't commitment to open source(tm) what is?!
From the link in the parent, emphasis mine.
Nothing would please me more than being able to hire ten programmers and deluge the hobby market with good software.
You mean after 25 years Gates still hasn't found 10 programmers?
hee heeTrolling is a art,
This strategy occurred to me as a potential M$ move about a year ago. Nightmare scenarios came to mind of legal prohibition of free software development. M$ can certainly buy plenty of judges and lawyers; this may yet not be an impossibility.
Free software should remain legitimate (not just legal, but a public good) in the public perception. ESR's article is a good start, but appearing as it does in Linux Today, he's preaching to the choir. The involvement of IBM and other big companies with free software lends legitimacy, but is probably too far below the public radar to be perceived as a compelling free-speech issue.
It would be good if somebody with the connections to do so could get these distinctions clarified in more mainstream media, before M$ has a chance to codify "free software == piracy" as U.S. law.
WWJD for a Klondike Bar?
I know why MS has brought out the big puppets for this kill linux/bsd/GNU show lately. They are scared. Linux and BSD is kicking their butts now. Linux is embedded far more than any microsoft embedded product (embedded NT is just plain funny!! How can you have an embedded OS that huge?? Windows CE is not realtime, cannot be realtime and is known to all in the embedded world that it is worthless, hell MS even abandoned it) Linux is winning the embedded front easily, there is no real competition there from MS.
Servers, Big companies are now starting to impliment Linux and BSD servers instead of MS. My company has issued a statment that we will NOT migrate to windows 2000, and running 2000 is not allowed. (reasons? it offers the company nothing but an expense) But this same company is popping up more linux servers every week (three in my office alone!)
Ms is losing, they can see it, and they really want to either slow down the steamroller or try and dynamite it. when a company with 20 employees can save thousands each year by not using microsoft and still get the work done, the dollars will start talking louder than the drones.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
I cannot imagine Open Source to be bad for customers - be it end users, corporations, etc. It could be bad to Microsoft. So what? Don't whine about it, deal with it, Microsoft!
We, the end users, just want our software. We want quality. And we want the possibility to hack into the source of our software, to get even more quality.
We don't care about who makes our software. We want to be independent from suppliers as possible, so when a supplier gets down, we don't get down with them. Now that's a sound business model!
This is your sig. There are thousands more, but this one is yours.
Those open-source freaks aren't the only one -- there are also people like the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, that just gives away computers and software and money, like socialists or communists! Just encouraging people to beg for things instead of earning it! If they're not good enough to pay for things, they should just crawl into the sewer and die, and get out of the way of the capitalists who keep our country strong!
Microsoft, protector of intellectual property rights - except for the ones of its customers. Yes, how soon we forget the Passport.com Terms of Use fiasco and how good THAT was for intellectual property... Bunch of hypocritical jerks.
== Paul Rickard, Editor of The Microsoft Boycott Campaign ====
bnf
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"The executive, Irving Wladawsky- Berger, an I.B.M. vice president, said, "If we thought this was a trap, we wouldn't be doing it, and as you know, we have a lot of lawyers."
Are "a lot of lawyers" really going to get you anywhere when it comes to the GPL?
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the GPL doesn't seem to allow for any legal recourse -- I'm surprised that IBM would make a statement like that.
~dlb
Let's dissect the article:
In short, another MS foot-in-mouth artist who only serves to drive people away.
At this rate I think MS's best marketing tactics would be to shut up for awhile and work on their software and products - software and products that I (be shocked) do not always think are that bad.
But I guess it's easier to insult people and play marketing games then write good code.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
> You mean I've been decieved by those nasty GNU hippies all this time?
Remember what Ballmer said a couple of months ago: Free software cheats people out of the opportunity to pay for their software.
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
--
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
John 17:20
The good thing about the GPL is that independant discovery is completely acceptable. The GPL is a copyright device, not a patent device.
You'll always be able to write non-GPLed software. Even better, you'll be able to use GPLed software as a learning tool to do so. In fact, as long as you paraphrase, you can pretty well use code snippets as well.
Contrast this to most companies attempts to patent obvious things, keeping anyone else from implementing that thing, independently or not.
These are two seperate things...
Price fixing is when two (or more) companies agree to set certain prices for their products instead of letting market forces decide them.
This is what the oil companies are doing. They know customers have to buy, so they agree to limit production enough to drive prices to their ideal spot of the price-elasticity curve, rather than having open production and open consumption set a price.
'Dumping' refers to selling something below cost. Some of this is allowed - loss leaders at the supermarket for example, but other things are not. The law is designed to prevent companies from doing a MS, giving away one product (supported by the income from other products) just to force competitors out of the market.
Based on suggests, to me, code that is reliant on GPLed code. It doesn't suggest that the code is derived from, that's different.
:= x + 1;", etc.
As for the 'translation'... To me, that says that mere translation doesn't create a new work. This fits with general copyright law.
I can't take Star Trek and simply translate it into German and sell it as my own. But I could take the idea of a spaceship of people from a similar society exploring the galaxy, etc, and write a story about them as long as it wasn't identical with the names files off.
I think RMS's comments of code being speech back this up... Translation is (mostly) a mechanical thing, "Oui" is "Yes", "ferme" is "close", etc. Much the same as "x++;" is "x
Direct translation doesn't involve any creative work, thus it's the same work (from a creation POV) as the original.
But, if you took the code and liked what it did, and came up with a new way to do it... that'd be like deciding you liked science-fiction stories with spaceships after watching Star Trek, then writing your own.
If Microsoft really questioned the Open Source business model they'd just sit back and watch competitors die. The only reason they're spreading all the FUD is that they know Open Source will kill them.
Look at what companies say about issues they don't care about, or wish to remain silent on... nothing. They certainly don't sacrifice the credability of their PR guys over unimportant issues.
Had MS quietly continued their business, I wouldn't think they cared. As is, it's pretty well a sign that they know they're tanking and they can't stop it.
Of course, it might take a while, and a Microsoft that tanked might still be more powerful than many other companies, but it'd be essentially dead, no matter what they call it.
Methink thou doth protest too much.
If MS was concerned Open Source wouldn't work, they'd shut up about it and watch Corel, IBM, Redhat, and all the other companies, big and small, take a huge hit. Then they'd rake in more money.
The reason do they have for their throwing away PR guys (what value do they have left after the lose all credability?)
They're afraid Open Source will work, for everyone else, and they're desperately telling people that the emperor looks simply divine in his clothes. To look just like the emperor (simply divine, I remind you) you should rush out and buy MS Clothes 2.0, and not take those free clothes everyone is willing to give you...
Simply put, quality sells itself. If they had anything that would sell itself, they'd let it.
They'd stay friendly with IT types who went to other alternatives, knowing they'd be back. Instead of how it is now, knowing that anyone who investigates a unix-based alternative for a server is never going back to NT...
(The only reason to stay with an NT server is to support clients who demand Outlook/Exchange/Active Directory. I'm not into the MS stuff, so I don't know how much of that can be done ala Samba...)
It's not news that MS doesn't like Open Source/Linux/etc. What is news is that MS is lying, yet again, to a bunch of execs.
That means that IT types need to know what they say so that we can refute it when our bosses panic about us running Apache instead of IIS.
It's "Know your enemy", they're my enemy because they're trying to convince my employers to use less workable "solutions" (if they can be called that) to already solved problems.
This is not the case - from a commercial perspective it is far better
a za ar/
to use a Duel company licence and licence-GPL/LGPL scheme.
I think it's time for everyone to read "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" again
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/writings/cathedral-b
"The Cathedral and the Bazaar" is not just about releasing source code
to the public for inspection. Mostly the article covers the advantages
in using a more open *development* model.
Quoteing the introduction
"""Linus Torvalds's style of development - release early and often, delegate
everything you can, be open to the point of promiscuity - came as a
surprise. No quiet, reverent cathedral-building here -- rather, the Linux
community seemed to resemble a great babbling bazaar of differing
agendas and approaches (aptly symbolized by the Linux archive sites, who'd
take submissions from anyone) out of which a coherent and
stable system could seemingly emerge only by a succession of miracles"""
Instead of *developing* in a closed loop environment ( limited to the number
of programmers you hire, subcontract and constrain under NDA agreements )
you throw the development open to everybody and their dog.
( The rest is history - http://www.opensource.org/docs/history.html )
If a business is going to *develop* a project in an open Bazaar like way,
Then it is more important to develop under a open source licence that
includes an Anti-"Whats yours is mine and whats mine is mine" clause.
This prevents the competition taking existing source code and adapting
it ( to the point of producing an incompatable proprietary version )
without providing a reusable copy of the modified source code to
the original project.
Only GPL/LGPL viral type licences provide this class of protection
( even if is is currently untested in any jurisdiction ).
The GPL/LGPL licenses are clearly understood by a large population of
programmers, adopting it encorages participation in the project.
This is the reason why Mozilla, Sun Openoffice and a LOT of other
projects are *developing* their code under LGPL/GPL or Duel
licence GPL.
See http://www.openoffice.org/license.html for
an example
Well, look at it from the other side, how would you feel if next time there is an Apache conference, or a Kernel developers conference, or a perl conference or whatever, people from MS showed up waving banners outside, harassing you by asking the speaker endless questions about open source ethics while, say, Linus is talking?
I'm sure you'd be very pissed, *really* pissed, and I don't even want to imagine the flames here on slashdot if that happened.
We live in a society where free speech is a guaranteed liberty, all this implied talk of 'MS is going to spew FUD at this convention, let's go and show them who's right' leads down a slippery slope to civil unrest.
If you honestly want to go to this talk to listen, to ask meaningful questions, to be civil, then so be it, if this is a public event (which I'm not sure), if you plan to go there to just be a nuisance, think how you would react if the same was done at a Free software conference where you were attending.
Just because you don't agree with MS's ethics, or with their position is no excuse to resort to intimidatory tactics. If you want respect, please be prepared to give some.
-- the cake is a lie
Apologies for that one - in retrospect, it came out a little harsher than I intended (although it did scan really well :-).
My intent was to point out that, to my mind, BSDLing code is akin to placing no value on your code - you don't care what anyone else does with your code, because it doesn't impact upon your financial position. The GPL places a (nonmonetary) value on code, which people must pay before using the code.
Sure, but do you get a discount because you helped to write it? If not, then by my math, you are paying for the right to use code that you wrote.
At the end of the day, this is really the nub of the argument. I don't think you're an idiot who places no value on his code; I hope you don't think the same (or worse) about me. The only difference between our positions is that I want to ensure that noone is able to profit (financially or otherwise) from my altruism without being altruistic in return, whereas you don't mind what anyone else does, as long as they use your code, and credit you in the source code.
This is a fundamental difference of opinion, and I doubt that any amount of yelling, arguing, cajoling, or otherwise will convince either one of us that the other is right.
Russ %-)
... and never, ever play leapfrog with a unicorn.
Thats one way of looking at it. Here's another:
"I'm giving my code to the world, at no monetary cost. If you want to use my code for your project, then I ask that you play by the same rules. I'm not going to let you exploit my effort for your personal and exclusive gain."
versus:
"I'm giving my code to the world, at no monetary cost. Do whatever you want with it. If you want to take it, modify it in a way that is incompatible with my version, and then charge me (or others) for the priviledge, go right ahead - fine by me."
Personally, I find the second much more offensive.
Don't think it would happen that way? I give you the MS TCP/IP stack, and the Darwin layer of OSX. Apple and Microsoft are making buckets of money out of someone elses work. This isn't to degrade the effort made by Apple and Microsoft on code that they did engineer; however, the fact remains that they didn't engineer the BSDL'd code they use, they didn't have to pay for it, and they are not required to give anything back to the community in return. Admittedly, Apple does, but this is just PR - not a legal requirement. MS certainly doesn't.
If this code had been GPL'd, Apple and MS would have been forced to either contribute back to the community, or develop their own code, from scratch, on their own dime.
The reason I use the GPL has nothing to do with some inherent desire to conquer the rest of the code writing community. It is simply a way of ensuring that you don't profit from my altruism in a manner that I cannot or will not exploit.
If your code is BSDL'd, it may as well be in the public domain. The only advantage that the BSDL gives you is that whoever swipes your code has to credit you, in the source file: something that 99.999% of proprietary software users will never see. If this doesn't bother you, then fine. It's your choice. However, don't preach on how much more free you are. I, however, will continue to interpret your choice to use the BSDL as a sign that either:
Russ %-)
... and never, ever play leapfrog with a unicorn.
You read it here first.
--
+&x
Probably not -- read this:
"Either verbatim or with modifications and/or translated into another language" is the kicker -- it's very loose phrasing. And it could indeed be taken that modifications and translation are the same as reading, digesting, and writing your own based on it.
The GPL also repeatedly uses the term 'based on' later in the license. So it's probably not legal to do so.
Simon
Coming soon - pyrogyra
Well, duh! The GPL license is the only one which forces people who use the software to release their software under the GPL license as well. Why don't Microsoft have anything against the BSD license? The same reason I don't -- because the BSD license doesn't have a hidden agenda. The BSD license is a way of releasing source in a manner that is free for anyone to use -- and then the people who use that software then have the choice of whether they release their software under that license or not.
GPL isn't altruistic at all. The way I feel about it is like this:
"I'm releasing my software for free! But if you want to use my source, I'm going to make you release your software for free too, so that I can use your modifications."
Versus:
"I'm releasing my software for free. I don't mind what you do with it -- it's free, it's out there, and what you do with it is your choice. Just give me a credit, and everything's kosher"
Which is more altrustic to you? Which gives everyone more freedom?
Simon
Coming soon - pyrogyra
This has already been mentioned in this context, but I haven't seen it yet in this discussion. Gandhi's four steps to victory are as follows:
1. They ignore you.
2. They laugh at you.
3. They fight you.
4. You win.
Doesn't this also apply to Microsoft?
MS has spent some time at step 1 (OSS community ignoring them).
Then, the OSS community has spent a lot of time laughing at Microsoft for it not being 'stable'.
Now, the OSS community is fighting Microsoft, trying to ensure it has replacements for EVERYTHING Microsoft does (GUI - KDE/Gnome, Office Suite - KOffice/Star Office... MS Money - Gnucash etc etc etc).
When does step 4 happen again?
Simon
Coming soon - pyrogyra
Ah, you should qualify that even further really.
"Open Source isnt a good thing in general if you want to make a profit from selling proprietary consumer productivity software."
However, Open Source is a great thing if you want to make a higher profit in any other buisness segment. And considering that the Microsoft is one of very very few companies making money in from that segment, that would mean that for 99.5% of worldwide industry, ranging from car manufacturers to corner grocers, Open Source (including Free, GPL software) is a very good proposition.
Jim Allchin, a software designer at Microsoft
ok
First of all, Linux is good for Microsoft; they probably enjoy having an easily identifiable enemy to bash, and rally up against, since so few real MS enemies is left.
But it seems that MS have some trouble with crushing and destroying Linux; First, Linux really isn't a single company that can be killed or bought, or intimidated into submission.
At same time, "everyone" agrees, that Open Source has its advantages, and actually makes pretty good software that works.
The advantages with OSS (Open Source Software) seems so compelling, that even MS must stress, in the middlest of a full scale FUD attack against OSS, that MS software is kind of Open Source (see, a few hardware manufactures, and some Uni's are allowed to peek into some parts of our code). Really mixed signals.
OTOH; This FUD speak, targetting especially the GPL license, really underscores one thing;
Open Source, and OSI approved licenses, like GPL, really are a viable, long term, money making, market gaining, idea and force, or else MS would not bother.
Remember, this is not a random MS employee venting his personal opinions, but part of a carefully corporate campaign (see article). MS PHP's must have met to strategy meetings, made plans, exchanged emails, sought approval from Balmer/Gates?, and put lesser minions into action.
I guess it soon will be season for some serious MS "astro turfing".
I'm surprised no one mentioned the comments on OSS in other countries. The quote sounded rather ominous to me:
He said Microsoft was particularly concerned about the inroads that the open-source idea was making in other countries. "It's happening very, very broadly in a way that is troubling to us," he said. "I could highlight a dozen countries around the world who have open-source initiatives."
This makes OSS sound like a health epidemic in a third world country. What does MS mean by they are "concerned" about OSS in other countries? It sounds ominous and egotistical (not a surprise really) It doesn't sound like they're just referring to companies in other countries, but governments. Government software is one area where in my mind there should be a mandate for open source.
What Microsoft's "concerned" with is that they're not getting to rape these countries with outrageous license fees anymore. In some countries, where the average yearly salary is considerably less than a license for Windows 2000 Advanced Server with enough CALs to run a proper network environment, what kind of sense does it make not to use Free Software?
Strangely enough, Microsoft would actually prefer these countries steal Windows, in the hope that someday they'll be able to capitalize on them as customers when they do have enough money. When they're not dependent on Microsoft in any way, that's when Bill loses!
Right...
Hey man, this is the open source revolution and you cant have a revolution without some bloodshed, or at least taking a few hostages. Proletariatians of the computing world, gather up your arms! The operating system will not be held by the bourgeois at Microsoft, no longer! We demand an operating system of the proletariat, owned only by the community!
How we know is more important than what we know.
You know absolutely nothing about communism. Go here read it and stop foaming at the mouth. BTW - at the last turn of the century it was precisely the communists who believed that "human labor is about to go the way of the dinosaurs".
How we know is more important than what we know.
Bullshit.
Don't get me wrong, I think Java does a good job in certain fields, and a lousy job in others, and I'd say the same thing about every other programming language in existence.
But don't even try and tell me that it wasn't a buisness decision to fight Microsoft. No previous programming language has been marketed to VPs and managers as well as programmers. No previous programming language got prime-time TV advertisements (anybody else remember the "Java has no limits" spot?) and huge billboards next to the downtown highways.
Java has the distinction of being the first programming language with a marketing slogan.
It's a nifty language and I like playing with it. It can do some things that, while certainly not new, are damn useful. But it wasn't a natural language evolution. It was designed to do one thing -- make money for Sun.
You cannot apply a technological solution to a sociological problem. (Edwards' Law)
This point was clearly made before as referenced by this article.
Police state tactics, such as the suppression of speech in the DeCSS case, are most definitely not features of capitalism. They are bugs in the U.S. implementation of capitalism where corporations buy Congressmen and get them to pass unconstitutional laws, while uninformed voters keep electing them.
And don't think for a minute this won't happen in your lifetime.
It won't happen in my lifetime, or our grandchildren's lifetime. We've been promised true AI "real soon now" for decades, with very little progress. Even menial jobs require a degree of intelligence that computers do not have and will not for the forseeable future.
We all depend on our labor because we are all slaves.
This makes no sense. If you're a slave because you have to provide for yourself, how are you not a slave if you are forcibly compelled to provide for others?
How to solve most of our problems: 1.Lots of nuclear plants. 2.Cure aging.
Oh, you mean PHBs, right?
The problem with this is: you can't buy out open source, you can't tie open source up in courts, you can't bully them around with license audits, ... all the nice tricks that worked against other corporations don't work here since it is no corporation. The only thing is throwing FUD around, and even that is apparently not easy. They can't argue away that some good software has come out of open source, and derisive statements about that "Linux game" don't hit home. I don't know how Microsoft could "defeat" open source, but they're sure trying hard. Maybe they try the 'embrace and extend' method as in "hey, our adapted open source license is so much better, why don't you use it".
"By the way if anyone here is in advertising or marketing... kill yourself." -- Bill Hicks
Isn't it stran9e how in one complete sentence they can say Open Source has no effect on MS, yet in that same sentence state it has gained ground? If I'm not mistaken MS stands to lose more than any other system since Solaris and SunOS can use open source code.
Again articles like these do nothing more than strengthen open source standing in the market since it gets them exposure without having to spend on marketing, so kudos to MS for continously bashing open source.
Yet at the same time the arguments get pretty boring and redundant at times wouldn't you say
removing the dot in dot comm
Want Root?
There's no value in free!
Oh, and here's a map.
[
[
Of course we all know the next step on this path, don't we?
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
This is no link... but it's a quote of the whole article:
S OF T.html
'May 3, 2001
Microsoft Is Set to Be Top Foe of Free Code
By JOHN MARKOFF
SAN FRANCISCO, May 2 -- Microsoft is preparing a broad campaign countering the movement to give away and share software code, arguing that it potentially undermines the intellectual property of countries and companies. At the same time, the company is acknowledging that it is feeling pressure from the freely shared alternatives to its commercial software.
In a speech defending Microsoft's business model, to be given on Thursday at the Stern School of Business at New York University, Craig Mundie, a senior vice president at Microsoft and one of its software strategists, will argue that the company already follows the best attributes of the open-source model by sharing the original programmer's instructions, or source code, more widely than is generally realized.
The speech is part of an effort by Microsoft to raise questions about the limits of innovation inherent in the open-source approach and to suggest that companies adopting the approach are putting their intellectual property at risk.
Advocates of the open-source movement say that making the code available permits other developers to tinker with it, find problems and improve the software. Although the movement has not yet had a significant effect on sales of Microsoft's Office and Windows products in the personal computer market, the company wants to enter the corporate software market, where open source has gained ground.
In his speech, Mr. Mundie will argue that one aspect of the open-source model, known as the General Public License, or G.P.L., is a potential trap that undercuts the commercial software business and mirrors some of the worst practices of dot- com businesses, in which goods were given away in an effort to attract visitors to Web sites. G.P.L. requires that any software using source code already covered by the licensing agreement must become available for free distribution.
"This viral aspect of the G.P.L. poses a threat to the intellectual property of any organization making use of it," Mr. Mundie said in a telephone interview this week.
I.B.M. in particular has been heavily marketing the free Linux operating system.
Mr. Mundie does not identify I.B.M. by name in his speech, which was provided beforehand, but he says that large companies are naïve in adopting the open-source model.
"I would challenge you," he said, "to find a company who is a large established enterprise, who at the end of the day would throw all of its intellectual property into the open- source category."
An I.B.M. executive said that his company had considered the issues surrounding the protection of intellectual property and had decided that it was possible to follow both a proprietary and a shared business model, even one based on the G.P.L.
The executive, Irving Wladawsky- Berger, an I.B.M. vice president, said, "If we thought this was a trap, we wouldn't be doing it, and as you know, we have a lot of lawyers."
In February, Jim Allchin, a software designer at Microsoft, became a lightning rod for industry criticism when he said in an interview with Bloomberg News that freely distributed software code could stifle innovation and that legislators should be aware of the threat.
Mr. Mundie said he would elaborate on Mr. Allchin's comments while also trying to demonstrate that Microsoft already practices many of what he called the best aspects of the open-source model.
"We have been going around the industry talking to people," Mr. Mundie said, "and have been startled to find that people aren't very sophisticated about the implications of what open source means." He acknowledged that the open-source movement was making inroads.
"The news here is that Microsoft is engaging in a serious way in this discussion," he said. "The open- source movement has continued to gather momentum in a P.R. sense and a product sense."
He said Microsoft was particularly concerned about the inroads that the open-source idea was making in other countries.
"It's happening very, very broadly in a way that is troubling to us," he said. "I could highlight a dozen countries around the world who have open-source initiatives."
Mr. Mundie said that in his speech, he would break the open-source strategy into five categories: community, standards, business model, investment and licensing model. Microsoft, he said, in support of the community ideal, already has what he called a shared-source philosophy, which makes its source code available to hardware makers, software developers, scientists, researchers and government agencies.
Microsoft would expand its sharing initiatives, he said. But he added that the company's proprietary business model was a more effective way to support industry standards than the open-source approach, which he said could lead to a "forking" of the software base resulting in the development of multiple incompatible versions of standard programs.
He cited the history of Unix, which has been replete with incompatible versions. Although he acknowledged that the open-source approach had created new technologies, he said that business models using the open- source community were suspect.
"It is innovation that really drives growth," Mr. Mundie said, arguing that without the sustained investment made possible by commercial software, real innovation would not be possible.
He reserved his harshest criticism in the text of his speech for the G.P.L., a software licensing model defined by programmer Richard M. Stallman in 1984.
"This is not understood by many sophisticated people," Mr. Mundie said. "The goal of the G.P.L. is sweeping up all of the intellectual property that has been contributed. That creates many problems downstream, many of which haven't come home to roost yet."
Mr. Stallman has made a distinction between the open-source software movement and the G.P.L., which he designed as part of the free software movement that he led.
In a response to Microsoft's Mr. Allchin in February, Mr. Stallman wrote:"The free software movement was founded in 1984, but its inspiration comes from the ideals of 1776: freedom, community and voluntary cooperation. This is what leads to free enterprise, to free speech, and to free software."
Today a proponent of the open- source software movement said he thought that Microsoft was taking a clever approach in its challenge.
"It's very clever of them," said Eric Raymond, president of the Open Source Initiative. "Instead of attacking the entire open-source movement they've singled out the one license that is in a sense politically controversial."'
Copyright 2001 The New York Times Company
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/05/03/technology/03
--
Ner lbh sebz gur HFN? Gura lbh'ir whfg ivbyngrq gur QZPN!
Microsoft has been a clever strategist in the past, and there are any number of ways to skin the GPL cat. This isn't one of them. If I were Microsoft, I'd:
Like Word 2, Word 6, Word 97, and what-not?
(Emphasis mine.)
Free Manning, jail Obama.
Don't do it! M'Kay?
:)
here
Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana.
Aside from people pushing away because "it's Microsoft" I'm sure some people would work on it.
What got me thinking though, is where would things be in a year? Aside from the obvious fact that there'd be distro's (RedHat Windows? Almost sadistic to think of it) but what would people add that's not already there? And I don't mean fix the BSOD, because I'm sure that'd be the first thing on the list.
But in a year, would it even resemble Windows as we know it? Would people shy away not because it's Microsoft, but because it's a fundamentally different API (To an extent in NT and definately under 9X/ME)? Would we just replace it with X and make it POSIX?
Anyway, a lot of rhetoric there, any thoughts?
Free Online Woodworking Resources Directory
Still, I have to wonder if ESR is being effective in getting out the message that these things are going to come and that they're so detached from reality, so manipulative in their core, that they should be completely ignored. The problem I see with ESR's write-up is that it's easily construed as an open attack on Microsoft. While he talks about Microsoft's deplorable tactics, it's easy to make a case that he's employing FUD. The image of Microsoft as wanting to steal your data appears at least twice, references to it wanting to keep its greedy hands on its monipoly that is slowly destroying the software industry come about a few times, too. These things all might be true. The fraud accusations may also prove true. Microsoft is a monopoly, and it has been hurting the software industry.
The problem is that most users don't see it that way. Most users don't understand how things were prior to Microsoft's grip and they don't see why Microsoft's hold is such a bad thing (while we're pointing at the lack of good competing products within the commercial space to Microsoft's stuff as demonstrative of how thoroughly Microsoft has damaged the industry, they're pointing at the lack of good alternatives as a good reason for Microsoft to continue). Okay, that's not the problem -- it's more of a cause of the real problem: telling the users how we see it ("how it is") won't change their minds. They will openly and honestly reject your arguments simply because it doesn't mesh with the view from their perspective.
The proper way, of course, is to show them what competition gives them. Show, rather than tell. Telling does nothing, even when your article is specifically about the evils of Microsoft. There's simply not a convicing enough case to be made when the users are wrapped in the cloud of FUD and complacency. Not with words, anyway. So if they're going to reject even the best made attack on Microsoft as it stands alone, what happens to this article? The point of the article was to clue people in on what was going to happen, not attack Microsoft. In the eyes of the commoner (journalists included) not open to the evils of Microsoft, this makes it just another baseless attack on MS.
So while ESR does a good job playing prophet and countering the likely topics of tomorrow's speech, he lets so many people off-the-hook: they don't need to acknowledge these things because they have an easy out--he gives them a convenient way to dismiss the article without thinking about it.
If a corporation is a personhood, is owning stock slavery?
Hmmm... It seems that Craig Mundie's speech has a couple of intents which are logical: justify their closed source model to Wallstreet, and discourage companies from opensourcing existing software products. But I wonder how much that is motivating this speech, as opposed to the hope that people will come to illogical conclusion that they shouldn't use software based on a bad business model...
From the article:
Intellectual property of countries? As far as I'm aware, some public universities hold patents, and that's about as far as any country has intellectual property. And what university has any software patents? Are they trying to imply that, say, by using a GPL'd wordprocessor, any document written with it is "open source"? Yes, many advertising based web sites have bombed (mainly due, as others have pointed out, to the irrational obsession with click-through rates). But giving away software in the hopes of getting support contracts (which many open source companies use) is a different business model than giving away content to gain eyeballs, a model that some companies have managed to make profitable (like Cygnus). Yes, if there's some GPL'd code out there that you'd like to use for a non-GPL'd product, you simply don't use it; seems simple enough to me. And no one is advocating doing anything of the sort as a business model; the only people arguing for whole sale opening of IP are people like RMS, who are morally opposed to IP. All the other opensource gurus point out that you should carefully consider what you should opensource, and how you should do it. Ohhhh boy. He's implying that there's lots of managers/executives who are seriously considering going opensource without knowing anything about the business model repercussions of it, without actually saying so (who did he talk to, about what implications?). Well done, Mr. Mundie, well done! And how many times has this actually happened? Especially with GPL'd software? If so, then Microsoft doesn't really have anything to worry about, do they? Eh? How could this happen? I guess that, say, branch A of a company could GPL it's software, which virally affects the base libraries the entire company uses, so software from branches B to Z of the company get virally affected. But this would assume that: 1) the company is using GPL without being aware of it's viral properties (unlikely), and 2) they can't release their base libraries under LGPL (which would contain the contagion).Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose that you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself.
Give a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day, but set him on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
4. First we Won (the right to be microsoft free)
3. Then we fought (the hardware manufactures to release specs so that we could support more hardware)
2. Now we are laughing at microsoft for running around waiving their hands and pissing their pants scared.
1. Next we'll ignore them :-)
Stramge. My family used to be good friends with the Mundies a few years ago, especially back when he was the CEO of Alliant. He seemed to be full of praise for X and UNIX then...
Not necessarily for people, but read the freakin article. Corporations that are writing closed applications could theoretically have to open it up if a developer included a few lines of GPL.
This is not considered good for the company!
You quitting proves that the karma kap worked. The most annoying of the whores shut up. --CmdrTaco
Wouldn't it be more correct to call the GPL an inductive license or a recursive license, as opposed to a viral license? Viral sounds bad and isn't very descriptive of how the license actually works.
And that is called competition, which is a very very bad thing.
Well, if you want to extend the analogy, it's also called a violation of the minimum wage laws. Where is the Department of Labor when we really need them?
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
"one treats others with courtesy not because they are gentlemen or gentlewomen, but because you are" --G. Henrichs
I think MS has ever right to question to business model on which open source software is based. As the dot-com fallout out has shown, ideas that look great on paper don't always work so well in the real world. That's not to say that OSS won't be useful or successful, but I think the market will determine that. Apache being a grweat example for OSS.
I'm surprised no one mentioned the comments on OSS in other countries. The quote sounded rather ominous to me:
He said Microsoft was particularly concerned about the inroads that the open-source idea was making in other countries.
"It's happening very, very broadly in a way that is troubling to us," he said. "I could highlight a dozen countries around the world who have open-source initiatives."
This makes OSS sound like a health epidemic in a third world country. What does MS mean by they are "concerned" about OSS in other countries? It sounds ominous and egotistical (not a surprise really) It doesn't sound like they're just referring to companies in other countries, but governments. Government software is one area where in my mind there should be a mandate for open source.
This guy actually has the audacity to exercise his right to free speech?!
--
Well, we can just show them Sendmail (which handles the majority of internet mail), Apache (the most popular web server), and Linux (rapidly gaining market share in everything from servers to embedded systems). We can show them gcc, which runs on almost every system. There are countless other notable examples, and there will be more in the future.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Not to mention that free software could do a lot to bridge the digital divide, so the causes are more related than you'd think. A poor inner-city school can afford as many Linux licenses as it wants (since they're free), but few or no Microsoft licenses.
Just because it CAN be done, doesn't mean it should!
Anyone else notice that they are promoting their "open-source" efforts to business flunkies? Not to the Engineers, who would know better, but the to the business majors who will be making the buying decisions. If you didn't already realize it, it's a little insight into their business model: FUD.
.NET against your wishes. I personally make sure that I am seen to know about computers and what is best for the company and others should too.One good way is to set up a stable network that does exactly what the PHB wants. Thence, some marketing drone gives their speil, afterwards they come to you saying "What do you think of...?"
Whoa there. I was with you until the last word. They USE FUD, correct, but they know quite well it aint the techos who hold control of the purse strings. They go for the accountants, the Execs, the people who sign off the cheques. Most are technical illiterate and easily FUD'ed. Microsoft sales and marketing know this. Why should they spruke to technical people when we dont or wont buy their product? Sell to the people who really matter, the people with the chequebook. If we are lucky, we can get to a postition to counter Microsoft marketing, but that takes things like political skill and gaining respect enough so that your word can matter
If you dont, you will be ending up installing XP and
"Old Rallydrivers never die - they just fail to book in on time"
This is funny, because just this morning I was reading how Microsoft is expanding their services and consulting branch. Just like Oracle, IBM, SAP, and everyone else that have already figured out that they don't make that much money by selling software.
Isn't this exactly what rms said umpteen years ago? Free the software. If you want to make money, sell support or other services.
According to the Wall Street Journal which I read this morning Mundie is actually going to talk about Microsoft's plan to open-source it's operating system to key partners and thereby gain some of the benefits of open-sourcing.
This seems like a perfectly good strategy and will allow Microsoft partners to submit code fixes to bugs they find. This should improve the quality of Windows dramatically.
I am somewhat disappointed at the gross misreporting of the story on Slashdot. It would be refreshing if the stories were not outright lies.
Thanks for reading this.
Hopefully I won't be modded down into oblivion because I have not towed the party line in this case because it happens to be baseless. Slashdot readers need to realize that living in a fantasy world made up of fake news is not going to give open source an edge over anything. Pretty soon we'll end up living on a hill in Montana disconnected from reality.
Let's argue from facts instead of baseless fabrications.
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Milk, it does a body good.
How about just thinking of the GPL as a corporation?
(before I go on, I don't know if anyone else uses this analogy, so I don't mean to steal anyone else's idea here.)
Anyway lets call the company "GPL Inc." GPL Inc. produces proprietary software, just like any other normal company. Funny thing is, the cost of all this proprietary software to the public is $0. And just like any normal evil corporation, there is no way in HELL that they are going to let you see their code unless you are an employee.
But everything's okay, because it's REALLY EASY to get a job at GPL Inc., you need not even fill out an application. Downside is the pay sucks, and the dental plan just isn't going to happen any time soon. By working for GPL Inc., you have access to the source of their vast collection of proprietary software. Just like an employee of a normal company, you can work on that software and improve it. But since you're an employee of GPL Inc. whenever you work on that software, all the work you do is the property of GPL Inc.
If you're company sells Linux boxes, you're just reselling software from GPL Inc. If your employees work on that software, they're being contracted out to GPL Inc.
So herein lies the problem: GPL Inc. is a massive international corporation. They just might write more software and have more programmers than even MS does. They write some of the best software in the world and people are starting to realize it. They have partnerships with all the big players in the industry, with the obvious exception.
And that is called competition, which is a very very bad thing.
--
Heres the problem with the majority of the ./ readers:
Microsoft runs a buisness. They are successful because they are very good at running a buisness (yeah I know its sp). To prove my point, take a look at MS versus your Linux Distro companies:
(A): Linux Distro Companies - With the exception of Redhat, most range from failures to be failing in the buisness world. Redhat of course got lucky and broke even. Why is this? What is that one of them offers that other doesn't? Not a damn thing. Each of these companies is haunted by the fact that joe blow down the street offers the exact same product for free - and probably something close to the exact same service/support agreements.
(B): Microsoft - Microsoft is a successful buisness. They have sucessfully penetrated and conquered numerous buisnesses. They offer a product which is unique and like no other. (They are the makers of the only MAJOR OS which is NOT FULLY POSIX compliant or UNIX based) They offer service/support agreements that simply cannot be met by other companies in the sheer quality alone (sometime take a look at MSDN - you'll be amazed at what MS will just give to you) simply because they dont have the knowledge of the product that MS does.
Now I understand that its the tendency of people in America to "root for the underdog" and for a long time a I did as well. But sit down and take a long hard look at MS' buisnesses, their success, their products, and their support and you'll find something that any of your beloved linux communities/companies have yet to offer.
Gam
Troll = Somebody who would dare disagree with the herd of Slashdot. (In otherwords ME)
I love idealists not because I am one, but because they make life bearable for pragmatists such as myself.
"The Red Cross should be destroyed! They are taking away valuable business from our Doctors and our relief workers! Their volunteers utilize anti-business practices in what they called 'helping' their and other 'communities' while taking away the opportunity from all the starving doctors and workers around the US! We must act now to purge this ugly system from our country as it promotes communistic ideals and is not the 'American Way'."
Honestly, that's what Microsoft sounds like. What is so wrong about people volunteering to do something worthwhile? They enjoy it and provide something (often) useful. The GPL is there as a safety measure against such things as people freeloading and taking someone else's hardwork, adding to it, closing it, then not giving it back. The only problem is, that's exactly what Microsoft WANTS to do with it. It's like, if someone volunteered for the Red Cross and they needed to help clear someplace a ways away and they flew you by plane there, they'd sure want you to help clean up if you volunteered, instead of just getting a free plane ride. Look at Win2k's use of the FreeBSD TCP/IP stack: Free plane ride to where they need to be. No agreement to do any work.
Just my two cents
--------------------
Craig Mundie, a senior vice president at Microsoft and one of its software strategists, will argue that the company already follows the best attributes of the open-source model by sharing the original programmer's instructions, or source code, more widely than is generally realized
I realize that in some *very limited* circumstances, MS does share their source code, but to make a comment such as this is just plain deceitful. To make a comment such as what Craig is saying, that MS shares their source code "more widely than is generally realized," is akin to saying that I can pay down part of my student loan by submitting one cent to the Financial Aid office. Technically it's true, but in practice it's just plain BS.
Question for Craig: If, as you say, Microsoft shares its source code "more widely than is generally realized," then why don't any freelance programmers have access to it? For example, why doesn't the Wine team have access to it (not even one member)? And so on.
Leave it to Microsoft to make up stories like this.
[end rant]
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Am I the only Slashdotter who is sick and tired of losing 9000 karma points every time they moderate?
I pledge allegiance to the flag...
of the Corporate States of America...
Yes, partially due to the fact that each vendor was restricted from building on the work of others, and partially due to the fact that there were multiple vendors. You won't see "Bob's Win32", simply because Microsoft actively works to prevent such compatibility.
Once solid platform-independent implementations of the various UNIX tools became available, people began switching to them. For all the complaining people do about the various Linux-based OSen, they are remarkably consistent at the most basic user level (drop me on any GNU system and I will be able to at least find my way around the system, write code, etc). And this toolkit is available thanks to the GNU GPL and the enthusiasm RMS roused in the various developers.
Secondly, free software actually enables integration with closed platforms. For example, see Samba or Cygwin, which allow tight integration between Windows and Unix (no thanks to the "open" and "developer-friendly" Microsoft). And the first thing I and most other people do when confronted with a fresh Solaris box is to install a decent userland.
Uh huh. Sure. Let's take the WWW as an example, since everyone lately seems convinced it's the most innovative thing since sliced bread. It was invented by a guy at CERN, and Mosaic, the first massively popular graphical client, was written at NCSA. Since Web stuff became a commercial thing, exactly what "innovation" have we recieved? Bigger and more offensive ads and horrifically noncompliant HTML, that's what.
--
TO BUY A NEW CAR WOULD MAKE YOU SEXUALLY ATTRACTIVE.
Is the GNU organization and the GPL at heart anti-captialist?
I believe that it is. I believe that the ultimate goal of GNU is to provide in abundance the goods needed by humanity and provide them for free. I believe software is only the first step - they dream of robotic farms and mines to produce physical goods for free as well. I've heard these guys and they want to save the world and end poverty.
So once again, is the GNU really anti-capitalistic? Then, if the answer is yes, you should prepare for all-out war in the years to come if you decide thats where your loyalty lies. Captitalism is not just going to fade away, it will put up a HUGE fight.
I think we as a group are ignoring this important question, and if we really want to end captitalism, then we have poorly defined what we want to replace it with and how it will be done.
No, Thursday's out. How about never - is never good for you?
1. They ignore you.
2. They laugh at you.
3. They fight you.
4. You win.
Linux spent approximately a decade at step 1. Step 2 was hit this past year (I think) when Microsot ran an ad featuring mutated penguins in Germany. With these remarks, coupled with Allchin's earlier ones (Free Software being un-American and all that), it looks like Linux has entered step 3.
Pity. I was hoping step 2 would last a little longer, but I guess Microsoft isn't in a "laughing" mood these days.
TheFrood
If you say "I'll probably get modded down for this..." then I will mod you down.
I mean obviously, Slashdot editors KNOW that they are preaching to the choir, so why do they post this? Perhaps they need more banner hits?
I mean, the fact that MS doesn't like the GPL isn't exactly news.
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
Oh that's it!
Here is a sample letter to send to Microsoft:
Dear Microsoft,
I am a hardware maker|software developer|scientist|researcher|government agency (please choose one). I would like the source code to Windows 2000 Pro. Please send it on CD-Rom to the following address. Thank you for your assistance to the hardware makers|software development|scientific|researchers|government agencies (please choose one) community. Your good will and generocity is highly appreciated.
Sincerely,
(insert name here)
(insert address here)
Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud.
... lies in one word - INEQUALITY.
Nothing in this world is equal. Everything is relative. Some things are stronger; some are weaker. Some people are smart; some are stupid. Some are industrious; others are plain lazy. Get the picture?
The pie of income property of which you speak to divide is grossly inproportionate. Some property is in more demand. Some property is valued more than other property. Try buying beachfront property. It's expensive because lots of people want to live there and there isn't enough of it to go around. When demand goes up and supply can't keep up, price moves up as well. Simple economics.
And what about that pie? Where does it come from? Have you considered the BAKERS of that pie? People created the pie. They also create other pies using their own resources. Should they be expected to share it without compensation? What's to encourage them to bake more pies? Maybe you'll want to distribute the hard earned flour and water and eggs from someone else to the pie makers? OK. But then, how do you compensate your suppliers? Maybe you don't, ultimately. Maybe your suppliers stop putting their hearts and souls into making their products because there's no special reward for them. The pie makers also start doing the same thing for the same reasons. At the end of the process, everyone gets a pie, but the pie created under the new system of distribution doesn't taste as good as the old pies do. They break apart, spoil more quickly and so go to waste.
But wait, you say. Let's EDUCATE everyone top and bottom so that everyone knows the game. Well, you find that not everyone shares your enthusiasm. Some are natually lazy. Others realize that no matter how hard they work, they'll never get ahead. So they either work for themselves on the side, or do nothing more than they absolutly have to. In the end, education means nothing.
Income property remains income property because the owners make it work. They take the risks no one else wants to take and they reap the rewards. The simple rule is this: You work; you eat. Nothing gets handed to you. This isn't slavery. It's survival.
Intellectual property protects artists, writers and inventors from other people wishing to steal what they own and profit from it. Our oceans of laws and rules help us live together in complex societies. If you don't want it, go and live in a jungle. If you do, plan on spending most of your time trying to survive. Food and avoidance of predators (the 2 and 4 legged kind) will consume your time.
The free software / open source movement will succeed, but not because it's the forefront of a great social movement. The ability of dedicated, communally-minded individuals to enter and exit the community of developers via the internet is it's biggest strength. When you have dedicated individuals, the odds of any project succeeding increase greatly.
Giving away things for free makes a lot of sense to people who don't earn a living for one reason or another. Everyone likes a free lunch. The trouble is that the lunch actually costs something, had to made by someone and had to be delivered to the consumer. Once you start earning a living and stop thinking that the world owes you something, you'll see things more clearly.
Actually, isn't he sorta making a valid point for all object-oriented software (which, at last glance, most of the Windows and its API is?) The whole idea behind methods is to hide control not only from the user but the coder -- they should only touch what the original programmer intended them to touch. Granted, Open Source makes life a little easier when the methods themselves are busted, but the point he's making is succinct and valid: if you follow most guidelines for OOP, there is nothing required in knowing the underlying code.
Granted, different people use Open Source for different reasons. I use Open Source (on my dual-boot Win2K/RedHat 7.1 machine) not for its Open Sourceness but because I happen to like Linux and KDE2's (in my opinion) advanced GUI. I could care less if I could read the code, and chances are most Linux users, at least nowadays, will never read the code. To me, user interface is 9/10 of design (and following OOP is 9/10 user interface).
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
Personally, I think both Open Source and closed source (like Windows) software has its place, and arguing the merits of one over the other is just silly. It's the same thing I find with Mac Addicts. Ever go to a Steve Jobs keynote and yell "Your computers are too expensive Steve! Lower the prices!"? You get physically and verbally beaten by 100 people around you. 50 years down the line, most of these Mac Addicts will be looking back at these keynotes and saying "What were we thinking?"
- I don't care if they globalize against free speech. All my best free thoughts are done in my head.
All open source accomplishes for these people is letting hax0rs be able to find bugs and backdoors easier. I work on a system which depends on open source software. I've lost track of the number of times I've saved the day by reading through the source of a program to figure out what's going wrong. I'm definately in that ".1%" of people who benefit from having the source. As for the other 99.9%, they are secure in the knowledge that for every black hat looking for bugs and exploits, there's a hundred white hats. How do I know this? Same way you know the 99.9% / .1% ratio I guess.
Thousand upon thousands of people like me stumble across bugs in open source every day while we're trying to get our work done. We send in a patch or at least a useful description. What happens when you hit a bug in closed source? I'll tell you what - you ring the vendor and they deny it for an hour, then they admit it but don't do anything, then you buy a premium support contract, whereupon they agree to fix the bug - in the next version. Meanwhile, your business is suffering. Open source is definately the more business-friendly option.
Software patents delenda est.
How many shares do you have of MSFT? 100? 1000? Hah! I wipe my ass with that many shares every morning. Let's face it, your total holdings in MSFT amount to basically dick. But I'm going to answer you anyway, just because I'm in that kind of mood.
1000 shares of MSFT stock = dick;
[Bill] wipes his ass with 1000 shares each morning;
[Bill] wipes his ass with dick each morning;
Hmm
Steven
-- I have marked myself unwilling to moderate-- I don't have other accounts to artificially inflate the karma of
Seriously, why? All that it says is if you want to use code that's licensed under GPL, you better GPL your application too.
However, nothing stops you from looking at the source of GPL software, figuring out the algorithms that are being used and using them in your own non-GPL software later on (assuming, that you actually rewrite it in your own way and don't just copy the source). For instance, there are a lot of very cool algorithms in the Linux kernel, such as the copy-on-write trick (when you fork a process, its pages do not get physically duplicated, but the pages tables are modified to point to the original process' pages, until you actually start modifying them) or their very efficient and cool slab allocator (OO-type memory allocator which actually was first developed by Sun back in 1994) and many other cool tricks.
There is absolutely NOTHING that prevents Microsoft employees from looking at that code (other than their internal strict policies not to do that - I have a friend who interned their for the summer and he tells me that they are prohibited from visiting open-source projects that do something similar to what they are working on), figuring out how the algorithm works and how it's implemented in the Linux kernel and then taking that IDEA and implementing it in Windows. As long as they are not copying the code, it should be perfectly legal, right? However, you cannot do the same thing with Windows, since you don't have access to the code and thus can't see whether they are using any cool algorithms that you can also put to good use in your own OS.
Wait a second folks. Everyone here at slashdot loves open source. We use it everyday, contribute to it and live by it but there might be something we're missing in our enthusiastic defense.
...to suggest that companies adopting the approach are putting their intellectual property at risk.
The speech is part of an effort by Microsoft to raise questions about the limits of innovation inherent in the open-source approach
Are there limits to innovation using the open-source approach? Well there's certaintly less money involved and to be brutally honest money equates to work. The hardest working most dedicated open-source advocate cannot get as much done as an employee. The open-source developer has to take large breaks from work to get money to live while an employee earns while he works! Revolutionary idea I know... I mean earning money for work! Who would have thought.
Hmmm. Well yes they are and since profit margins will drop there is a large risk to any company trying to make money from open-source. Take for example
Stormix cashes out
SuSE lays off most US staff
VA Linux Announces planned 25% staff cut
But that's where M$ made their mistake. Open-source doesn't have to belong to a company. It can be created and maintained by the community (I almost said 'The People' but I've got an aversion to that expression.). M$ are stating the obvious. Open source is dangerous to companies and it slows innovation but that doesn't mean it should be stopped. What we need to know are the long term effects of open source. I'm not too sure what the end result is going to be but it might turn out alright in the end...
Red Hat Breaks Even
Pinky: "What are we going to do tomorrow night Brain?"
Pinky: "What are we going to do tomorrow night Brain?"
Brain: "I would tell you Pinky but this 120 char limi
From the GPL:
b) You must cause any work that you distribute or publish, that in whole or in part contains or is derived from the Program or any part thereof, to be licensed as a whole at no charge to all third parties under the terms of this License.
...
These requirements apply to the modified work as a whole. If identifiable sections of that work are not derived from the Program, and can be reasonably considered independent and separate works in themselves, then this License, and its terms, do not apply to those sections when you distribute them as separate works. But when you distribute the same sections as part of a whole which is a work based on the Program, the distribution of the whole must be on the terms of this License, whose permissions for other licensees extend to the entire whole, and thus to each and every part regardless of who wrote it.
Thus, it is not the intent of this section to claim rights or contest your rights to work written entirely by you; rather, the intent is to exercise the right to control the distribution of derivative or collective works based on the Program.
I think the the GPL abilities that you cite (charging for the mechanical distribution of free software and charging for warranty protection) do not in any way contradict the original claim: that incorporating GPL'd code in a commercial product is not feasible. GPL has been called a virus for good reason.
I am not asserting anything bad about GPL, and I am not trying to enter into an argument about its merits. I'm a big open source fan (though I have some problems with GPL). But I do understand why software companies developing licensed intellectual property need to be very cautious about using GPL'd software in the development environment. There are lots of very smart guys who are open-source on weekends who don't let GPL through the doors of their labs at work, because the nature of their business depends on IP license fees.
There's plenty of pro-GPL rhetoric asserting that proprietary software is intrinsically immoral, and that IP is evil. I agree that the GPL as written doesn't go that far; but GPL advocates often do, and the bottom line is that GPL places very substantial restrictions on a for-profit software developer/licensor.
JMHO -- Trevor
-- We all have enough strength to endure the misfortunes of other people. La Rochefoucauld
To my mind, #1 and #2 are clearly true. Proponents of #'s 3, 4 and 5 love to piggyback their ideas on the success of Linux, Apache and FreeBSD, without any real justification. Yes, Linux has shown that community development works. It hasn't proven it superior. There's no a priori reason to think that giving away source is a sound business decision, and the people who have tried have hardly convinced me. (Red Hat sells code mostly written by others and now has cut their losses to the point that they round off to zero? Wow!!) And the "Gimme! Gimme! Gimme!" mentality not only isn't proven by the fact that Linux is good, it's laughable to most of the developers actually creating free software.
It seems to me this speech is mostly targeting arguments #4 and 5. I'm inclined to agree with Microsoft and my objection is with the people who invoke Perl and BSD to defend Eazel and Napster.
Unsettling MOTD at my ISP.
Why, oh, why must the prime example of all that is rotten with capitalism send forth it's trolls, as if wandering from the lost underside of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge, in search of some ear to disgorge into it's utterances? The Beast of Redmond issues proof, once again, that it fears Open Source. What else is new? You'd think they'd co-opt it like Apple has BSD... sheesh.
--
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
let's not forget underhanded business tactics and crushing opposition with illegal business pratices, or, when that fails, the might of the M$ dollar. But hey, who cares, they are making money right? And that's all that's important, apparently.
First off I'd like to say open source cannot be bad.. if open source project rise up to the point where the FREE MARKET decides they are good enough to compete with the software put out by giant software firms, then where is the added value of the giant software firms that you are paying for? That is a basic concept at the foundation of a free market. If the market decides the added value of an MS product doesn't warrant its cost, then it isn't purchased. MS can then add value or reduce its price until it is competitive again. The whole arguement of open source being bad for competition is bs.. it's bad for corporations who can't justify their existance in the face of a strong open source movement. Obviously all these people making open source code are surviving somehow, aren't they? And also managing to release free software that *somehow* meets the standards of the market. I don't see a problem. Unless of course you work for a software company that can't beat open source code even though they are paying professional programmers to do nothing else. Don't expect laws to protect mediocrity boys and girls. That's a giant step backwards. Finally, MS attacking the GPL is so completely transparent: obviously there is GPL liscenced code MS wants to incorporate into their programs and they want to do it without open sourcing their own software, obviously. Sorry boys! You can't take the benefit of GPL without the downside! No free ride for you! If it weren't for the GPL you wouldn't even have it to pirate.. I mean, incorporate... so I suggest you take those highly paid programmers and actually make them code something that works nicely. Or you can take the short route and end up open source, of course, though why MS would do that with GPL software is a little beyond me. Or, if you are MS, you can try to shape the country's laws and society to suit yourself. Failing that, you can lie, cheat and steal whatever you need. Enjoy! The options are limitless!
Seriously, these guys are idiots relying on sound bites. ESR and RMS would eat these idiots for lunch in a philosophical debate on software. They can't even sort out the differences between Open Source and the GPL.
It would definitely be in Red Hat's best interest to do this kind of thing, if for no other reason than to just say "Red Hat" alot and brand like crazy. (Microsoft is a master of this, just count the number of times you read MS, Windows, or Office brand names within an MSNBC article related to the tech industry) Given what IBM and Sun could gain, I can't see why they wouldn't do it either...
--------
Bleah! Heh heh heh... BLEAH BLEAH!!! Ha ha ha ha...
Step 1: Open your source code under the GPL Step 2: ??? Step 3: Profit
"It's happening very, very broadly in a way that is troubling to us," he said. "I could highlight a dozen countries around the world who have open-source initiatives."
We have seen Mexico City move away from Microsoft. We have just seen Argentina take the first baby steps away from Microsoft. The above statement FROM Microsoft tells us that those moves away from MS are the tip of the iceberg of an international movement away from Microsoft.
Why is this happening now? Two things have happened in the last couple of years that make this possible. First is StarOffice and the other liberated software office productivity applications that have come out. The application base of liberated software has reached critical mass. The second is simply price. You don't have to have a Microsoft OS to run the key applications you need to get business done any more. The other thing is that Microsoft software is expensive. MS software is seen as expensive even in the US, arguably the wealthiest country in the world. In every other country it is seen as outrageously expensive. It is also seen as American and not to be trusted because it is to some extent under the control of the US government. (Remember the NSA key?) If you use liberated software you don't have to pay MS's high prices and you don't have to worry about who has set up backdoors in your system.
And yes, this means we are in a very dangerous place in history. We have already won many battles we didn't even know we were fighting. But, now the beast has been awakened. MS will not rest until liberated software is illegal.
StoneWolf
P.S.
I'm using the phrase "liberated software" instead of "free software" because I hate having to say "free, as in free speech, not free, as in free beer" to make people understand what I'm talking about.
So Microsoft only dislikes the GPL... I guess that this piece of opensource software is acceptable....
Then everybody better watch out for killer GNomes.
They'll be led by the evil 2.4 Kernel Klink.
Whatever floats your boat. In my case, that would be a sea of Mercury.
The free software ideal cannot hope to win in a capitalist system where a person's livelihood depends on his or her labor. Intellectual property owners (such as Microsoft and the music industry) will fight it with everything they've got. Right now they have two formidable weapons: IP laws and powerful police states to enforce them. But those who yearn to be free also have a formidable weapon, the internet.
The internet and other communication technologies (e.g., file sharing systems) are the first major kinks in the armor of a sick system. As technology progresses, the system will eventually die a horrible death. What will happen to a slave-based economy when robots and advanced artificial intelligences replace everybody, i. e., when human labor, knowledge and expertise become worthless?
And don't think for a minute this won't happen in your lifetime. The internet is the latest giant leap in human communication. Before that came mass telecommunication technologies and before that was the movable press. If history is any indication, we can expect a giant leap in technological progress and scientific knowledge. In fact, it is happening before our very eyes.
We should all demand a system where everybody is guaranteed income property, a piece of the pie. There is plenty for everybody.
Communism confiscates all property and enslaves everybody. Capitalism gives property to a few and enslaves the rest. It's sad. The land should not be divided for a price. It should be an inheritance for us and our children and their children. It's the only way to guarantee freedom in a world where human labor is about to go the way of the dinosaurs.
Intellectual property laws exist only because we have a slavery system. Our livelihood depends on working for others so we can pay our taxes. The reason that we have to work for others is that 99% of people have been deprived of an inheritance in the wealth of the land. Income property is owned by a few and the state. The others are slaves. Artists, programmers and inventors depend on their work to make a living. Can we blame them? We all depend on our labor because we are all slaves. So now we are swimming in a ocean of laws and rules that take away our remaining liberties, one by one.
Demand liberty! Nothing less.
Fact The FBI were looking for Mitnick long before Markoff wrote about him and long long before the book came out.
Fact Mitnick was wanted as a parole violator after release from jail after his second conviction for hacking
Fact While on the run Mitnick broke into Shimomura's home computer system and stole code that converted a cell phone into a scanner.
Mitnick wanted to be caught and wanted to go to jail. It is the only rational explanation for his behavior. The sentence he got was mild compared to what a third time thief would have recieved.
The allegations made against Mitnick by the cracker community are simply sour grapes from folk who don't understand that breaking into computer systems is evil and that people who do it should go to jail for a very long time.
Looking for an Information Security student project suggestion?
Try http://dotcrimeManifesto.com/
When Microsoft denounces open source as a hurdle on innovation, it somehow has a point Open source is very good at incremental evolution but no one in the community really has the power to rebuild a full OS from scratch and ram it through the throat of the installed base as Microsoft can. With its monopoly, Microsoft has more opportunities to implement a serious technologic shake-up (and a serious shake-down for the end-user at the same time
And when you think about it, GNU/Linux or BSD are indeed old technology grown from the 70s, still stuck with unsexy monolithic kernels, etc. The support for desktop is still unconvincing. They lack productivity applications. All things considered, Microsoft did a fairly good job at creating and enforcing some software consistency on this nightmarish hardware piece of crap which is the PC.
In Microsoft's eyes, open source OSs just have one little tiny annoying inconvenience. They work. Day after day, they faithfully fulfil all the obscure brutish jobs they're being asked, lost in some remote corners of the sever farm, toiling endlessly, alone amid their peers, all those other servers also toiling endlessly on their own obscure brutish jobs. They're no good for the end-users but ask them to do one specific thing over a network, tweak them a little bit if necessary - hey, you have the code ! - and they'll do it, no question asked, going, going, keep going. Who cares which software is running as long as it runs. Software is a commodity.
They lost a battle and an important one in the most ignominious way. With its monopoly on the desktop market, Microsoft was supposed to leverage its proprietary protocols to pry open the server market and force and cash in its solutions in the machine room. But in retrospect, it becomes evident they made an ugly mistake with the all-in-one NT, the same software on servers and desktops alike. By cumulating the worst of both worlds, it took more than 5 years to turn NT in something close to a decent platform. On the server side, they should have started from an existing proven platform like BSD and extend it as closed source to support the proprietary desktop protocols. It would have been there much faster. The desktop side could have then had a life of its own without slowing the server side. A nasty case of NIH syndrome. And they lost those 5 precious years that allowed Linux, Apache and Samba to grow up and make NT irrelevant in the server room.
But that's not really the most frightening for Microsoft. They not only lost the battle in the server room but, missing their window of opportunity to become the One, the war has shifted to a new battlefield. The fastest growing segments in IT are wireless, PDAs, SAN/NAS and internet-based applications such as database Web access over intranets or ASPs (when they don't die...). And coming on the horizon are residential broadband and internet-based appliances. Microsoft has no serious edges on any of those markets, a bit there, a tad here. It's just another competitor and has strictly not a chance of building a new monopoly as it did out of the original IBM PC. IT is not a niche anymore, the market is huge, the array of technologies to dominate is beyond the grasp of any company, and so much funding is now available that even Microsoft and its $25B in cash at the bank is just one player among others.
The IT market is slowly shifting from the all-purpose PC to a patchwork of heterogeneous specialized devices, both for the end-user and for the infrastructure. With the PC, consistency is in great demand and Microsoft had a global solution, good or bad but a solution. With specialized devices, OS and applications are just tools to adapt, tweak and slap together for such or such tasks. Open source is the evident solution. There's no point for anymore great innovation on the tool side. Like metalwork machine-tools, they simply exist. They are there and they are a commodity. The problem is now to use them.
Microsoft has every good reason to shriek like a swine in the slaughterhouse. Open source killed its only leverage, on the building blocks. After nearing world domination, it's seeing its death, slowly fading in irrelevancy, its edge blunted, becoming just another company in a mature market.
Oh yeah, it won't be fast but it will be painful.
What will happen to a slave-based economy when robots and advanced artificial intelligences replace everybody, i. e., when human labor, knowledge and expertise become worthless?
And don't think for a minute this won't happen in your lifetime.
I think you have been reading WAY too much Asimov! Or maybe Blade Runner?
We should all demand a system where everybody is guaranteed income property, a piece of the pie. There is plenty for everybody.
There already is in the US. Something like 45% of the federal budget is used for "social programs" like welfare, medicaid, medicare, and social security. That is almost $1 BILLION dollars of handouts.
Capitalism gives property to a few and enslaves the rest. It's sad. The land should not be divided for a price. It should be an inheritance for us and our children and their children.
Last time I checked, my neighbors owned their property, not the government. And I'm pretty sure that their kids will get that land when they die. Of course, I am against the inheritance tax.
It's the only way to guarantee freedom in a world where human labor is about to go the way of the dinosaurs.
Watch out for those hoards of robotic monkeys which will be constructing roads and houses!
Intellectual property laws exist only because we have a slavery system. Our livelihood depends on working for others so we can pay our taxes. The reason that we have to work for others is that 99% of people have been deprived of an inheritance in the wealth of the land. Income property is owned by a few and the state. The others are slaves.
Slavery? If you want, you can go live Unibomber style out in the wilderness. No taxes to pay out there! Ah, but you want your shiny things to play with, don't you? But, you would rather that someone else just gave you the shiny things instead of having to work to earn enough to be able to buy the shiny things. You are free to attempt to gain your shiny things any way you want (legally- stealing is bad)- work for someone else, work for yourself, build your own shiny things, try magic, beg on the street, whatever.
So if you had land, how exactly would you be a thriving idependent person? Selling apples, I presume. If you want land, go buy some! Open a newspaper and read the several pages of property listings. Really, the state will not prevent you from buying any! Of course, now that I and my friends own land, we are set to retire. Except that we still want to eat, heat our abodes in the winter, etc.
Artists, programmers and inventors depend on their work to make a living. Can we blame them? We all depend on our labor because we are all slaves.
So exactly who does not make a living by working? If you are rich enough to live off of the interest, you could. But you had to earn that money in the first place. Or if you inherited it, some ancestor at some point had to earn it. No one grew a magical tree of money. We depend on labor because your wry wit is not enough to make people give you money.
So now we are swimming in a ocean of laws and rules that take away our remaining liberties, one by one.
This I actually agree with. Too many laws already.
Demand liberty! Nothing less.
I do. I just don't demand free property and handouts so I can sit on my ass all day because I won't work hard enough to buy the things I want.
Vote monkeys into Congress. They are cheaper and more trustworthy.
Interesting point here. I had never really thought of it before(not being the stereotypical IT/Slashdot type), but it's true that open source is much more beneficial to hardware companies than software companies. Is this a good or bad thing? I'm not sure. As a reader of electrical engineering trade magazines, I note that many companies are starting to use open source models for ASIC designs and many hardware IP areas. I'm curious if open source cores gain a foothold over proprietary hardware design, will these hardware companies back off from their open source support?
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I think that claim is pretty difficult to defend.
Huh, I like that - like Word 95 documents load into Word 97 and still look the same HUH! And do you rekon you can ever actually get the document to look the same again? No chance!
I think that open-source inherently encourages compatibility ... If one version of a program is compatible with previous/other versions and the other versions arent, which do you think people will use?
I once saw an interview on tv with Bill G. The topic was about providing access to computers and the internet to 3rd world countries to help their education systems etc.. Well.. Bill G didn't think this was such a great idea. His point was that if you live off of 1$ a day your not going to go out and get a computer. I think he is really worried that people who live of $1 a day will not be able to buy his copyrighted software. Bill G is the pioneer of software copyright. He has fought to keep his code secret. So his company coming out dissing free software is not unsuspected.
But I think that you're missing the point of open source. Open source, as advocated by Sun, IBM, etc., says that you bought the hardware... here's the software that comes with it. The point isn't to profit. No hardware manufacturer makes money off of the software they put on it, so they have no problem with giving the source and all rights to it.
This is the way things were in the beginning, before closed source ever existed, and many feel that this is the future too.
Check out Stallman's reply at:
- 05 -02-019-20-NW-CY-MS
http://linuxtoday.com/news_story.php3?ltsn=2001
Nicely done.
Here is my challenge to Mundie: play fair and let consumers actually choose. Here is another challenge to Mundie and Microsoft: stop talking about innovation and actually deliver; so far, no significant innovation has ever been delivered in Microsoft products.
Of course it was. But Sun competed with Microsoft by doing something entirely different from anything Microsoft had done: a safe, cross-platform language and library based on C++ syntax and "Smalltalkish" semantics. Microsoft's response to Java/JVM is to make an almost identical, but incompatible, product.
It was designed to do one thing -- make money for Sun.
Actually, it wasn't designed for that at all. It was an accidental success: the industry was ready for a simple OOL, and the promise of applets pushed it over the edge. Once Sun saw Java catch on, they heavily promoted it.
Here is an interesting article on the same subject, except that it was writen in 1998. I actually think this article does a better job of expressing Microsoft's view.
I'm not a Microsoft supporter, but I'm not a Microsoft basher either. This article raises some interesting questions that I think deserve at least some thought. If you read it with a definite bias against Microsoft, then you may miss some of these points because the author is definitely biased toward Microsoft. Try to look past that.
The main point is, let's say you are a developer working at a company developing a product which does X. Does it then make sense for you to go home after work and work on a Free Software project which does X? No, it doesn't. In fact, you'd be a little pissed off at the developers that were working on a Free Software project which does X. It doesn't matter if your company's project is superior or not. The fact is that free is free, and the Free Software project has a big advantage when it comes to price. True, competition is great. But your company had better develop one kiss ass project to be worth actually spending money, and they had better do it for as little cost as possible. This is all great for consumers. But most of us are not consumers. How is this good for us?
"The only rights you have are the rights you are willing to fight for."
Mr. Mundie "The goal of the G.P.L. is sweeping up all of the intellectual property. . . "
A few points, IMHO:
1) good for open source, as "intellectual property" is doublespeak - in US law, there never has been any ruling that says that copyright, trademarks, or patents are inalienable rights but rather a deal between the people and busnesses to maximise innovation NOT to make money. See the Supreme Court ruling in Fox Film Corp. v. Doyal: "The sole interest of the United States and the primary object in conferring the [copyright] monopoly lie in the general benefits derived by the public from the labors of authors."
2) Weather you are libertarian, liberal, or conservative, I think most people would be happy to limit the "rights" of companies and countries - they have been taking too "rights" for them, many at the people's expence.
some further reading
prolebox
rantbox
That's a peculiar way of seeing things.
I almost never see anybody engaging in 'splitting' behavior except GPL and BSDL advocates ripping at each other's throats. The 'divide and conquer' sadly seems to really be an internal struggle.