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Can Open Source Companies Stay That Way?
JoeGee writes: "According to this article on ZD Net, more and more companies born from open source projects are beginning to move towards closed source products as a source of revenue. Version 5 of GFS will be closed source, and even SuSE's director of sales Holger Dyroff has a quote that seems to disparage the service model of revenue. The one company that refuses to change its operations is, surprisingly, Red Hat. Red Hat CTO Michael Tiemann says 'We believe the Red Hat brand stands for open-source.'" Yes, this is a dupe. Bad Tim! *whack*
The point has been made many times here before, but bears repeating once again: Free Software and Open Source are two different things, regardless of what you might read on ZDnet.
- fr eedom.html
"Moving to a proprietary system also can spur ill will. Because of the freedoms afforded by the open-source movement, older versions of software may live on as competition. The Free Software Foundation, founded in 1984, continues to work to ensure open-source versions of programs live on as long as possible."
Not true. The Free Software Foundation was established to promote and support Free Software. They have nothing whatever to do with Open Source, and are careful to say so.
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/philosophy.html
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-software-for
The term "Open Source" is much abused, because it lacks sufficient precision. Everyone from authors that really want to encourage software freedom but do not always want to use the GPL, for entirely honest reasons (e.g. the BSD folks, Eric Raymond etc.), right down to parasites who care only about a quick buck (e.g. most of the shiny-suited salesmen who leaped briefly onto the Open Source bandwagon), call themselves part of the "Open Source movement". It's a conveniently huge umbrella under which even Microsoft might have fit, had they needed to. It was started by well-meaning people for the right reasons, but with a flawed charter, which may or may not be fixable at this point.
It's not necessary to agree with everything the FSF and Stallman have ever said to see that they are right about several things. One of these is that a genuinely Free Software license can be an effective way of reducing your risks, if someone decides to close part or all of the source of software that you or your business depend on.
Perhaps this is a necessary and inevitable shakeout, where we'll see a clarification of what the world wants from software freedom. It comes at a time when many different freedoms we take for granted are under attack, from many sides. In the case of software freedom, we will need to look hard at what we want, and what we're willing to do to defend it.
What you're suggesting is a maintanace nightmare. I've been involved in projects where the customer gets the code. They hire some 3rd rate engineers to modify the source and then call us when something goes wrong. Do you know how long it takes for us to even find out that they modified our code? We can't have a clause that says once you touch code, we don't help you because we do charge large amounts.
That being said, going open source for general purpose software is a great idea. Some of the software that we've made would be great for open source. It can be used across verticals and the equivalent open source project is either still in the infancy or is just bad. At another company I worked, there was a proposal to do just that. I hope they followed through.
Me.
Read the YaST license sometime instead of spouting off something you picked up here.
Only this licence gives the Licensee the right to use reproduce, to
distribute or to amend YaST or works derived from it.
1. Usage
YaST and SuSE Linux may be used for personal and commercial
purposes if the copyright and licence terms of the installed packages
and programmes are observed. The use of YaST, even if a modified
version is used, does NOT exempt in particular the Licensee from the
duty to take due care with regard to the licence terms of the
packages or programmes installed through YaST or works based on it.
2. Processing
All programmes derived from YaST and all works derived from it in full
or parts thereof are to be filled on the opening screen with the clear
information "Modified Version". Moreover the operator give his name on
the opening screen, stating that SuSE GmbH is not providing any
support for the "Modified Version" and is excluded from any liability
whatsoever. Every amendment to the sources which are not conducted by
SuSE GmbH are deemed to be a "Modified Version". The Licensee is
entitled to change his copy from the sources of YaST, whereby a work
based on the YaST programme is created, provided that the following
conditions are satisfied.
a) Every amendment must have a note in the source with date and
operator. The amended sources must be made available for the user
in accordance with section 3) together with the unamended licence.
b) The Licensee is obliged to make all work distributed by him which
is derived as a whole or in part from YaST or parts of YaST to
third parties as a whole under the terms of this licence without
royalties.
c) The amendment of this licence by a Licensee, even in part, is
forbidden.
SuSE GmbH reserves the right to accept parts or all amendments of
a modified version of YaST into the official version of YaST free of
charge. The Licensee has no bearing on this.
So you can do what you want, short of charging royalties, but have to make it clear that the version of YaST you distribute is modified.
SuSE also contributes much to XFree86, ReiserFS and ALSA.
Sure, they don't distribute ISO's but you *can* do a network install via FTP even though it's a well kept secret.
If you don't care for SuSE, that's cool, but next time do a little research.
You are mistaken. The triple licenses are just to get a wider audience.
If you have some GPL software, you cannot revoke the rights you have granted others under GPL; that is true.
But if you are the copyright holder, you can ABSOLUTELY stop issuing new versions under GPL.
This is where it gets tricky you see.. if I start an OSS project, and people start submitting patches to me... does that mean they are now co-authors, or have they given me said patches to include in my software? I believe in most cases, I am still the sole copyright holder, I bet. I forget where, but this has happened before, where a company has taken many changes from people, improved their product, then went back to closed source (of course the OSS version is still available.. they can't revoke that). But they did, effectively, steal the work of others.