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Last Word on ADTI Document
kris writes "Linux and Main's Anthony Awtrey put together a very nice analysis of the ADTI "Opening the Open Source Debate" paper before and after the temporary retraction. He came up with some interesting research of just why the paper adressed specific examples such as the FAA and exposes the FUD behind the FUD in the paper."
Ya think we might, one day, get a non-inflammatory response to the ADTI paper? This latest one is as bad as all the others - filled with deprecating comments written as if the audience was part of the "in-crowd." If you really care about the accuracy of the debate, why waste your time writing a rebuttal article for the linux audience? The ADTI article was not aimed at the linux audience but rather at the suits who don't know the details of the either the politics or the tecnology. A rebuttal written for that target audience is worth more to the forward progress of linux than a hundred of these "nudge, nudge, wink, wink" rebuttals that can only sound like the squabbling of an infant to an outside party.
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
The ADTI report is written to be read by politicians; the rebuttals I've seen are written to be read by techies. I do hope that anybody who's sending one of these rebuttals to their congresscritter does an editing pass first, though.
"reverse engineering harbors very close to IP infringement because and has staggering economic implications."
That is utterly bogus. I spent the first 5 years of my career reverse engineering IBM's PCs (back in the days when IBM was the "bad guy" and Microsoft supplied a fun little OS that freed users from sysadmin tyranny). Due to the efforts of hundreds of engineers like myself at PC "clone" manufacurers, we now enjoy a utopia of cheap, fast, interchangeable PCs supplied by numerous competitors in the marketplace.
Decades of continued reverse engineering between manufacturers as they added improvements has maintained compatibility as the architecture has scaled in performance by over 1000X. The affordable computing power made possible by reverse engineering has provided immeasurably huge benefits to the world's economy.
Unfortunately, the software market has not seen nearly as much reverse engineering and cloning as the hardware market. If it did, we'd all get to keep more of our money to spend as we wish, and we'd have fewer headaches managing and sharing our data.
Sending your money to someone just because they've erected a barrier of obscurity and secrets around the tools you need to use your data does not help the economy or spur innovation. It's more like being taxed to pay for an entitlement program.
I have yet to read the newly revised version of the ADTI document, but looking at the original doesn't fill me with anger, or the need to go change the world.
It just depresses me. That there are people out there who find nothing better to do with their time and money than to tear other people down.
We have Microsoft machines at my Day Job. And MS SQL servers. And an AS 400. And a Macintosh (granted, only me, but hey, it's a start). And several Novell servers (I love the new licensing scheme.) And a Nokia IPSO box.
They all do a job, they all work together, and when I need to do something new, I look it over, and choose what I need. More often than not, it's Open Source, and everything else is slowly being pushed out (well, except for the Netware boxes - NDS rocks). I don't care about philosphy. I care about cost, performance, and how easy/difficult it is for me to use.
I might read the new version of the ADTI just for the heck of it. Odds are, I won't. It doesn't nothing but tear down, and I have a hard enough time building things to worry about what I should be taking out.
Of course, that's just my opinion. I could be wrong.
52 Weeks, 52 Religions with John Hummel
Last word, my ass. The AdTI paper is so freaking biased and badly written, that we'll be ripping it apart for weeks to come. Unfortunately, it'll do little good until a) a serious and polite rebuttal, aimed at the same kind of people the original paper is aimed at, gets written, and b) it gets diffusion equal or superior to that of the AdTI document. The much maligned, "inflammatory" rebuttals that have been written and published in mostly-linux weblogs are little more than preaching to the choir.
Perhaps some of the big Open Source organizations can help? someone from the Free Software camp? the FSF perhaps?
No, they won't be in trouble and they have no desire to stop the Open Source movement. Software proprietors love the Open Source movement and Microsoft has never complained about that movement's goals (giving gifts of code to business) or its means (advocating use of non-copylefted Free Software licenses like the X11 and new BSD licenses instead of licenses that preserve software freedom). Microsoft and AdTI complain most about one movement and its chief license: the Free Software movement and the GNU GPL. The GNU GPL is properly recognized as a Free Software license, not an Open Source license.
Also Microsoft has decided to join 'em rather than beat 'em. The most recent AdTI revision is remarkably poorly timed. It would have had some weight if it had been published before Microsoft decided to become a turncoat.
Digital Citizen
I want to see 10-20 arguments like this made. they are clear, concise, NON-INFLAMMATORY, and make a point.
Then I suggest you get writing. It's not like Santa Claus can be expected to bring you this stuff for christmas.
I don't mean to be a complete asshole. I'm just trying to say, if you know what the arguments are, why not write them down yourself? I don't see why you have to wait for someone else to do it, unless you want the official RMS guide to why FUD sucks or something. Part and parcel of the whole OSS mentality is this: if you have an itch, scratch it yourself.
Tastes like burning! - Ralph Wiggum