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Slides Of Microsoft Anti-GPL Advocacy
An anonymous reader links to these slides outlining Microsoft's position on Free software licenses, in particular the GPL, writing "Regarding the latest memo from MSFT, the current politics is to be against 'copyleft' type licensing... Protecting freedom is fundamental for Free Software and MSFT knows that. They don't want licenses that protect our freedom." Makes an interesting companion piece to the anti-OSS memo mentioned the other day.
What good is this to my lynx browser?
Kidding aside..
It's just a bunch of jpg's on a non MS site. Just pointing out the obvious, what verification do we have these came from M$?
Please tell me and don't mod down, I think I have a very valid question here.
It seems someone at Microsoft has sat down and thought long and hard about this. I'm certainly not one of MS bigger fans, but I think they pretty much got this one right.
Naturally, they don't like the fact that they can't take something under the GPL and integrate into their own products, like they have with BSD-licensed code. And, on some level, they have a very good point about products of research that are released under the GPL. The only value they have to any company working on a closed-source product is as an example, while a BSD-style license would have allowed them to take the existing code and adapt it.
In this aspect, the GPL actually harms interoperability and if the purpose was to give the research results a wide impact, releasing them under the GPL would be counterproductive.
I live under no illusions that all software will one day be open source, and perhaps it would be a good thing for people to think an extra time about the consequences of their choice of license.
For standalone programs, the GPL makes a lot of sense, but perhaps BSD-style licenses are more appropriate for prototypes and example implementations. Perhaps also the operating systems themselves, but that's a harder call.
I'm glad some people finally understand that the battle isn't about markets or choosing a software license, but freedom. All to often people think that free markets are about markets, and not freedom. But just the opposite is true, when a society has healthy freedoms - the markets tend to take care of themselves.
There is an old saying, a nation can't be half slave and half free - but only all slave or all free. Unfortunately, alot of people don't understand this about copyright controlls. They think that choosing a software license is like going to the store and choosing between pears and apples or between painting your room yellow or pink - that it's just about preference. Well, it is not, and it is so fusterating to see how people refuse to consider the long term consequences of their own belief systems.
The simple truth is copyright controlls are untenable without massive free speech restrictions like the DMC0A (and beyond), and information is so easy to manuipulate and change form - that it can't be controlled unless all of it is controlled.
> ...you don't really have much more freedom than with closed software, infact, in many cases you have much less.
How is this possible? Closed source software never allows you to even see their source code, much less modify or redistribute it. Further, more and more closed source license even limit how you can USE the software. They often don't allow you to even install the program on more than one machine at a time.
The GPL places NO restrictions on how you can use the program. As long as you don't redistribute, you have complete freedom to make any changes to the program to suit your needs. You can make unlimited personal copies and run on all of own machines.
Only when you decide to redistribute a GPL'd program does it limit your freedom. Commercial software never allows you to redistribute it.
So please tell me one instance where a closed source application has even a single freedom that the GPL doesn't already give you.
-- Don't Tase me, bro!
Okay, maybe I'm dense, but how does your line of reasoning go? The only restrictions I see in the GPL are that 1) You have to make your source available under the GPL if you make a modified version and you choose to distribute that version to the public, and 2) programs that use GPL'ed code fall under the GPL.
That's it. You can use the program on as many machines as you want, give copies to your friends, all legally. You can even make modifications and keep the source to yourself, so long as you also keep the binaries to yourself. There is nothing in there to prevent you from being selfish. Heck, for most purposes you don't even have to accept the license. You can decline the GPL and still use the program all you want, you just can't legally modify it.
Compare this to Microsoft's licensing policies. Let's take a specific example: Windows 98 OEM version. That Windows disc that came with your computer can only be used legally on your computer. If you replace, say, the motherboard, it's not the same computer anymore, and you no longer have the right to use that copy of Windows 98 on any computer at all. Similarly, if you sell the computer that the disc came with and build a new one, you cannot use it on the new computer, even if you wiped the old one clean before you sold it. And there are lots of other restrictions, too -- read through a Microsoft EULA some time. If you actually take the time to understand it, you will find that there are about a zillion restrictions on how you can use the program. And of course you are not allowed to modify it, and couldn't if you wanted to, unless you are a wizardly programmer who can read binaries and reconstruct the original source code from them.
Compare this to the GPL, where there are only those two restrictions, and they only apply to developers. And the GPL is probably the most restrictive open-source license: others, like BSD-style-licenses, or the Zlib license, place effectively no restrictions at all on your use of the program. So, please explain to me: how is it that you have less freedom with open software than with closed?
I must conclude that this AC is a troll. Dang. Oh, well, I've got karma to burn.
In the sixth slide, it says that the GPL is 'Known in the OSS community as a "viral" license.'
Totally regardless of whether or not the GPL is viral, isn't this the description that Microsoft came up with?
I'm confused. Who first described the GPL as viral? MS? RMS? Somebody else?
For me, the most interesting slide was the bottom half of img_0224r.jpg, (Areas of Concern) where it says: "Primary research results placed under the GPL are precluded from commercial use: TCP/IP example".
I'm wondering if this translates to "We are concerned, because we can't charge people royalties for every packet they send." I would have loved to have heard the commentary that went with that slide.
I've always HATED the stupid "M$" text that people use when talking about Microsoft. They want to make money - good for them. HOW they go about it has proven problematic/wrong/illegal/whatever, but the motive is the same for all companies - make money.
No one is suggesting propping up a company at the expense of another - certainly not in this thread.
Please lose the $, or use it evenly:
$un
Net$cape
$ear$
$BC
$pirit
$am$ Club
$heraton
etc
creation science book
You can look at the GPL and write your own proprietary implementation. But a lot of source code from companies like Microsoft and Sun software is licensed under agreements that "contaminate" you; that is, you can't develop a competing implementation because the presumption will be that you copied stuff from their source code. They also contain lots of other clauses that "infect you", like with an indefinite possibility of getting dragged into a law suit between Microsoft or Sun and a third party.