Microsoft And The GPL/LGPL

AnimeFreak writes "In this CNET news article, it talks about how Microsoft's new license that will allow competing companies to read-over software code for their products does not allow software covered under the GPL/LGPL licensing agreement (such as Linux, SAMBA, and Mozilla)."

Comments

Re:So?

[tunah]

If you read the article, you would see it is part of their settlement with the DoJ. Now _I_ have no right to complain, I am not a US citizen. But if it was my DoJ I would be seriously pissed off that the settlement will apply only to companies. Antitrust legislation is for the people (as is all legislation, in theory).

Re:So?

[rainmanjag]

You miss the point of the op-ed. Yes, software implementations are copyrightable and licensable. Perens isn't saying that MS should make their implementation of CIFS anything other than they already do. However, it's been a hallmark of competition for a competitor to simply look at the way the product works and the reverse engineer it. They can then license their implementation any way they choose. And this has happened the SAMBA project engineered their own implementation of CIFS and it runs on any *NIX system that wants windows file sharing compatibility.

However, what Perens *is* saying is that if Microsoft patents certain features or qualities of its implementation, then if SAMBA wants to make an interoperable product, they have to pay royalties to Microsoft in order to be able to use the *patented* (not copyrighted) technologies. And it's this type of IP patent abuse that has got Perens and the entire computing world (except those with legal monopolies gained from unjust patents) scared $hitless.

Brain Control?

[Advocadus Diaboli]

What Microsoft is going to do is pretty serious. They are publishing documentation to the proprietary things they do and they publish them under a license that an Open Source developer is not allowed to use this information.

So in short they are denying you to use information. And of course that would just mean, that every Open Source development in projects that are related to what MS is "disclosing" have to stop immediately, otherwise MS could claim that the developers violated their license. And the question is if Open Source then has to prove if they are innocent or if MS has to prove that they are guilty. Anyway, legal affairs cost much more than many Open Source developers can afford.

So this is just another form of censorship. But its much worse. Microsoft is "publishing" something and in the same moment trying to disallow you to use that knowledge which is published. A thing that is really serious because the human brain doesn't have an infrastructure that tags information as "not usuable for Open Source" and so on. Or can you imagine a school that learns you how to add 1+1 and then tells you: You are not allowed to use this knowledge. And keep that in mind!

As a developer I don't want to bother if the knowledge that is stored in my brain is free or not! For me it is free and nobody, especially not Microsoft has the right to control what I'm doing with my brain!

So for an Open Source developer this sort of license agreement simply says: Read the information and forget it completely. And so there is no need to waste time with reading at all.

So, basically this license can be used by Microsoft to protect even things that are not able to get a patent for.

If I go on thinking about this a bit more, then I think that Orwell was a very big optimist when he wrote "1984".

"The Management"

[Anonymous Coward]

I work in a state agency (hence the AC), and the prevailing "unwritten" policy that has been tossed my direction is that we will use Micro$oft platform software for systems that we have a shortage of competent workers to use as resources (ie one, me) due to these principles:

1. Given that the administrator up and quits tomorrow, "The Management" can go on the street and hire an MS trained professional from the myriad unemployed yokels who thought certification = job.
2. Micro$oft Administration is easy, and if they had to, "The Management" feels they could administer the box without personnel. (Which is false)
3. "The Management" had a bad Linux experience - had business needs that were met by a non-administrator implementing a linux box for those needs... and the non-administrator got a better job and left them with an un-administerable box. Said box was then owned by skinheadz and used for DDOS attacks, because the box wasn't administered properly.
4. "The Management" believes that finding bugs in Micro$oft software and submitting them to M$ will get the bugs fixed.
5. "The Management" believes contacting Micro$oft with support issues is better than having to support yourself in the Open-Source Arena.

So.. we continue to use M$ software in a highly vulnerable part of our enterprise (web).

What's the point?
The point is that members of the technical community (read: tech workers, not most middle-managers) are already convinced of the issues of interoperability, standards, and the monopoly status of Micro$oft. The hurdle lies in convincing "The Management" that the only way to break this monopoly and to curb these business practices is to take your business elsewhere.

From my perspective, most of those in middle management feel that Micro$oft will do what is "right", and do what is "best" for the tech sector, and that having a large corporation there to take care of our interoperability worries, and our standards issues, and our implementation problems is a nice comfy thing to have. It gives them a sort of comfort zone in which to work in.

I think I started rambling.. I better move to my weblog now so I don't get modded too heavily.

Re:So competing means????

[skribe]

Thou shalt use a license like the BSD one...

Translation: Thou shalt allow us to steal.

Not competing on quality

[Get Behind the Mule]

It may be stating the obvious, especially on Slashdot, but there are many people in the world who need to hear this: again and again, M$ pushes its products not by trying to make them have the highest quality and win in market competition, and certainly not by innovating, but rather by playing political hardball and introducing gratuitous incompatibilities, all to deprive consumers of choices.

So many times, I hear people insisting that M$ could only have become so powerful by being the best. This seems to derive from a profound conviction that market forces can only ever do The Right Thing, so anything that succeeds in the market is by definition a superior product. I think that market forces make this happen most of the time, but like anything else conceived and practiced by human beings, markets are flawed, in that they sometimes allow products to succeed by shenanigans rather than by quality. And M$ is living proof of it.

Here's M$, reacting to the open source phenomenon, which may truly be the biggest threat they face today. Especially the GPL fosters the existence of software that they couldn't at least copy for their own purposes, unless they open their source code as well. So what do they do? Create even better products that beat out GPL'd software on the market? NOOOOOOOO!!! Instead they create a license designed to make the competitor incompatible, by legal fiat. Not that any consumer of software derives any benefit from the intracacies of software licenses, and not that there's any innovation in legally forbidding interoperation.

What will it take before M$ apologists finally get it?

Re:Not competing on quality

[buss_error]

Instead they create a license designed to make the competitor incompatible, by legal fiat.

Just as an aside to your comment, (which I whole heartedly agree), if I ever get busted for something, I want to be treated like M$: I want to be able to meet with the prosecutor and tell them what punishment I'd like.

Now that everyone is freaking over the license, can I ask a really stupid question? Can't we tackle this from the other way around? For instance, write a client for Windows to use Unix, instead of writing a Unix program to work with Windows built in clients? Or am I being really stupid?

You know, you're right...

[kscguru]

These are REALLY distilled, but...

The GPL/LGPL basically says you can't change the license on the code to anything non-GPL/LGPL.

The MS license says you can't ever change the license to GPL/LGPL - or, in other words, MS must always have the option to copy/buy/(steal?) the code back.

Really, MS just took the GPL and turned it around on itself. If the ideas behind the GPL are valid, then the ideas behind this license are valid. Clever trick... you ALMOST have to admire their lawyers.

MS has faith that open source can't survive without MS code. Open source has faith that they can survive without MS code. I wonder who's right...

So does Kollar-Kotelly know about this?

[jejones]

...and if not, shouldn't she? Seems to me this is clear evidence that the proposed settlement is worthless.

why not just?

[maxpublic]

Why not just make a third license with exactly the same terms as the GPL, but which requires that every user fork over one penny for use of the program to the FSF at some point before January 1, 3000 A.D.?

In this case distribution isn't 'free' since there is a real cost involved, even if that cost is delayed. Companies use the idea of 'delayed costs' all the time in accounting; why can't common citizens do the same?

Better yet, have one person buy the program and then relicense it under the actual GPL. You can do the same with the exempted BSD license and I doubt MS could do a damned thing about it.

(Well, actually, I don't doubt that. They've obviously bought Bush and through him the DOJ, so they can probably do just about any damned thing they like, with Federal marshals to back them.)

Max

Re:NAS Vendors Effected

[Jeremy Allison - Sam]

This is a very astute comment (IMHO). The real reason behind this is to raise FUD in the minds of vendors looking at Samba on Linux as an alternative to Microsoft's server appliance kit.

Doesn't matter if it's legal or if the patent claims are valid. It's to get the CEO's of appliance companies to go into their engineering dept. and say "see, we should have licensed from Microsoft to be *safe*".

It's all about the dollars and control of the vendors........

Regards,

Jeremy Allison,
Samba Team.

Why not an MIT/BSD license?

[MAXOMENOS]

I am not a lawyer. That having been said, the clause at issue seems to be the following:

1.4 "IPR Impairing License" shall mean the GNU General Public License, the GNU Lesser/Library General Public License, and any license that requires in any instance that other software distributed with software subject to such license (a) be disclosed and distributed in source code form; (b) be licensed for purposes of making derivative works; or (c) be redistributable at no charge.

...

3.3 IPR Impairing License Restrictions. For reasons, including without limitation, because (i) Company does not have the right to sublicense its rights to the Necessary Claims and (ii) Company's license rights hereunder to Microsoft's intellectual property are limited in scope, Company shall not distribute any Company Implementation in any manner that would subject such Company Implementation to the terms of an IPR Impairing License

It occurs to me that there are two well-known open source licenses that satisfy this requirement: the BSD license and the MIT license. They both basically give carte blanche to use the licensed software in any way one pleases, and contain none of the so-called "Intellectual Property Rights Impairing" provisions..

So ... can we re-license these projects under a BSD license? Or is there something I'm missing about the agreement? For example: if we link a GPL program against a BSD library, does that library become GPL?

NB: I believe very strongly that this is an effective way around this problem, so I may play devil's advocate with any replies. Hopefully we can hammer out a solution somehow.

This is completely useless.

[tunah]

Okay, I've been thinking about this and the possibility of getting an implementation of these standards to the GPL via BSD, and have realised why this has absolutely no credibility.

Scenario 1: An implementation can be released under the BSD license, which can then be 'forked' by a third party (the fork being GPL) and the original abandoned. Microsoft can do nothing. This license means nothing.

Scenario 2: For some reason in the license, the action outlined above is not possible. This must be due to something in the license. If it just says 'you may not relicense under GPL' you just relicense under the X license (say) and then under GPL. The only way microsoft can get around this is to say something like:

If you redistribute source of this program or of a derived work of this program this paragraph must remain intact, and the GPL or other IPR must not be used.

Now what do we call that, boys and girls? A viral license.

RMS's bogeyman was closed source, MS's is the GPL. They both discovered that if you want to release the source, you need a viral license. Unfortunately for microsoft, that makes their whole excuse for eradicating the GPL collapse. Oops.

Re:Welcome To The Real World.

[Chops]

Are you a troll? Well, in any case, into the abyss.

From what I've seen of the anti-GPL rhetoric that has come out of MSFT, they are primarily against Richard Stallman's political agenda that comes with the GPL.

... a fine reason to dislike RMS personally, perhaps, but a foolish reason to dislike the GPL itself. An interesting footnote to this was the message in which Linus said he specifically wanted the kernel to be licensed at v2 and not "any later version," because, while he liked the GPL v2, he didn't trust the FSF not to go haywire with future releases.

They see nothing wrong with altruistically giving away code (which is what the BSD license and its ilk are about) but licenses like the GPL that attempt to devalue the cost of software are anathema to such people. The GPL drives the cost of software to 0 or at worst the cost of distribution media (just take a look at Cheapbytes for a living example of this). This means that any entity that produces GPL software most augment their income in some way be it through moonlighting, consulting, support, selling hardware, etc.

If everyone were the kind of perfectly efficient weenie tightwad this argument assumes, then yes. I see no evidence of this in the real world, though. People do buy GPLed software in boxes in stores (I'm one of them.) CD sales were booming while Napster was in its prime. And every day, free sample trays in supermarkets sit peacefully on their little tables, the shoppers around them miraculously resisting the urge to maximize their profit by gorging themselves instantly. And I've never heard of anyone buying anything from Cheapbytes.

This is not a mere side-effect but was an explicit goal of the GPL which can be garnered by reading Richard Stallman's early writings especially the gunk about software developers should work as waiters so that we can afford to give our software away.

Interesting. I believe this tall tale to be attributable to this:

So I looked for another alternative [to writing proprietary software], and there was an obvious one. I could leave the software field, and do something else. Now I had no other special noteworthy skills, but I'm sure I could have become a waiter. [Laughter] Not at a fancy restaurant, they wouldn't hire me, [Laughter] but I could be a waiter somewhere. And many programmers, they say to me "the people who hire programmers demand this, this and this -- If I don't do those things, I'll starve." It's literally the word they use. Well, you know, as a waiter, you're not going to starve. [Laughter] So, really their [sic] in no danger. But -- and this is important, you see -- because sometimes you can justify doing something that hurts other people by saying "otherwise something worse is going to happen to me." You know, if you were really going to starve, you'd be justified in writing proprietary software. [Laughter] If somebody's pointing a gun at you, then I would say it's forgivable. [Laughter] But, I had found a way that I could survive without doing something unethical, so that excuse was not available. So, I realized though that being a waiter would be no fun for me, and it would be wasting my skills as an operating system developer. It would avoid misusing my skills. Developing proprietary software would be misusing my skills. Encouraging other people to live in the world of proprietary software would be misusing my skills. So it's better to waste them than misuse them, but it's still not really good.

There are, of course, provisions in the GPL that protect your right to resell GPL software at any price.

Since the GPL makes it near impossible for an entity to simply produce and sell software as its core business,

I'm not convinced that licensing your own code under the GPL means that you can't make a profit selling the stuff. Asserting that the mere existence of GPLed software makes it near impossible etc. etc. is basically complaining about the existence of competition ("Yer honor, they can't sell it that low! I'll go out of business!")

... it is unsurprising that the world's largest software company would be wary of doing anything that encouraged the spread of this meme. What is surprising is that most observers find it difficult to realize this and instead of applying Occam's Razor, resort to conspiracy theories about how MSFT wants to steal their code.

Hehe. That bit was very nicely done. That google search seems to indicate that some people take this kind of rhetoric seriously, though...

Not news

[ulmanms]

In this CNET news article...

I'm not trolling, but that's not a news piece. Yes, it's on their 'news.com' site, but it's an opinion column, written by Bruce Perens.

I'm not saying he's not right, it's just that presenting it as news is misleading.