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Freedom or Power Redux
Ed. note - a brief response to Tim. A) my name isn't Timothy. (I know, I know, we all look alike. :) And B) I was trying to say pretty much what O'Reilly is saying - that all licensing, including the GPL, is an expression of power over what other people can do with the software. Hence the term "all licensing". If there were no copyright whatsoever on computer code, no intellectual property considerations at all, perhaps we could approach the state of true freedom. In the meantime, the GPL is a good way to place code firmly into a state where it is mostly free - you are free to do anything with GPL code except take it out of its free state. As far as restrictions go, this one is infinitely more palatable than most of the powers that software licensing seeks to exercise over software users.
As a more general point, I take issue with O'Reilly's description of copyright law as a compromise between creators and users. There's absolutely no evidence that the rights of users are considered when copyright laws are made. All copyright law changes made in my lifetime, nearly all copyright law changes ever, have been expansions of copyright law - if it's a compromise, it's an extraordinarily one-sided one. (I suppose you could a describe a mugging as a compromise between the mugger and the little old lady over rights to her purse.) Copyright law is more accurately described as a compromise between copyright holders and copyright holders. Other descriptions are both inaccurate and do a disservice to efforts to reform the laws.
In the Free Software world, we are all forced to make hard decisions. One of the most difficult is deciding which license to use. And I applaud these two men to even consider broaching the topic in such a public way.
Unfortunately, the two viewpoints are irreconcilable. One values the rights of the individual over the needs of the Free Software world, and one values the needs of the Free Software world over the rights of the individual. RMS promises that everyone will have the right to see the code they're running, and that right will be enforced by a society who accepts the GPL. O'Reilley promises that everyone will have the right of self-determination as an author, as long as the GPL is not mainstream. The problem here is that the realization of both visions is mutually exclusive.
So, to these men, I say: drop it. Let the chips fall where they may. Let the people decide which license should govern them. It's nothing short of a vi vs. emacs or Christianity vs. Islam battle, and neither side stands a chance at winning. Let the users decide.
~wally
Please, post comments. Don't use your position as the guy writing the story to give your comments an automatic permanent "+5, sysop".
Copyright is a brilliant compromise. It encourages people to make things available that they wouldn't otherwise, knowing that they still have some control over these things. Now, I grant freely that the huge extension of copyright duration works solidly against users - but other aspects of the law have done a very good job of balancing these things, such as the fair use rules.
In the absence of copyright, how exactly do you think games would get written? How would John Carmack earn a living?
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
On the point that "all copyright changes" don't take into account the user this isn't the case in the EU where some changes have been done for that reason.
One issue that isn't often addressed is the cultural differences between countries that lead to different approaches being appropriate in different countries. The same is true within different parts of an organisation ("If I can't pay it ain't worth it" to "If its free then it fits in my budget"). Licensing is about the _writer_ of the software or work which may make sense in their environment but not in that of another. Thus a proprietary license and ownership but free distribution (eg Java) may make a lot of sense if it ties in with the aims of the program.
IMO Writers of a work have a right on how it should be used, it is not for _users_ to say how it should be used as it is not their effort that created it. That said the Writer's right does not extend once the users effort has been expended, whether that be by paying cash or by building upon the artefact.
If I buy a brick, I do not expect to pay a regular license for the house.
Cultural differences are just as important. If a certain practice seems strange or odd to you probably means that your approach seems odd to them. Basically tolerance is the important deal, being dictatorial makes you as much as a fool as the guy you are arguing against.
An Eye for an Eye will make the whole world blind - Gandhi
Carl G. Jung
--
"With one breath, with one flow, You will know Synchronicity" -La Policia
You also aren't allowed to distribute GPL'd code without an attached political screed you may not agree with, nor are you allowed to release free software which links with GPL'd code, but doesn't contain any. Consider RIPEM; a program was released, which was self-contained, and had a sed script to change it to link with the GNU fast MP math library. They got harassed because it was *POSSIBLE* to make their code *WORK WITH* GPL'd code, but it wasn't free enough.
:)
That's a far cry from "the only thing you can't do is take away the freedom". It is a lie, and a willful one, to claim that you can take away the freedom of *ANY* free code. If I put code in the public domain, no one can ever make it unfree. They can make their own versions with whatever restrictions they want, but *MY* code remains free, forever. No other license can say as much.
My blog: http://www.seebs.net/log/ --- My iPhone/iPad app: http://www.seebs.net/seebsfrac/
Those who want to make their code free should be able to make their code free and prevent anything non-free from interacting with it. Those who want to write proprietary software should be equally able to do so under whatever terms and conditions they wish. It's ultimately up to users to decide what kind of software they want to use. The "best" license is not the license that RMS or O'Reilly say is best, but the one that gets the most support from people at large.
Google's cache works.
And I'd be a Libertarian, if they weren't all a bunch of tax-dodging professional whiners.
Berke Breathed
this is one issue that I have never understood about open source advocacy: the talk about "users".
(pure) users can't program thus their "freedom" is a 1:1 coupling to the freedom of the programmer that is their "supplier".
The only freedoms that thus matter are those of programmers (and "users that can program", if you must). But an easier metric to compare licenses would be "Nth level recipient", i.e.:
zero level: the original programmer and licensor
1st level: the programmer that builds on the original code
2nd level and onward: programmer that wants to build on the N-1 level base.
The GPL gives "most freedom" to levels 0 and 2 onwards (the more "selfish" license), whereas the BSD license gives "most freedom" to level 1 (a license giving "most freedom" to all of them can't exist, it will always be a fundamental choice). As soon as a level is occupied by a "user", there won't be any N+1 levels after it, so "freedom" becomes irrelevant.
Stallman doesn't give a shit about the software industry -- he lives and works in the academic universe.
Since his job & livlihood is funded by gov't grants, charity and tuition, he does not have to worry about actually producing profit.
Conformity is the jailer of freedom and enemy of growth. -JFK
But the GPL is just as much an expression of power over users as any proprietary license.
Hello, RMS.
I like the project I'm working on. I want to share the source code, because I think a lot of other people might apply it in groovy ways that don't suggest themselves to me.
But YOUR viewpoint is brick for brick the same prison as the Redmond Institute for the Monopolistically Inclined.
Mr. O'Reilly, your moderate view is a breath of fresh air.
Get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see things thou dost not.--King Lear
The copying issue is the problem and what I would love to see is a free license with the following restrictions:
I believe something like this would go a long way to making sure that developers get their due, and can earn a living by charging for software but other developers/users can make copies, share with friends, or learn from the code.
The Anti-Blog
O'Reilly says
But that's not the same goal as RMS. RMS has repeatedly stated that he'd accept an inferior piece of software, if the superior product was non-free. RMS expects the right to copy the software, read the software, learn how it works, and make modifications to it. RMS wants the software to be unencumbered at to how you use it, where you use it, why you use it, who uses it, when you use it, EXCEPT for the tiny encumberment that you don't deny anybody else the same freedoms.
Until O'Reilly argues on the same wavelength as RMS - which means either attacking the stated goals of RMS, or attacking the means RMS uses to achieve those goals - then O'Reilly won't have an essay worth reading. When you watch a debate you expect PRO and CON for the SAME argument, not PRO and PRO for DIFFERENT arguments.
There is a clause in the GPL that says something to the effect "This code is licensed under this version of the GPL or any later version." Removing that clause from your COPYING.TXT pretty much gives you the licence on the Linux kernel. The GPL and LGPL are nothing more than tools in and of themselves. As long as the "any later version clause is removed" then the FSF has no power over a GPLed work.
The FSF also recommends that developers give the original copyrights to the FSF. You don't have to do that either. Basically, using the GPL does not morph a developer into a slack jawed Stallmanite.
It sounds like the GPL as used on the Linux kernel may be what you are looking for. The kernel developers also permit proprietary kernel modules but feel no obligation to maintain module compatibility across kernel releases. It is up to the proprietary vendor to track the kernel in that case. So you may or may not want to remove that addition as well.
RMS acts like a rabid maniac sometimes but when you stop to think about it his point makes a lot more sense from a freedom standpoint.
Many people claim that true freedom is the right to impose whatever restrictions you want on something that belongs to you, a part of property law, and since software is intellectual property this naturally applies to software too. Unfortunately this does not hold water.
If I own a piece of land then I am well within my rights to restrict your access to it. If I sell you a piece of land my right to restrict your use of it goes away. Why is this not so with software? Furthermore, if I buy a Honda, why should I expect the Honda corporation to restrict my rights to open the hood of the car, fix the engine if it breaks, etc.?
What RMS is doing is challenging our notion of "intellectual property". Intellectual property rights are not natural rights. Congress was given the power to grant limited monopolies to creators and inventors, to encourage them to develop the arts and sciences in this country. What is happening, particularly in the proprietary software field, is exactly the opposite. Companies are using these rights to stifle innovation and competition in the field, to ensure that customers must purchase whatever software they sell no matter how bloated/buggy/outdated it may be (*cough*Windows*cough*). This has the potential effect of creating a sort of "software illuminati". Much as the guilds of the past kept information about their trade secret, both to remain in business and as a form of protection from a Church that banned the acquisition of certain types of scientific knowledge, the proprietary software companies of today keep their source code, which is nothing but information about their craft, secret. The Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution both came about during periods of relative intellectual freedom, when anyone could acquire the scientific knowledge necessary to invent and develop new technologies, art, etc.
Free software promises to do the same thing in the software world. RMS realizes this, and so does Bill Gates which is why he's so afraid of it.
RMS has not called for a law banning any form of proprietary software (that I can tell), and we all know that he has very strong opinions on what kinds of policy should be implemented in his version of a free society. I can't speak for him but it looks like he's taking the correct approach in a free society, putting his money where his mouth is. He believes that free software is so damn good from a freedom standpoint that it will eventually win out over proprietary software in the end, and that makes the GNU project a sort of social experiment to determine if this is the case. So far the outcome seems hopeful despite the landscape being littered with the decaying husks of open source dot-coms: Linux, Mozilla, Apache, etc. usage is still growing.
This is why I use free software: because proprietary software is a car with the hood welded shut.
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
Attempt to paint the FSF as communist fail to address that they are talking about intellectual property, not real goods; additionally, they fail to realize that the FSF focuses its efforts on motivating developers to release code under the GPL, rather than coercing them to do so. To describe them as communist would be akin to describing the United Way as Stalinist.
It has everything to do with ethics. I don't see how you can argue its like politics and social philosophy--what do you think ethics is?