Slashdot Mirror
UK Govt Warned: Don't Buy GPL
JPMH writes "ZDNet is reporting that a UK IT industry body backed by Microsoft, IBM, Intel, BAE Systems and other high-tech heavyweights has urged the UK government not to commission open-source software, and particularly not software covered by the General Public License. According to Intellect, which lobbies for about 1,000 UK IT companies, the requirement of open-source licences for software funded by the government could have a negative impact on competition for contracts, the quality of the resulting software and even the confidentiality of government departments. In particular, Intellect recommends that the government drop the GNU General Public License (GPL), the licence upon which the GNU/Linux operating system is based, from its list of acceptable default licences for government-funded software, and steer clear of the GPL generally."
That which is free.
What should I do??
These are taxpayer dollars we're talking about. Shouldn't they be spent on something where the user is completely free to modify - either licensed BSD, or public domain? Kudos to this lobbying group for standing up for the beleaguered UK taxpayer (Tony Blair sure doesn't).
This is weird
My penguin ate my sig
What, did SCO get to them or something?
-David Barak
Need Geek Rock? Try The Franchise!
they'd rather sell you their closed source buggy software at over-inflated prices. did you expect "industry leaders" to suggest otherwise?
abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz
...typical.
Considering that IBM sells solutions powered by Linux. Am I missing something critical here? Perhaps this was not a unilateral action by the member companies, but instead an action taken by whoever is nominally "in charge" of the consortium?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Ok, let's have a clean fight here: nothing above the belt and no biting!
Am I the only one who is confused the IBM is thrown into this group?
-- p06 "On religious wars: They're essentially wars over whoo's imaginary friend is better"
This is BULLSHIT! This is just going to make me more determined to make my GPL application better than commercial and stuff it in thier face and and say, in a Nelson mocking attitued, "HA ha!".
On one hand, they do tons of work on GPL'ed software, now here they are against GPL code.
What gives??
Press any key to continue, any other key to quit.
just shows you how many bumchums billy boy has
There has been a few similar stories around, is the problem that they're saying not to allow GPL/OSS or that they're saying not to force GPL/OSS? It's not very clear to me at least.
The government is there to hand out taxpayer money to corporations.
It's so obvious.
the major advances in civilization are processes which all but wreck the societies in which they occur - A.N. White
Considering all the SCO IBM news and IP claims I wouldn't be overly interested in tying my gov. software to GPL either.
telling you not to buy Kentucky Fried Chicken.
DUH.
Wow!! So if I want to use the software for my own personal gain and charge to use my version, I can. Then I can get FREE software research. Yea!
when your competion give away their software (and a good lot of free help too) is it fair that these firms should go out of buisness (the 1000 lobbying), i thought captitalism was supposed to work where the cheapest/most efficient solution wins , those that can't play , don't.
interesting times indeed
I'm happy to see Microsoft is looking out for governments worldwide, and not just here in the US.
666-607: 6th floor apartment of the beast
The GPL license COULD potential open a business up for a lawsuit, and anyone who reads Slashdot knows that GPL-lovers are very quick to cry for censure of any company suspected of violating the license.
The safest, and most appropriate license for government-funded and government-created software is the BSD license.
(-1, Raw and Uncut is the only way to read)
that M$ is behind the current SCO/IBM situation. They can only copy things that others have done. Now they (M$) are trying to kill OSS just like Netscape and taking a page out of IBM's FUD from the 70's to do it with.
this report will get ignored in the aftermath of the war. Blair isn't Mr popular now anyway, and you have to remember that lobbying groups in Parliament are 10 a penny.
Maybe the Open Source Community should have one too.
An infinite number of monkeys will eventually come up with the complete works of
I could swear I saw another story above this one, but was told to move along when I clicked on the Read More. Looks like I beat the subscription system!
Is there a sonyesque powerstuggle going on inside IBM that results in left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing?
fact is: opensource is changing the IT industry economics and IT providers should adapt or die ...
...
...
... (anyone in it 's sane mind really believes that OSS is inherently bad and insecure ? got tell that to NSA, NASA, ESA, IBM, the City of Munich or google ...)
as usual some people really don 't get it (not a big deal - dynossaurs got extint anyway) and will try all sorts of dirty tricks like this one
I hope as an european netizen and taxpayer that EC watch bodies look very wel at this kind of tricks
Other than that - lots of good publicity for OpenSource
Cheers from Portugal
I still fail to understand, here we have IBM for LINUX (supposedly) in the SCO suit, then against LINUX in the UK. Can someone enlighten me as to if there is more than the usual "anti-LINUX corporations" stories than there appears to be?
I'm about to tangent out here, but, It's like there is no way out. The current options are Windows, or any of a number of UNIX or UNIX-like-variants. Almost all of the UNIX variants are tied up in various infighting , and Windows is dominated by domination. Can't I just use a free, license free, drama free, and lawsuit free version of Mac OS 9?
"Hi, we don't like having to compete with these guys. Could you please help us destroy our competition? If you do this, competition between the existing installations will improve! Really!"
* Don't sponsor RMS
* Don't send a gift to Linus
* Never buy a beer from the OSI guys
* [your 'I misunderstood the topic,too'-line here]
The group of names mentioned, (MS, Bea, and IBM) are probably not themselves lobbying, but a GB-lobby group...
So don't go trashing IBM for this, as I'm sure that being part of this GB-lobby group has some other advantages which do 'profit' open source products (from IBM, or otherwise).
But that all aside, this is a pretty silly situation, as other parts of the UK goverment have endorced Open Source software.
But hey, this article only states that the lobby group has lobbied against, but that isn't very dramatic is it?
Moderation: +4. Modded 70% Funny and 30% Overrated. 100% Saturated.
What's great about this document is that it basically says:
(1) OSS won't make us money.
(2) Therefore, you shouldn't use it. Because, um, it won't make us money.
(3) That would suck for us.
Okaaay.
Why would they want the UK government to get a geek, a few x86s, and the Apache source?
;)
They'd be stupid to want that.
What they really want is the UK government to buy some big IBM iron, an IBM-trained geek, and the support contract for the open source software that goes on yonder iron.
Why not? Taxpayers paid for it.
So after reading the article and a little thinking, this seems pretty obvious. What they article seemed to be implying was that any work that the government commissions to a company would be open-source. So, if the govt were to order a database program, that program would be open-source, and the company would have a tougher time selling it to somebody else.
This is nice for us, because more stuff goes into the public sector. Not nice for companies because they can't profit twice on a lucrative govt contract. This would definitly include IBM. So, remember that IBM needs money to fight lawsuits, and they would like the govt to fund them for the development of software and then make more money by selling it to us.
In Denmark the IT-industry organisation is controlled by Microsoft. Their role in the danish EUCD implmentation was not supported by several of their big members.
ZDNet is reporting that a UK IT industry body backed by Microsoft, IBM, Intel, BAE Systems and other high-tech heavyweights has urged the UK government not to commission open-source software...
I don't understand, this means not to fund open-source projects (which would suck) - it doesn't mean they can't use them, right?
From the list above, you can see that some of the most popular open-source technologies are not GPL. "Recommending against the GPL" does not mean "Recommending against open source."
Just something to keep in mind...
Simpli - Your source for San Jose dedicated servers and colocation!
A study commissioned by the fox, today issued a strong warning against putting a lock on the henhouse. "Locks are dangerous things. They can pinch your fingers. They cause changes in behavior that are undesirable."
- For the complete works of Shakespeare: cat
Number of mentions of the word innovations per page is roughtly equivalent to the probability that this report was funded and ghost written by Microsoft.
Lets see: 3 mentions in 4 pages. MS probabilty factor - 75%.
Well now that companies are turning countries into virtual communist controlled economies by lobbying for (and getting) extentions to copyright laws, requirements for manufacturers to implement digital restrictions, and tariffs on blank media, expect more of the same in the future. Ironically, socialist operating systems such as Linux and BSD are the only way to avoid a communist future. Linux is socialist software and is not communist in any way, much like the American Heart Association is a socialistic organization and not associated with communism in the least. Capitalism is dead!
If the UK government is required to buy open source, it can't buy WebSphere/WebLogic etc. Without such a requirement, they can continue to buy linux and IBM can sell them WebSphere.
when you head up to the local military base to take an M1A1 Abrahm's for a test spin. You're a tax payer, you paid for the damn thing, about time they let you drive it, right?
When it sits around the industry, it really sits around the industry... err, uh, both sides.
The UK's position as a world leader will be severly impacted by following advice like this.
And this in turn means that the french terrorist apologists probably would be strengthened. Therefore it's a really bad thing.
How small a thought it takes to fill a whole life
These are obviously all indigenous UK companies that need to be protected, by the UK tax payer!!!!!
Help fight continental drift.
Yes, this is exactly what tax funded government research is for.
You probably don't realize the wealth of information that is already public domain from government research.
And I agree, these government projects should be BSD licensed or public domain. GPL is too restrictive (eg. you can make BSD-licensed software GPL, but you can't make GPL'd software BSD-licensed).
The ratio of people to cake is too big
All cynical comments about big corporations aside, it actually makes sense...basically, (from what I gathered) the UK government's proposed regulation would require that any software developed for the government be released under the GPL. This would mean that if a company wanted that big government contract, they would have to release, for free, software they could sell repeatedly otherwise. Essentially, it'd be a one time sale.
When their numbers dwindled from 50 to 8, the dwarves began to suspect Hungry.
I have a feeling the UK's loyal friends within the Commonwealth will have a different opinion.
..."
The Commonwealth looks like it's verging towards a common strategy.
"The OEE and the DTI are considering establishing open-source licence terms as the default for government-funded software"
This sounds like it's swinging the pendulum even further than South African plans.
"When the Government decides to develop software using a restrictive licensing base, such as the GNU GPL, (it) should be aware that this would prevent it from deriving commercial gain
Which would be bad because we all know how much of our software we buy from the British government.
Esteem isn't a zero sum game
haha GPL weenie :)
So you do not mind paying for research and project that help Microsoft and IBM. The are very large companies. I guess one could say that each company could get a hold the software equally, but then would their not be various format and versions of the same thing? What if by chance I develop the greatest widget based on a BSD licensed widget ( here using widget in the abstart sense ) and Microsoft develops one that pushes their agenda of constant upgrades. And is totally incompatible to mine. Theirs sucks but you are going to buy their and ignore mine. The public is not served and the mega corporations make out like a bandit. But you and every one else are left to pay for both the original development and now the new inferior version Microsoft is dishing out.
If the widget was GPL'ed, Microsoft would not be able to push me out. My great work would be notice and used and others coudl jump on my bandwagon abd the public is enriched.
I love open source. The GPL is great. But don't force anyone to use it. That defeats the purpose of 'free' software. If someone decides to use open source software, it should be because it is better than the alternative. It shouldn't be because there are no alternatives.
I don't believe a closed source license is a good one at all, but likewise I don't think the GPL is the best idea either. Either putting it directly into the public domain, or using a BSD style license is the best solution, IMHO.
NOTE: This is for discussions of software being *developed* with government dollars, not when bidding is going on to use existing software for a contract, which is a whole different issue. But when development is done with everyone's dollars, it should be open for use by all.
Sweeet, my first ever opportunity to be a /. grammar nazi.
"UK Govt Warned: Don't Buy GPL"
When I read this, I got the idea that the UK government had warned people not to buy GPL software, which was scary to say the least.
fortunately, TeX is not distributed unther the GNU GPL, so Britons can still do high quality typesetting.
Seriously, don't content yourself with ranting here, exercise your political opinion where it counts, and Fax Your MP about this blatant abuse of our political system.
We all know that Open Source raises the bar for the rest of the industry, encourages competition rather than extinguishes it; make sure your MP does too, and that if he or she doesn't present your view, you may be more chosy with your vote next time round.
If everything were covered under the GPL tomorrow, would we be better off than where we are today?
They are against GPL not because it's open source, but because it's too restrictive. In other words, because it's not free enough.
Yeah, it's a bitch when a company can't slap a widget onto government funded software and then sell it back. You can see how the GPL might drive bid prices, aka government costs, down. As for quality, it's hard to see how someone can go wrong with GPL'd software.
GPL-lovers are very quick to cry for censure of any company suspected of violating the license.
Hey, that's the way copyright works. Big dumb companies set it up so they can screw you and me. Too bad when it gets used in a way they did not expect. Various programmers are quick to cry foul when they see work they wanted to stay free and are giving away, used by some big dumb company in an abusive manner. You don't think those same big dumb companies hesitate to set their well funded leagal department on individual programmers if they catch a wiff of anything they might lay claim to? Just look at SCO trying to extort the entire world of Unix. Nothing like that can ever come out of free software. Get back in your hole, troll.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
From what I remember of the GPL, If you dont publish the binary code for a program, you may make any changes you want to the source and not be forced to release them.
Most agencies that handle classified information will not want to share the code that handles that data. So any development work done by these agencies is kept within the agency and not subject to GPL.
The commercial software houses see their meal tickets going away and will spread any amount of FUD to prevent it. If the current crop of contractors will not bid on contracts that use/require open source, too bad. Someone else will be glad to take the contract.
Chris
Does Intel not realize how many of their processors are running Linux? Are they just telling us to buy AMD?
These are taxpayer dollars we're talking about. Shouldn't they be spent on something where the user is completely free to modify
You mean the way the user is able to modify MS Windows, MS Office, Oracle DB, Adobe Acrobat, IIS, and all the other software that government purchases with taxpayer dollars. Methinks you have lost perspective.
The solution is acutally quite simple. If you don't want your work to fall under the GPL, don't base it on GPL software. How hard is that? Just do it all yourself and you can license however you want.
Unfortunately, the recommendations of Intellect appear to go to far. Saying that GPL should be avoided is undefensible. Saying that it should be weighed against commercial software to determine what the most effective solution is for a given situation is a better position. The fact of the matter is that OSS doesn't always come out ahead in side-by-side comparisons.
IMO, this just seems like lashback against the kind of move that other governments are making in saying that OSS should be PREFERRED over commercial software. As a proponent of OSS I am perfectly happy to compete on a level playing field. Shift too far one way or the other and the system starts to break.
I am confused, I thought that IBM liked Linux? I think people in IBM are not communicating.
In any case, I hope this definitely goes through. Maybe then some of the people releasing their hard work under the GPL will think twice instead of just using "the license everyone uses" and screwing themselves in the process.
Hey, I have an idea. How about an icon of RMS in a borg suit? Assimilation can work both ways.
One of the factors highlighted in the ZDNet report is that of commercialisation. The position paper states that using the GPL would remove the option for the government to commercialise and profit from its work.
Call me old fashioned (and having said that I know I'm going to get at least one post that says "You're old fashioned"), but I thought governments were about internal order, external defense and maintenance of currency. Even being relatively liberal they should still only be concerned with generally looking after their citizens, not creating software.
After all, the British govt. providing the NHS really limits its ability to make money by running private hospitals. And if they didn't provide all those policemen they could make a fortune as a private security firm!
Cheers, Paul
It might make MS stuff look better in the short term, but I think we need to send emails etc. to the makers of theres TCO analysis and demand it be included. Why would the cost of interoperability be any less than say education of system Operators.
Once the component is included it is much easier to have a sober debate on the long term cost of "lock-in"
Help fight continental drift.
And of course, we all know that Microsoft's Licence is much better than the GPL, and its terms are so much more reasonable. After all, giving away all your rights away to Bill Gates is the natural thing to do, no? /sarcasm
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
This is what obsolete things do.
Lawrence lessig talks about how the past always tries to control the future. When companies/concepts/technologies become irrelavant they go to the government to get protection for their money machines.
The Phone company
The Music and Movie distribution Industry
And now the software industry
It is irrelevant what decisions the government makes becuase ultimately through the path of least resisitance Open-Source will dominate. The phone companies will be relegated to uselessness or at least not look anything like they do now, and the RIAA and MPAA will become a relic of the past. This is the way of things.
Governments change regularly, policy, leaders etc. etc. etc. But vi is forever!
The most sensible license for government contracts is no license at all. In other words, public domain.
There is no reason why publically funded IP should be copyrighted by a corporate entity.
I could understand BSD if it was only partially government funded, but for anything paid for by the taxpayers... PD is it.
The world is neither black nor white nor good nor evil, only many shades of CowboyNeal.
Well, first of all, you ARE completely free to modify a GPL'd software. Just don't redistribute it. Not as nice as BSD or public domain for some people but a hell of lot better than the Windows EULA of the week.
Second, if you think that's why these folks are against the GPL, you are NUTS. They are against the GPL because Linux is under the GPL and Microsoft is calling the shots here.
The GPL is a great license for people who don't want their work used against them in the future. It's probably BETTER for companies like Microsoft to release the code under GPL rather than BSD, etc., but since Linux is GPL'd, Microsoft has to be 100% anti-GPL. And the anti-GPL crowd laps it up!
Instead of being anti-GPL, be pro-Free-software. That includes GPL OR BSD OR public domain. ANY of those are better than closed-source software paid with public funds, don't you think??
Could there grounds for GNU to sue said industry body for libel? It would be interesting to see the claims against the GPL challenged in court. IANAL (duh)
quack
no sig, no plan, no clue
The government has a great track record of buying computer systems that are massively over budget and horridly late?
What interest would they have in saving money or time, that's not their job. There's plenty of ways to pay for failed project through new and exciting taxes.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
So how well do those work without gcc and glibc?
Yet another well-formed opinion from those who would save us from ourselves, our own prosperity and our own happiness as a society.
It just amazes me that there are still people who listen to these self-important, avaricious cry-babies who have somehow gotten it into their minds that profits from their current business models (without regard for their viability) are an inalienable right.
They clearly either misunderstand the GPL or are blatantly lying. The GPL does not require you to disclose anything unless you distribute the modified version.
Thus the MI-5, CIA,CSIS, Interpol, or whatever can freely develop their own internal software under the GPL, and deploy it throughout their systems. The requirement to include source only applies if they distribute the product. I expect intelligence agencies don't normally distribute sensitive software outside the agency.
Shouldn't they be spent on something where the user is completely free to modify - either licensed BSD, or public domain?
In this case, the GPL is exactly the same as the BSD license.
It's only when the user stops being a user and starts being a distributer that the rules change. The GPL does not allow people to stand on the shoulders of giants without a return in contribution.
It's not users (or "beleaguered UK taxpayers") but profiteers that are under additional restriction.
Microsoft is to software what Budweiser is to beer.
Unlike BSD, the GPL carries a political message in it, and the government would have to back all the statements in GPL such as "All published software should be free software", the definition of "free", etc.
For what it's worth, I personally don't think all software should be free, but more importantly, I disagree with the idea of having to distribute a political message with my software.
All the OSS software I wrote has been released under BSD-like terms, and when I use software in my projects, I give preference to BSD-licensed ones.
grisha.org
HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHA!
Is anyone surprised that business doesn't like GPL. I work for a living, I'm not impressed with GPL either. I release everything as BSD and Public Domain. It makes more sense from a business standpoint. Anyone could get contracted to work for a business or government, use my stuff in their project and they are done. Where I step in is, if a lot of contractors are using my stuff I get to write books on it and they sell like hotcakes. (most people will buy the extremely specialized books for their field, even if the books aren't very good). Also I can get a job easier as a contractor to work on my own "free" software.
The weird restrictions of GPL has always made it a hard sell when I've been contracted at various companies. We usually go "well this is GPL, so we can't statically link it here." or "This is LGPL, we can do this, but then have to do this".
RMS hippies are still paying off their student loans while wasting their time on GPL when they could contribute something wonderful to the community and turn around and actually sell it to business.
Release your applications as true PUBLIC DOMAIN today! Let everyone benefit from mixing your applications with other applications freely. Remember that PUBLIC DOMAIN means you have removed the copyright and can make no legal demands on it's use or distribution.
If you want to insure that you get credit for what you have done then use BSD license. Of course if it's public domain and some company just grabs it and claims they wrote it, that would be false advertising. The damages would be a lot smaller than copyright/license infringement, but most companies will be willing to mention your name someplace if your public domain code contributed a significant amount.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
WE all know how Microsoft is trying to tale over the world ... it appears they have inlisted the aid of several other companies ... or tricked them only to burn them later ...
A lot of people are yelling about governments not procuring or using GPL'd software, but it appears the complaint is about commissioning the creation of software under the GPL. And I'd agree with that proposition: if the taxpayers fund it, it should be in the Public Domain. Anyone and everyone can use it, abuse it, make money off it, extend it, wipe their butt with it, and write poems about it without any licensing issues whatsoever.
[
First of all, it's never been proven that BSD and Microsoft share the same TCP/IP code.
Secondly, the GPLicense is openly hostile to commercial ventures. Is it a good idea for the government to be openly hostile to commercial ventures?
The BSD license enables anyone to use the code, pretty much however they like. It's not "corporate welfare" because:
#1) it's not issued by the government
#2) it does not place commercial use over or under any other type of use.
The BSD license is a donation to the public, allowing code to be used for anyone's benefit, from the university professor, to the struggling entrepeneur, to the Fortune 500 company. It fits right in with the American governmental goal of "promoting the arts and sciences," an apolitical stance that's hard to argue with.
The GPLicense is a reactionary license meant to tear commercial interests down. For some it's a call for the liberation of software and computing from rich and powerful corporations.
But for the rest of us, making a political statement with a software license is as pointless as brushing your teeth with piss. The government is not the place for your fucknuckling software jihad, so grow up already.
You can also make BSD licensed software closed source, but you can't make GPL'd software closed source. If, let's say, FreeBSD were in the position where Linux is right now, how long do you think it would take Microsoft co-opt the market as they did with web browsers? Certainly they couldn't kill off the traditional BSD user base, but they could easily pull an Apple and suck away all potential BSD users into an incompatable closed source variant operating system hell.
You're damn right its tax-payers' dollars we're talking about. Whenever the UK government buys software from Microsoft, IBM, Oracle etcetera, they are essentially converting British Pounds Sterling into US Dollars and sending them off to US-owned companies. At least with GPL software its less likely to be spent improving a foreign economy, as we have as much chance to compete here in the UK, what with having access to the source code of this non-proprietary software.
Didn't some nutcase steal National Guard's M60 tank a few years ago? I think I saw it on TV. He went joyriding on the nearby highway and was eventually shot to death by the cops (he forgot to lock himself in)?
You are a troll but I feel like biting.
What you describe is not limited to the GPL by any means. A BSD license would make no difference whatsoever. It all depends on whether a person/company contributing code to a project has properly evaluated the rights they possess to do so.
In fact, if you actually bothered to look, you'd realize that most patent/copyright violation lawsuits of the past have involved commercial software mainly.
This is why a firm would use software from a mainstream provider (IBM, Suse, Redhat) with a proper contract that contained provisions for such eventualities instead of just farming stuff themselves of the net.
Do not spread "09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0" over the internet, thank you.
You mean the way the user is able to modify MS Windows, MS Office, Oracle DB, Adobe Acrobat, IIS, and all the other software that government purchases with taxpayer dollars. Methinks you have lost perspective.
Not what the government has purchased with tax dollars but what the government has developed with tax dollars.
Come on why does big business say this? This can only help competition. Everyone will have to lower prices to compete. It sounds more like they are trying to eliminate the competition
No, I think if Abe were alive today he would say something more like, "HELP!! Get me out of this box!!"
If you find a corporation EVER doing ANYTHING NOT FOR PROFIT, be very worried, it IS for profit but there is some reason they are hiding it from you. Expect nothing but pure profit motive from a corporation and you are on sound footing to deal with them. Greyfox has the right idea, the most dangerous people in the world are FANATICS, and a pure alturist is A HUGE FANATIC.
Single people are generally good natured and friendly, the bigger the group, the lower the combined IQ is and the more likely the group is to make stupid emotional decisions.
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
Yeah, God forbids the UK government makes its software choice based on *GASP* code quality *CHOKE* ! The GPL here is helping in leveling the field UP. The proprietary software vendors are forced to actually make programs that will stand up to these increasingly popular open-source alternatives.
But of course open-source is not limited to GPLed software. Expect more "GPL bad, BSD good" messages from this lobby group soon.
The GPL does not allow people to stand on the shoulders of giants without a return in contribution.
Sort of like if I make a charitable contribution, but only if the receipient makes charitable contribution of his own and only to those who make charitable contributions of their own and only....
grisha.org
One of the previous arguments of proprietary vendors is that a governament shouldn't base their decisions on the license of the software, specifically, the GPL. Instead, governament should decide based on the functionalities of the software. For example, Microsoft Office's Word is the best word processor available, so the governament should buy it, since it meets the user's demands.
Now, the table have turned. These UK lobbists are asking to deny a software based on its license, and that it doesn't matter if it is the best tool for the job. As long as it is GPL, it is wrong.
Highly amusing. It only indicates that proprietary vendors are shooting everywhere hoping that one of their arguments convince someone. And that the "feature-rich" argument, after all, isn't working.
Buy a Nintendo DS Lite
In addition to the 75% MS probability factor, there's also a 150% chance Ballmer wrote it himself. The word "developers" is mentioned 6 times in those 4 pages.
Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.
Java has changed so that you can now create a GPL'd version of it without licensing issues.
I think the real strenght/reasons for using the GPL would be to keep the government paid-for work in the hands of the community.
The real solution would be to dual-license everything. GPL + commercial. A percentage of all the commercial license revenue should go back to the government for future development projects.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
Well i can write a program, compile it with GCC and sell it with any license i like..
GCC's license means that any product which is a derivative of gcc must be gpl'd
-1 Factually Incorrect
The user is free to modify in both cases.
We need a new moderation.
Any code that is linked against the GPL, inherits the GPL.
In other words, you cannot use any GPLed components in
combination with proprietary ones that you do not own and
that are not licensed under the GPL.
We cannot f.e. distribute an AV-Player that uses GPL codecs
as well as proprietary ones. Hardware drivers are even more
problematic.
IMO it should be sufficient to release your code only if it
is a derivative work of 'free software'. At least you should
only be bound to release your own code if you combine it with
'free' components.
I,
Am in the unfortunate situation alluded to in the article referenced.
As a sole proprietor I've worked two years on a fairly sophisticated aviation simulation program that has usages in planning new airports and in airspace changes.
I would like to make my project GPLed.
Unfortunately, there are companies much more politically connected than I am that would absolutely love to take the code, go to the government official that they have in their hip pocket and sell it to them.
Sure, the stuff would have my name written all over it, but the government official would probably never ever see the code. All he would know is that some slick sales person sold him on the software and more importantly the big fat maintenance/upgrade contract that goes along with it.
That sort of thing is basically how it works in government contracting. Government guys have zero ethics and will screw you over in a heartbeat.
It's sort of like an ego trip for them. They know they have you (especially if you really want to sell them something) and they will jerk you around bigtime.
So yeah, if you're in a particularly giving mood then GPL is just fine. Just plan on not being able to put gas in your car for the rest of your life if you're gonna deal with government people.
Because there is always somebody who is going to make they government person more happy they you will, even though you might be the "expert".
Having said that, I have made my software's code available with fairly lax licensing terms.
The terms basically state that if you license the code and then try to sell anything based upon it then you owe me a piece of the pie.
If you want to use it for in-house purposes then you are free to use it.
If you don't like the terms then you can develop the code yourself.
Caution: Contents under pressure
IBM wants to sell their own programs, and reduce the profit of other corporations, it's called competition. So if they can sell Linux + IBM stuff for less (or with higher profit margin) than MS + IBM they will. They tried themselves with OS/2 but couldn't make it happen, so better with "noone" than somebody else.
Off-the-shelf software is becoming a commodity, where you can get your basic OS/office pack from Linux. IBM wants to capitalize on those special use systems that OSS will never make because not enough people are interested in making. Government software may definately be one of them, I'm not talking about your average secretary office pack but real custom made stuff, or at least obscure enough you won't find any decent OSS alternative on Linux, or any alternative at all.
Kjella
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
Without companies like IBM, other countries will do to us in the computing world what they've done to us in the automobile industry. How soon do you want to hear that American computers are crap, and everyone buys them from Japan instead. Is this already happening?
The only thing more dangerous than a file named -rf is renaming it -rf\ /
True, but when you make money, the government makes money.
It's the third week of a month that starts with 'J' and the last digit of the current year is odd, so that must mean that the above oft-used joke is funny again! ;)
Exactly. There are great and very mature systems like FreeBSD and NetBSD. And the XFree86 license is pretty open too. Programs like SQLite are basically public domain as well. So cutting GPL out of the picture probably won't be much of a problem. Linux fans are probably crying now.
On the otherhand, taxpayer dollars shouldn't be used to fund someone's for-profit software empire. In many countries if a government employee creates something for the government then it's Public Domain. That's really how things were ment to be. The government hiring contractors to do things is to get around this restriction. Because politicians and business lobbists are deathly afraid of deflating the market with a lot of high quality Public Domain software.
If the government contract people to write oodles of software just to have a Public Domain version of something that was already written. That would be terrible. But generally the government requests software that is highly specialized for their own uses. So only a portion of the contracted code that goes into the Public Domain is going to compete with commecial market.
Of course from what I was reading I didn't see any thing about not buying software that was already written. Institutions will generally buy something if it's available today and does roughly what they want. This is why you see a lot of copies of Windows and Redhat Linux still being bought.
I don't see the government contracting a firm to make a "free" workstation, a "free" operating system, "free" network routers, "free" PBXs, etc. This won't ever happen, but this is the kind of fear that your typical business lobbist has with the government dealing with open source, public domain, whatever.
To wrap up the point in simple terms:
Public Domain and BSD are good because it is the freest possible license. Things bought by the people should be FOR the people.
GPL is restrictive and should not be allowed. Because it's not for the people, It's for enforcing an idealism in software redistribution.
Commecial software is even more restrictive, And had the ethical concerns of funding private software empires with public money. This can lead to corruption in the government.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Now the Industry might be spreading some lies around about how open source code is buggy and of lower quality than stuff done by the "professionals" but I think that's a load of crap. Even the worst open source projects I've looked at seem to be only as bad as the average professional code-base. Open source guys tend to code toward the features they need only, but if you paid them to implement features you need, I'm sure they wouldn't have a problem doing that.
As far as the license issue, if I were in charge of a government (or other) agency, I would demand access to the source code of the work I'd commissioned. I would even consider releasing that code to the world, if not under the GPL license at least under a BSD one. Big IT companies might fear that because if their code made it out into the world, they would have commit seppku from the embarassment of the code quality or having some wise-ass kid releasing a much-improved version.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
...or something like "goddamn, that's one awful friggin headache!"
Hell, the Open Source Initiative website lists 42 others that aren't the GPL (though they may be derivatives...).
So find one that isn't as "restrictive" as either the GPL or the proprietary ones that give no access to the code...
Internet Explorer was unable to link to the Web page you requested. The page might use standard HTML or CSS.
Taxpayer Euros to you, bucko!
There may in some cases be a conflict between the Government's desire to maintain confidentiality and the requirement to disclose the software laid down by a restrictive licence, to the extent that the source code itself discloses attributes about the Government body that are regarded as confidential
Absolutely incorrect.
The GPL does not in any way cover internal distribution. This is not the same as public distribution. Making modifications and keeping them within your company, but not releasing the source, is completely uncovered by the GPL.
In regards to software that the government funds, the government should NEVER fund proprietary software development (except for things which are meant to always be secret, like the US govt's program to predict how radar bounces off of curved surfaces). Public money should not be used to create private information, or proprietary programs, which the public then has to pay for again.
In regards to what software is acceptable for the government, this organization's concerns about the GPL are bogus, and anything they say should be ignored. Irrelevant of the truth, they are going to advocate the use of proprietary software. It benefits them.
The proper course of action is for the government to give strong consideration to FOSS, and if it decides against using FOSS, it should have to publish and explanation of it's decision to the public. In fact, any decisions on what software the government uses should be justified to the public, and the government should be required to consider FOSS, for the very frequent cost advantages of using it. The government has an obligation to tax-payers to consider what is likely to in most cases be a less costly solution.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
Is the UK goverment going to go for the idea of profitability and greed, or are they going to go for the idea that one doesn't need money in a system where people do things because they like to? The entertaining part is that the GPL twists the idea of capitalism thoroughly; why should I go with something I have to pay for when something else is free and superior? So they pick the free and some people are out jobs, and in time programming becomes something people do for fun and enjoyment. As time goes on, hardware and software becomes cheaper and the control stays within that of the people and things like food, water, and shelter become readily available and free. No wonder so many corperations want this gone; they are capitalists opressing a movement that understands capitalisms faults and moves to exploit them.
Candy-Coated Knowledge
Can you point to a single example of a corporation that does not simply pass the cost of taxation onto their customers?
One? Just one?
Corps don't pay taxes. Rather, they pass that cost on to their customers. Biz 101, Zergwyn.
Er...save your kudos, friend. They're not advocating "freer" licenses - they're trying to push proprietary alternatives.
In any case, because they're taxpayer dollars, I think they should definitely go with free software. Since the govt. is unlikely to be a software distributor, there's no problem with using the GPL (or BSD licenses, for that matter).
Reminder: find a new sig
Of course there are other open source licenses than the GPL. That doesn't change the fact that the GPL predominates, nor diminish its important role in the promotion of OSS ideals. As of Apr. 4, 2002, sourceforge reported that 73% of the projects it hosted were GPL'd. The Linux kernel is GPL'd, for christsake. So you think it's o.k. for the UK to outlaw the use of Linux?! On what grounds?
Don't even pretend you are a friend of the open source movement when you make statements like yours.
The reason these companies want to eliminate the GPL from consideration is obvious: the GPL prohibits them from incorporating other people's work into their proprietary software. Now why should the government, in other words *you*, via your tax dollars, be financing work which proprietary software vendors can then appropriate for nothing and sell at a profit? Welfare programs should be reserved for people that need help, not Bill Gates.
--Lawrence Lessig for Congress!
UK Govt Warned: Don't Buy GPL
/.'ers to go into a wild frenzy. In fact, no where in the article did it suggest that the government of United Kindom had issued a warning about the GPL. The organization known as Intellect is *not* the UK government.
That's all that's needed for
In fact the title of the original article is "Industry group urges government to think twice on open source". Sure, it has a lot less shock values, but sure is a lot more accurate.
Therefore, I claim the title is crap.
It is not free. It is funded by 40 percent of my salary, 75% of what I pay for fuel, 30+% of what I pay for food and goods (delivery and other fuel related expenses are calculated before VAT), 25% of my company's profits, ad fscking naseum.
Frankly anything government funded should be either BSD or public domain at least in countries with extortionate taxation like UK. The taxpayer has payed for it 100 times. He should be entitled to use it as he sees fit.
So no closed source, royalty shit either. I have payd for it, I am fscking entitled to use it. So just play good ole BSD.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
but they rule
welcome to democracy where the majority decides who they ahve for lunch
republics have inalienable rights, democracies change on the whim of public opinion
so while you can disagree you better do it quietly
Wrong.
If you don't want your work to fall under the GPL, then make sure that your work is a modified GPL code. You still can include any GPL software (with its source code) into your package, and keep the resulting package under any license. But if you modify any GPL code then make sure that the modified piece stays under GPL.
How hard to understand that?
Less is more !
... and therefore the PEOPLE should own the resulting code which they have funded.
GPL is the only way to ensure that it is so.
The whole reason M$ is whining is because the world is moving onto GPL'd software.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Businesses are geared to think only in terms of how profitable a certain action can be, and are incorrectly projecting that necessity-for-profit onto others. Intellect appears to be trying to equate their perception of a reduced commercial value of GPL'd software to a reduced societal value of GPL'd software. And while the former is an unproven assertion at best, the latter is downright wrong.
Should we abandon the creation of roads where the cost of building a new highway exceeds the revenue of the resulting taxes? What about housing for the poor? Surely we're not "deriving commercial gain" out of those projects?
Seems to me this is yet another case where commercial organizations need to be reminded by the public that they exist only at the pleasure of the populace, and by their grace. When a commercial organization (or other entity) begins to promote it's own interests over the advancement of the society as a whole, that society is correct in recognising such an organization as hostile.
The thing about things we don't know is we often don't know we don't know them.
--dave
davecb@spamcop.net
They're just trying to help the crappy economy out guys!
Look at it this way, if the "Department of Tee" has 50 employees, each with a computer, and a need for office software, that's 1 package of Windows XP Professional $143 and 1 package of Microsoft Office Professional $179. Multiply that by 50, and that's $7,150 for the OS, and $8950 for office software, together $16,100. But don't forget, they might need new computers to meet XP's software requirements
Meaning another $16K pumped into MS, and the world's economy.
They're just trying to help, really.
Error 407 - No creative sig found
Why Microsoft and other entities that are convinced of the viral nature of the GPL have overlooked this blatantly obvious issue is utterly beyond me.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I don't think you have to expect much from the EU. Just this week the juridical department of the europarliament approved the new proposal for allowing software patents (and therefore . The woman responsible for preparing the final decision-making - a british labour member of the europarliament: Arlene McCarty somehow is in a lot of hurry to force this through by 30 june already. I think she has a hidden agenda.
Anyway - all pro-Open Source talk from the EU IMHO is just a lot of nice words and no action while at the same time they really don't understand what they're talking about and give more and more away to big multinationals...
Unfortunately I've only got a link about the news in dutch, but there's a petition to cut this crap over here. If you agree with what it states, please sign it.
0x or or snor perron?!
Not if Blair has his way, they'll be euros B)
My favorite bit is how they claim OSS aren't inventive and won't be able to provide any new solutions to problems.
"3) [restrictive licenses may lead to] Very basic software that would provide only minimally useful solutions-- for the same reason that anything beyond customary and already known solutions wouldn't be created."
Err... given that experimental software is one of the big areas of open source development, I find this surprising. Heck, the ReiserFS is a nice piece of computational science that is GPLed and he still gets to sell it to companies (as per most recent Linux Journal).
Oh well, back to do my non-innovative work, I guess. After all, it's open, it must be derivative.
A.
Is there a sonyesque powerstruggle going on inside IBM that results in left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing?
This is IBM we are talking about here people. It has thousands of employees worldwide working in dozens and dozens of divisions. It is not reasonable to assume that there is so much as one person at IBM who knows everything that the company is working on at any given time. It seems quite reasonable that different groups within IBM would have different opinions about any number of subjects including this one.
It's a huge multinational corporation. There are lots of divisions driving their own agendas. Unless the statement condemning the GPL came directly from the CEO or one of the top executives, do not consider this announcement to be official IBM policy...
*** Where are we going? And what's with this handbasket?
As someone who warks for BAE I really don't like this.
This is very anti-compititive. This would preclude
the government from using GPL or from contributing to GPL
projects.
Write your representativies and your corporate PHB's
who are doing this crap....
Governments hate the idea of open-ness.
--- Yx3 = Delilah ---
According to this, the UK uses a system of Crown Copyright, which if I'm not mistaken also applies to software created by developers working for the UK government.
Observations for the UK government to note (should any representative thereof read this):
This post expresses my opinion, not that of my employer. And yes, IAAL.
In other news, a US auto consortium, consisting of Ford, GM, and Harley Davidson is recommending that the U.S. government not buy cars from Asia, as they are shoddily built and may undermine the US's abilty to compete in the auto industry. (a bunch of companies recommending you not buy from their competitiors is news?)
Isn't it funny that all the open source advocates call GPL software free software and yet these people call it restrictive software.
If you want high-end software there is closed software that will run on an open OS, right?
Open software less secure then closed? eh, bullshit! Microsoft may have easily left backdoors for themselves in any software they publish. but we all know bout BSD. I wonder if the UK does?
Suppose I am a government funded researcher. To be precise, people and businesses in my country pay their taxes and the government awards me some of this money to fund a new software system. Suppose my system is useful for SMEs to quickly help them to communicate opportunities to do business. It doesn't matter what it does exactly; the key is that there is communication between different organizations and that this is facilitated by my government-funded project. If I GPL this software, everyone in the country gets to use the software. If you're so inclined, you could go into business to try to make money from the software; you could improve the interface, or make it easier to search for partnerships, or whatever. Of course, you must GPL your changes, but you might be the clear leaders in the installation and configuration of this SW, so you could make some money. In any case, whether you can make money or not, the taxpayers do not lose out.
Suppose now that the software is released into the public domain, or even under a BSD licence. Suppose further that half-a-dozen firms spot a market opportunity to improve this project and make a commercial product out of the system. This is fine in principle, but if one of those six firms is Microsoft, we have an immediate problem. MS could decide to integrate the system into MS Outlook; perhaps the system uses email to communicate opportunities. We still have no problem of course, because there are five other competitors, any of whom could come up with a better approach to improving the product. Perhaps some of them will flourish in organizations which do not use Outlook for whatever reason.
However, if MS wishes to, they can simply make a subtle change to the protocol used by their version of the software. Because MS Windows is universal, this new protocol becomes the de facto standard. Of course, even this wouldn't be a problem, so long as MS published their changes to the protocol.
Suppose however that MS declines to publish their changes to the protocol. Our five other competitors are pushed out, and whatever money there is to be made from the software will accrue to Microsoft. For all I know, MS are paying a huge amount of tax, and perhaps they should have the opportunity to make a killing like this. The problem is that all the other taxpayers get to pay twice; they funded the original software with their taxes. And now if they want to get the benefit from the money they "invested" before, they have to pay again, this time to Microsoft. Of course you could argue that MS might have made significant improvements, but I don't think that argument holds, because they wouldn't have to make any useful changes to effectively require taxpayers to pay again for what they have already funded. All Microsoft needs to do is to make some subtle and unimportant and secret change to the communication protocol and they've made an instant market for themselves (or, more accurately, they've damaged another market).
I think that this is the key problem with BSD and public domain licensing for taxpayer-funded software.
Reality is defined by the maddest person in the room
British citizens.
Now is the time to write your MP. Write him a _polite_ letter (snail mail is best in this case), in which you explain to him that GPL is good, esp. for government funded software. Read the comments in this thread, to get some arguments.
The most important thing is that you stress that this is important to you. Important decisions win votes.
the pun is mightier than the sword
Shouldn't they be spent on something where the user is completely free to modify - either licensed BSD, or public domain?
Why should they? Your tax payer dollars pay for your city park, yet you aren't free to set up a business in your city park; in fact, what you can do in your city park is quite restricted. And the purpose of those rules is so that everybody can enjoy the city park.
It's quite analogous with the GPL: tax payer dollars pay for the software, and the GPL ensures that the software remains there to be enjoyed by everybody.
Likewise, the fact that tax payer dollars pay for software development doesn't mean that anybody should be able to use that software for whatever they please.
Keep in mind that the same kind of people who make this argument against the GPL now had not trouble making the argument a few years ago that governments should pay for software development in the private sector and then leave ownership of that software with the companies that developed it.
It seems a bit off base to draw comparisons between 'professional programmers' and 'open source programmers'.
How may open source coders out there make money at what they do? Is it not possible to be a professional open source programmer?
Your reply, sir
You can read the original Intellect's analysis in here.
The ZDNet article misinterprets many things Intellect suggest:
1. Intellect does not suggest OSS licenses are all bad. Only GNU GPL could be problematic for the Government uses (ZDNet's title is so misleading)
2. The "GPL not suitable for secretive government bodies" is also overblown. The Intellect just suggests that if the Government wants to maintain confidential codes, they can't do it under GPL.
All in all it's fair to recommend the Government not going for 1 type of development model/license by default. The only question I have on the Intellect's analysis is that they suggested that businesses can't get back value of their IP under GPL. As far as I understand, GPL does not require distributing their software free (as in beer), nor giving up the right of redistribution (so I can't distribute a piece of GPL software in which the copywrite holder does not grant me the redistribution rights.) In that sense, GPL won't hinder commercial interest in software development as suggested in Intellect's paper, and the whole analysis could falls apart. But I'm not sure I'm correct on the GPL, better have someone more familiar with GPL to point it out.
A sig is redundant.
If you don't want your work to fall under the GPL, don't base it on GPL software. How hard is that?
Very hard for most people, especially the ones that want to make easy money using other peoples hard work...
Duh.
They say don't require GPL. I think for free software to get in there allowing GPL is the start. Requiring GPL is just as unfair as requiring Microsoft products.
This space intentionally left blank.
governments considering buying open source software is considered. Frequently people here say "right tool for the right job" and talk about open standards being more important than the software. What has surprised me is that so far I haven't encountered one of the most important arguments: The right choice for governments is not necessarily the best software for the lowest price. For companies that reasoning is the only sound one but for governments it's not since they need to take more things into consideration - such as jobs in their own country. Have you ever seen police cars in a country made by a non-domestic manufacturer if there is a domestic manufacturer? I simply don't understand why so many European governments are so happy to send money to Redmond instead of trying to increase employment in their country. Obviously MS Office is better than OpenOffice and whether the total cost of ownership of Windows is lower than that of Linux (for eg. government desktops) is debatable. Can you imagine what it would do for Linux if the German government decided that since there is a domestic supplier of operating systems (SuSE) that must be used even though compatibility with MS Office wouldn't be perfect and even though people would need re-training. And if the French did the same with Mandrake? Why can't governments (and others) see that with a little effort Linux can be considered just as generic an operating system as Windows - why, why, why? If they buy other domestic products simply because they're domestic why not apply the same logic to operating systems since with a little effort they can be just as generic as cars.
Karma. Moderation. Is my
They're scared.
We're winning.
Anybody elso have problems with governments funding GNU license type open source software?
The government should be public domain.
Anything is better than M$ taking over 50 billion US dollars .
.
.
.
.
.
away from those that do the work in the field
50+ billion was just their net profit, cannot even imagine
their gross profit
How many jobs could have been made with all those billions,
and the other billions that were labelled as expenses and
funnelled through the US govt tax system
Who really knows how many billions went thru M$ over the past
10 years , I am almost baffled to guess
I stagger to think how many coders could be hired for life
on the amount, and the residual interest, etc etc
You'd have the best software on the planet, and workers there
to help you with it instead of having to call a 1-800# to get
$hit $upport
Peace,
Ex-MislTech
google "32 trillion offshore needs IRS attention"
The government is responsible for spending the least, running the most efficient and approrpriate software and keeping its systems robust. Now there are small areas where Solaris and Windows are more appropriate than Linux.
Case in point. Certain types of networking betweenn Tokenring and Ethernet do not work stably in any version of Linux or the BSDs. If such a requirement arises, the government should not let its systems become unstable or expensive when they can use Solaris. Another example: many specialized inventory management, ERP and financial applications are only sold for Windows. If such a software is required, it must be run on windows given thats the least cost route. It is in the best interest of the people and the government itself, rather than sanction a team of programmers to try and duplicate that functionality for Linux or just a team of accountants to make up for the work manually.
Of course for firewalls, other networking, high security, web and mail services and other applications, Linux or the BSDs are a better option than AIX, Irix, Solaris, Plan9, Xenix, QNX, BeOS, AtheOS, CP/M, OS/390, OS/400 or Windows 2003. Discrimiation of software licenses in the government will incur high costs that the people would not want to pay, and will harm the security, stability and efficiency of the government. Governments should therefore use free software as much as possible but not exclusively.
"Give orange me give eat orange me eat orange give me eat orange give me you." -Nim Chimpsky
And exactly how will the UK government bodies modify software bought from companies such as Microsoft and IBM?
Your point about not being able to modify GPL software is moot when compared to the alternative.
I'm the lead developer of LISSARD, an open-source school administration system. I am having discussions with someone in the U.K. who is very interested in free software, and in particular, using LISSARD in several of the schools he represents.
As I understand it, some U.K. courts have recently ordered their current proprietary administrative system to open up their database backend, opening that market to competition. That's where LISSARD comes in. Anyway, no one (in those schools, at least) likes the idea of being tied to a single vendor, which is why the open-source model is much more attractive. (Don't like it? Hire someone to change it.)
Also, this person is actively trying to deploy open-source software wherever possible, with moderate amounts of success so far. The real obstacle, as far as he can tell, is that most people are of the "you get what you pay for" mindset. (To which I respond "I'll take your money
All in all, good times to be OSS.
BAE Systems uses Linux internally. It's not officially supported (because CrapSoftwareCo, aka CSC) don't do Linux (wankers) but the Advanced Tech areas use it for many things - including most if not all of their classified networking technologies in the Advanced Technology group.
I have seen no breaches of the GPL, but for them to recommend that the UK Gov't doesn't buy it is to say the least hypocritical.
This is the most insightful comment in the entire discussion, and I couldn't agree more.
I'm no expert on software deployments within..well, anything, but doesn't it seem smarter for governments to be writing their own open-source software, rather than depending on tools written by outside sources? If a government agency or network is reliant upon outside, unrelated developers to provide patches and updates, it makes me wonder if they aren't leaving themselves wide open to potential security holes and feature flaws. If they were to keep things in-house, at least they'd have the original developers on hand to track that kind of thing and keep things running smoothly. At the very least, it would allow them to tailor the software they're using specifically to the needs of their particular network.
I realize that there are financial concerns to worry about, but if we can toss out billions and billions of dollars to fund tanks and bombs, it seems perfectly logical to make that same investment in the security of government networks. I'd like to think that this should extend beyond just going shopping for hardware and software, and instead looking for the "best of the best" amongst the many developers out there.
IBM has its own team of coders working for linux, which is GPL'd last time I checked. I don't understand this corporate stuff :)
Yes, but... the US is currently running a trade deficit with the UK -- we buy more stuff from you than you buy from us. The dollars that the US spends on British products have to come back somehow, either directly or indirectly, unless you guys are just going to hoard them. Given the recent slide of the dollar against most currencies, hoarding hasn't been a good idea.
National governments should have very little reason to worry about the GPL. A national legislature can simply amend copyright law so that enforcement doesn't apply to the software in question (rendering non-acceptance of GPL terms moot), or use eminent domain to outright nationalize all IP rights to the software in question.
fact is: opensource is changing the IT industry economics and IT providers should adapt or die ...
Wasn't the article about the GPL? BSD is open sourced too, you know. >;/
I pay {a little something towards} the Government's wages.
I object to my money being spent on software when a superior alternative exists at much lower cost. The benefits of Open Source have been extensively pointed out elsewhere. Here I want to examine the malefits {I'm not sure that's a real word but it feels as though it should be} of closed-source {read: Micro$oft} software.
- Proprietary File Formats. This would lock software purchasers into an upgrade schedule, and creates interoperability issues.
- Closed Source Code. If you don't get to see the source code, how can you possibly know it is secure?
I belive that the Government should have the automatic right to subject the source code of any and all software it uses to expert scrutiny. {I would go so far as to mandate that a copy of the source code to all closed-source software be placed in escrow for dispute resolution purposes - only access to the source code would absolve manufacturers from having to guarantee software. Examining the source code is difficult but not impossible -- a bit like backing up your entire hard drive, which closed source suppliers are keen that we should do in the name of due diligence}. I would expect to see the software manufacurers obliged to permit this as a condition of contract. I also believe that in the vast majority of cases, open source software is eminently suitable for the needs of public bodies and therefore should be used as the de facto standard, unless it can be demonstrated that only a closed source solution is applicable.Doubtless this won't please Micro$oft, but my firm belief is that the needs of the people come before any corporation's interests. Software suppliers are not above the law. Maybe the Government could cut themselves some slack with the GPL and keep some Government internal software secret where there is a very good reason for doing so -- after all, they do make the rules. And any data made available to the public must be readable using Open Source software -- it is not reasonable to expect members of the public to have access to closed-source software, for a variety of reasons.
Je fume. Tu fumes. Nous fûmes!
Vender lock-in is good so that the government can pay more in the long run.
Since when is the buyer concerned about the profits of the seller?
"...with GPL software its less likely..."
..."
.`~.'".,,.'~".,,.".
These two words, it's and its, are one of the trickiest in the English language. Here's a little mnemonic that may help:
Posessive "its" doesn't posess an apostrophe.
Using this little phrase, you can tell that your usage above is a contraction (it is less likely...), and hence should read:
"...with GPL software it's less likely
Magic Grammar Dust for you:
I never thought my Govt. was supposed to make money on software they developed...if anything, they should give it back to me to use if it isn't classified....I've 'already' paid for it with my tax dollars...
Light travels faster than sound. This is why some people appear bright until you hear them speak.........
A BSD license means that the initial work is in the community for one and all. The problem is that some people can take that code from the community and add a widget or two and make it the new version their own.
Ideally, improvements should come BACK to the community.
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
This would be going against the "Software Choice" campain that is being promoted through the Initiative for Software Choice organization.. So is this organization not really promoting what they say they are?
Um you are buying your software and equipment from the UK subsidiary of the aforementioned companies. They pay UK taxes and provide jobs. Most likely they also give back to the community through charitable contributions. Unless your company sends a row boat back and forth across the pond every time you want to buy something, i suggest you reevaluate your opinion.
... yes but merrie and royale olde englande is ruled by dudes who still wear wigs and by funny royal like people, plus they disarmed their peasants, because they don't trust their peasants, so everything else they do sort of revolves around that methinkeths. Of course they want the peasants who fund the dudes in wigs and the royals to buy expensive software from their club drinking buddies.
/me checks calendar... hmm, 2003....
See, what would work is for everyone there to go to wherever those royal and wiggy guys hang out and like put heads on the battlements or whatever that is called. Every nation needs that at least once every couple of hundred years or so, keeps em honest and stuff. Then there's no rip off nonsense for a spell, then it gradually goes bad again. rinse lather repeat.
I mean, really, calling people "lords"? Say whut? "Curtseying"? "Knights"? We are supposed to take them serious?
I'm sure most of the people over there are just fine folks, they just suffer from the same thing we do, out to lunch government and these people who are already rich as snot so they think they deserve to be richer and have more power and to tell the peasants "what's good for them". I bet they even have people who supposedly "represent them" in the rich as snot royal or semi royal good ole boys government/business club, too.
So a law that says any code made by the government that they release (they can keep the secret nuclear codes secret) must be public domain. Or maybe they can require a BSD-style attribution in any copies. But you can make a logical argument that GPL is not allowed. In addition anything else requiring copyright is also not allowed, they are not allowed to give or sell it to a company that sells it as closed-source or even as open-source but GPL software.
Unfortunatley due to the stupidity of lawmakers, this lobby will confuse production with use and convince them that they cannot *buy* GPL software. If this argument was logical it would say they cannot buy Microsoft software either, but they will snow the lawmakers enough that they will fail to see such obvious conclusions.
If such a rule was done correctly, the only real losing part for GPL software is that the government would not be allowed to "improve" it, because their improvements, in order to be useful, would have to be GPL restricted and this law does not allow that. However it also means that the government would not be allowed to write code that improves Windows either. The government could write public domain modules that work in Linux, and can write public domain programs or libraries that work on either Linux or Windows. Linux is allowed to incorporate those modules into it's own code and even make the result (with some additions) GPL. Microsoft is also allowed to take such modules and put them into it's closed-source product.
This actually sounds quite consistent to me and could work. However everybody has to be shown that the GPL is somewhere between public domain and proprietary. If the GPL is not allowed then everything on one side of it, such as proprietary, must also not be allowed. Microsoft is trying really hard to obfuscate these facts and try to get the "middle" of the range clipped out, even though that is totally illogical.
Then again the RIAA is actually trying (by eventually making recording devices of any kind illegal because they can be used for "piracy") to outlaw the public domain. Odious as this is, it is logical as well, and could be a way to say that "proprietary software is the only legal software" and both GPL and BSD and public domain are all illegal.
[nt]
Who is BAE Systems?
Blair was Microsoft friendly, buying Bill's junk and asking him for advice. But like other UK government projects it hasn't been done very well and many of the sites are only compatible with IE.
Now there's talk of a lack of interaction between systems and in my eyes going for a GPL solution is better.
Makes sense. Go BSD and the headache you can get license wise is minimized.
Considering the increasing popularity of open source alternatives amongst government circles in other European Union member states, this effort will be a waste. I'm sure its a safe bet it will become a European Commission code to use open source platforms such as Linux for member state governments...if such legislation is sent to the European Parliament, all of the greens/socialists/leftists/anarchists/communists and crazy French peasant tractor driver respresentatives (MEPs) will vote gleefully for an act aimed at punishing an American cash-cow such as Microsoft.
"Right now, somewhere in this world, Scott Baio is plowing a woman he doesn't love," - Peter Griffin, *Family Guy*
Why should they? Your tax payer dollars pay for your city park, yet you aren't free to set up a business in your city park; in fact, what you can do in your city park is quite restricted. And the purpose of those rules is so that everybody can enjoy the city park.
It's quite analogous with the GPL: tax payer dollars pay for the software, and the GPL ensures that the software remains there to be enjoyed by everybody.
You probably think that copying music w/o the owner's permission is "quite analogous" to stealing their car. You do right? right?
BSL licensed software is free forever. If Bill Gates sails by in a pirate ship and scoops up the software to put in to Windows XX, and charge us all for it, and keep us all down by holding his (jack)boot on our throat - guess what - the original software is still free. (Re your analogy: there is just as much open space left in the park after WalMart opens a new megastore in it as before (and if we could swing this with things like parks, Wal-Mart would be allowed to open stores in parks))
You can't steal (or horde or whatever stupid inapropriate analogy you want to use) open source software. It isn't possible.
The rest of your letter is quite logical and correct. You need to reword this so it does not sound like some kind of anti-GPL rant, but instead expouses the positive aspects of using something else.
Personally I use the LGPL with a modification that allows static linking. The idea is that anybody can use my code for any purpose, but if you alter any of the source or header files you must release those changed files and anything they call. This allows my software to be used by anybody while disallowing the "embrace and extend" problems that are the main reason people GPL stuff.
Other than my mother, you mean?
C'mon, this is SLASHDOT!
If a piece of Governement funded software were to be subject to a restrictive license, such as the GNU GPL, commercial companies would often not see a benefit in entering tinto such an agreement because:
1) There is a limited amount of money that could be made from the original development because of the limited opportunity for further revenue.
2) They may not want to make public and available for free use any of their IPR that is employed in the development.
Feh. If in today's economy you've got someone balking at developing FOSS, then you can just find someone else. There are plenty of software companies who are hungry for work. They're not worried about future profits, because they're trying to stay in business today.
This is just B.S. cooked up by our "betters" in the IT industry to try to keep their pockets lined with taxpayer cash.
IMO, without this code, Windows would probably be used by fewer people, as its networking code would be worse or would have cost MS more making something else worse, and MacOSX would have been based on Linux
IMHO without BSD there would have been no Linux. Academics would not have had *nix source to study, rally around, and develop operating systems classes and textbooks around. Hint: Minix, key in the "genesis" of Linux. Without BSD there would not have been a large body of *nix knowledge and developers floating around ready to turn a little kernel into a *nix OS and environment. Without BSD there would not have been a "reference copy" of a working *nix to take a look at when coming up with yet another implementation or variant.
The user is already completely free to modify GPL code. They just have to supply the source code to the modifiations when they redistribute the binaries. If they don't redistribute binaries then there's no difference to BSD or PD code.
Anyway, the real problem here isn't users. The real problem is rich companies who will take BSD or PD code, profit from it, and not return changes to the community. If you think this doesn't happen then you are fooling yourself (eg, BSDI, AT&T).
No fucking way are you directly taxed 40% of your salary - unless you're REALLY poor, that is...
That was classic intercourse!
i'm a pro, so they say, i'm a pro, dontcha know?
spread my fertilizer all 'round, sit back, watch things grow.
mostly crabgrass, bayobabs, the occasional lemon tree.
my clients, bless their ignorance, dig lifetime dependency.
i write code, so they say, i write code, heads explode!
actually, spend all day grepping the Net, node by node.
paint on a nice splashscreen for those who would pay me,
slap on a license to bill. (get it? haha! i just slay me!)
what's this newfangled free software jazz i hear about?
why do i have to swear fealty to some borg just to shut it out?
can't i just continue to shovel my fetid wares?
one hand in the client's purse, one on her private hairs?
reality bites, gotta relate, reality bites, damn this shite!
who was the idiot who taught me that thought was like sight?
i close my eyes yet still gardens of others seem to thrive.
i dose on lies yet still truth and freedom will not dive.
"These are taxpayer dollars we're talking about. Shouldn't they be spent on something where the user is completely free to modify"
Shouldn't they be spent on something where future versions of the software are guaranteed to be available to use free-of-charge?
The GPL protects your software from people who would steal it and prevent people from using it.
Like usual they have completly ignored the fact that the original author can dual license, and are trying to spread the FUD that releasing anything under the GPL means you are giving up all your rights to it.
let's hope he does, then
That was classic intercourse!
Read the pdf, what a hodge-podge of unsupported statements. Firstly it is written from the perspective of the "Sponsoring" software companies. As pointed out, it totally ignores the fact that 99% of Government funded in-house code is for internal use. Why? Perhaps because they have specailist needs. How many Defence Departments or Internal Revenue agencies does any nation have.
Suddenly the premise that commercial software houses "do so in order to supply the software on a repeating basis and thereby to generate licensing revenues that allow them to make a profit on their investment" becomes null and void.
Governments do create or sponsor code for distribution to end users or clients, particularly in Health and Internal Revenue. Much of this is distributed free in the interest of eGovernment and reducing costs to the taxpayer. The development platform here is dependant on what the client machines have (usually Win95/98) and they can code it in VB if they are stupid enough. A large segment of the economy is still run on clipper code.
"Such a proposal would inevitably act as a deterrent to commercial involvement in Government sponsored R&D software projects because they would have such a limited opportunity to exploit any commercial gain from any privately owned IPR.." So this reads like they expect to profit from Government funded R&D, I thought this was where stendards otfen arose from due to the long term investment and the free rider effect. Normally, when a company pays you to write code they own the IP and I fail to see why this should not be the case with the application of public money. This effect was again raised yesterday by Hans Reiser. US style Corporate Welfare is perhaps not that appealing to the rest of the world.
Some other points;
Lack of adequate competition in the bid process.....
What they are really saying is that "we want to be protected from competition". Especially from small independant development firms that may be able to deliver on a more cost effective manner and with much less overhead. That would be worse that government bodies buying the development tools and coding it themselves.
Software that would not include leading edge developments.......
Like corporates and Governments implementing JAVA and web services and not waiting for .NET
This doesn't mean "we have established products and would like you to help protect the monopoly positions we have created by lack of interoperability
Very basic software which would only provide minimally useful solutions.....
Ah yeah, like "Hello, Microsoft. We are thinking of standardising on WinServer2003 if you could add...".
Confidentiality issues....
Well dont release the code. And if you do, don't copy any privacy law protected personal data into it.
And finally "For the reasons discussed the setting of a default position for use of restrictive licences such as the GPL, brings with it some commercial disadvantages that may in some cases outweigh the benefits." Read any MS EULA.
I would be interested to see the role IBM really has in this as it smacks of biting the hand, Linux and JAVA seem to be a large factor in the slowing down in the death of the mainframe.
I hope I haven't taken any quotes out of context, but they really need to be speaking to someone like Richard Alston in Australia.
Stopping myself...Abort (core dumped)
Come to think of it, their stock symbol is SCOX.
"Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival."
--Dr.W.Edwards Deming
This reminds me of those occasional commercials that the UFCW or Teamsters unions will do when urging a boycott of a particular independent non-union supermarket or two - buy ad time, say don't buy, and watch as their commercials had no effect.
This sig no verb.
there's no magic machine that changes pounds into dollars. american companies are forced to either to sell the pounds at the market (driving down the pound, thus increasing british exports), or to invest in the british capital markets which is also good for british investors. so basically quit whining you silly protectionist.
I recently found out that the contents of US federal government web sites are public domain.
Shouldn't the non-military, non-NASA, non-classified source code be public domain also?
Government investments in software and other assets have to accomplish a number of goals, not only do the need to procure something for the government to use but they should also meet a number of economic goals, in software terms this often means helping create jobs, generate new intellectual property and generally stimulate and maintain a vibrant technology economy... as a community we talk about a lot of these tenants but so far have failed to clearly articulate a business model in terms that Government policy makers can understand. Until that happens the only governments that will ever turn to OSS on a national level will be the ones that have other larger economic battles to fight with the countries dominant in technology. Who knows, maybe Germnay will use their love of OSS as a tool in the ongoing battles over who retains share in the automotive industry. "America, give us a better break on the cars we ship onto your shores and in turn we'll drop this free software rubbish and allow you to profit off it once again". Who knows, I'm not an economist.
Heh, actually, this is my first FP. =)
Also, what the hell are you going to do? Flame me to death? You don't have my name, my username, my e-mail... You basically know NOTHING about me, save for the fact that I'm an AC. So, go away.
Therefore, I believe it only fair that everyone has the opportunity to benefit from software developed with government dollars.
Absolutely! Now, why exactly isn't the GPL a good choice for ensuring that everyone has the opporutinity to benefit? Anyone can use the software, and distribute it to anyone else who wants to use it. This includes corporations! They can benefit from using the software, or modify it so that it benefits them more. Businesses already derive a great deal of benefit from using GPL software, so why would government-paid GPL software not be of benefit to them?
Oh, right... Because the GPL doesn't allow proprietary derivatives, making it difficult for a company to sell me shrink-wrapped EULA-encumbered versions of the software my tax dollars already paid for.
So what you're really saying is not that companies can't benefit from GPL software, but can't profit. Easily. From traditional software sales models. And I say "So what?" Why do companies have to be able to benefit more than everyone else before you'll approve?
It's a sad day when when it is considered unfair for a corporation to be merely equal to a normal citizen instead of preferred.
The enemies of Democracy are
One more thing. (Referring to parent of parent)
Damn. Getting uppy about a FP. If you can't handle it, set your damn threshold to 0. -_-; That should get rid of all the stupid FP's, like mine.
The group argued that the GPL's conditions would prevent the government from profiting from its software, and could estrange proprietary software companies.
At least in the US, research and development funded by taxpayer money is supposed to be part of the public domain. I think this is a rational stand. Anything else puts the government in direct competition with private companies, harming the very people who paid for the effort in the first place. As for estranging proprietary software companies, nothing would prevent them from developing an entire project themselves, using no GPL code and, thus, not having to share it or GPL the derivative work. If they use GPL to save development time and money, why shouldn't they have to be bound by the very licensing agreement that made the savings possible?
Once again, governments should not be profiting from work funded by taxpayers. As for commercial companies not wanting to participate - not bloody likely. When has any company (including all the biggies mentioned as part of this group) been unwilling to line up at the public trough? They charge well for government contracts and there is far less oversight because the government is not governed by normal rules of economy.
Intellect also charged that it would be a mistake for secretive government bodies to use open-source licences, since these might require the revelation of sensitive information.
Only two things to be said here: 1. the GNU license does NOT require ANY derivative works to have the source distibuted. I think (and I have no doubt I'll be corrected if wrong) that if a government only distributed the derivative works internally, they are NOT required to release the source. It is only if they dsitribute binaries publicly that they would have to release the source also. 2. It has been shown many times in history and most recently right after 9/11, that governments can and will act contrary to legal constraints in order to guarantee security. The US government has done it and, damnit, so has the British government! Why the hell would the matter of a GPL license stand in the way?
You can request software developed for the government (US). They may denie your request for one reason or another, but they have to make a case to not give it out. Not sure if you could then release the source under a GPL or not.
This is the UK we're talking about (RTFA)
It's less if you're poor, a lot less if you're really poor.
It's 40% marginal (actually 41% since April when they slapped a 1% extra national insurance charge on whole of salary rather than capped like other NI charges) if you're on a reasonable salary.
Lets hear it for Mercantilism! Woo Hoo! I guess who ever said theres nothing new under the sun wasnt that far off.
I think there's a "BSD is dead" joke in there somewhere.
All "GPL==restrictive", "BSD license=free" posts are real nonsense! Where are the arguments for that?
The GPL and FreeBSD licenses are restrictive to users in almost the same way. They can use software under both licences free (once they obtained it), make changes and let everyone copy it. Only difference is that the BSD license asks to leave the advertisement intact and the GPL to provide source code.
But then you are already on a developing level. The only difference between the licenses is on this level. This does not make one license more restrictive than the other, the restrictions are just different! The GPL say you give changes backs (restriction for the company further developing the source) and the BSD license restricts the developer (the developer can not develop further on his own source if a company patched a few lines proprietarily).
Anyway the government buys/gets a product and uses it, so the GPL does not restrict them.
However companies are restricted, so they don't want to deal with GPL (as in article), but developer are restriced with BSD license, so they (hopefully..) want to use the GPL.
GPL doesn't prevent the government from doing anything. The government does not act as a software distributor, thus there is no reason why the GPL should infringe upon the Government (IE the "user's") rights.
Why is everyone against the GPL? Because it's easy to twist the language? Because it takes a few sentences to explain?
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
This is _so_ not an issue in Toronto.
If the City of Toronto bought $43Million worth of software from Bill, they would ignore the licensing altogether, only use $3Million worth, and send Bill a cheque for $85Million.
If you sent them a piece of software and say "Hey, this is free", they've have to hold a $12Million public enqiry to find out what the hell went wrong.
Notwithstanding the above, the City lacks the skill to alter any piece of gpl'ed software sifficiently to make the license an issue.
-- Karma whore? You betcha. --
Personally, I believe as a businessman, technician and tax payer that open source is better.
Companies can make plenty of money from support and enhancement to the client. Government can retain the source and/or give some modifications back to the community. And govenment gets many options on suppliers.
I recently heard of a company who had just the object code, and the contractor pissed off to the other side of the world with the source code. Also, many companies have maybe 2 or 3 people who can do parts of the system - open source creates more developers with mature experience in a product.
And what if you find a bug in Microsoft software. Can you get it fixed right away? Not necessarily. You have to hope that MS take it seriously enough to do it. With OSS your chances are much higher, or you can do it yourself.
I support the BSD license for government funded work. Its good for both hackers and businesses and is not one or the other.
I oppose proprietary ones if they are funded by a government. What Microsoft in particular is doing is giving out hundreds of millions to universities in the hope of them teaching Microsoft specific programming and using their R&D work to benefit them. Even if its mostly funded by the government, MS can say make this proprietary and secret to all except us or we will not give you anymore money.
That is whats bad.
http://saveie6.com/
In the most extreme case, you can release a source code patch under a different license to circumvent the GPL.
Running GPL software, and Purchasing GPL software (which is what Intellect is trying to prevent) have N O T H I N G to do with the rules of the GPL regarding derivative work.
If the government wanted to release a derivative product (which they won't) they can take it up with the original author to release it under a different license if they so desire.
BSD license is fine. But there is no reason why not to use GPL software, especially in this case.
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
For whom, exactly?
No, but I do think, once the open source hype is a bit over, or companies are more aggresively pushing proprietary again (after they let it slip a bit over the last years), lots of new code extending a BSD product will be proprietary and the 'good' version is locked again. Then the efforts have to be doubled again by open source developers. Which is a waste.
This sounds perhaps hypothetical, but look at some companies tactics, who want to sell open source (Suse and Lindows come to mind, but there are more). The GPL really helps keeping free software free.
like the government is going to work with these software companies on extending their closed-source, proprietary products, with the intent to redistribute. When have you ever heard of that happening?
I think it'd be easier just to ask GPL'd software authors nicely if they could specially license XYZ to the government for whatever purpose they need.
Then they could have their name attached to whatever it is the government releases, and feel proud they are doing their civic duty. Only assholes would decline that. So fuck them.
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
Who then profits from the company? Who owns the companies producing software, and how much impact does that have on stability of industry?
Something someone once told me - no-one ever shuts down their Head Office - it's nearly always satelite sites that go first. Do you want the people of your country to work in satelites or head offices?
However a simple copyight notice or note in some help files is different.
BSD is alot more friendly in this regard. MS for example rarely even mentions the university of california qoute. Linux does not either unless you view the source.
BSD is deffinetly more corporate friendly. This is why Apple chose that instead of Linux when designing MacOSX. Their lawyers rightfully were worried that the FSF might sue them for keeping Aqua and other apps closed that run on top of the os. After all its linked to the operating system right?
This is a fuzzy area that SCO and MS have been going after. We know this is probably BS but in Canada a lawsuit was won just for linking! Risk managment is important in any business decision. BSD is just less risky in this regards and is considered more safe.
The GPL was designed to make all software free. Go read about RMS viewpoints. He is quite radical. BSD is a more community and academic standard to benefit everyone.
http://saveie6.com/
I agree with You. I just wish someone would speak up about these things to the general public. Your analogy is good. Make up a few more that has the same simple but good point and make them known to everyone. Managers at Your job, friends, relatives, they should ALL know that the GPL is on the side of the consumer. Basically You're preaching to the choire here on Slashdot.
.haeger
I speak of Linux, GPL, Mozilla and all Open Source alternatives whenever I get the chance. Do the same and perhaps we can get some mindshare of the masses.
You are not entitled to your opinion. You are entitled to your informed opinion. -- Harlan Ellison
While I'll take your money Don't bother changing any licenses, just if someone wants to buy it, you have a company that is willing to sell it. You can use money from any sales to pay for someone (perhaps yourself) to provide support.
Open Source Software (OSS) As a Possible Default Exploitation Route for
Government Funded Software
Comments from Intellect
Intellect represents around 1000 companies in the information technology,
telecommunications and electronics industries based in the UK. Formed in 2002 through
the merger of the Computer Services and Software Association (CSSA) and the Federation
of the Electronics Industry (FEI), Intellect members contribute around 10% of UK GDP.
Further information about Intellect can be found at www.intellectuk.org and a full list of
members at http://www.intellectuk.org/publications/corporate_ literature/factcard.pdf.
Intellect thanks the Department of Trade and Industry and the e-EnvoyÃââs Office for the
opportunity to comment on the interim conclusions on a draft policy for the use of OSS as a
possible default exploitation route for Government funded software.
Background to use of OSS
One of the main purposes for acquiring software under an OSS licence is to provide a user
unrestricted access to source code so that it can be modified and improved without requiring
further consent from any IP rightholder. Many software developers who are involved with
developing this type of software do it for personal interest and not for commercial gain.
Others are committed to promoting innovation, while others Ãââoe particularly corporate
sponsored contributors Ãââoe are motivated by a desire to promote interoperability and open
computing environments by sharing code within the information technology ÃâÅ"ecosystemÃâÂ.
Types of OSS Licence
There are numerous types of OSS licence but they basically fall into two categories:
Permissive Licences:
These types of licences, such as the Berkeley Software Distribution Licence (BSD), allow
users to copy, re-distribute and modify the software at no charge, whether in source code or
machine-readable object code, and do not seek to restrict these rights. Users are free to
distribute modified versions of the software under whatever terms they wish - including as
part of a commercial product subject to standard commercial licensing terms. So software
that is the subject of such OSS licences can be used in conjunction with commercial
software in a solution, leaving the commercial software to be governed by the licence
imposed by the developer and the open source software to be governed by the original
licence terms. Under these terms commercial developers do not seek to make economic
gain from the original Government funded research, merely from any subsequent changes
or innovations developed by them.
Restrictive Licences:
These licences, such as the GNU General Public Licence (GNU GPL), grant free rights to
users to use, copy or modify without payment or restriction. They prohibit users from
distributing the software on any terms other than the original licence, and impose this
requirement on any program derived from or based in whole or part on the software. In the
context of an OSS program that is then developed commercially, unlike the permissive,
these licences impose their terms on the commercial part of the software as well as the
OSS element.
Page 2
2
This actually limits the freedom of the developers whose programs utilise, are derived from,
or in some cases even link to or interlink with, such li
In this case, the GPL is exactly the same as the BSD license... The GPL does not allow people to stand on the shoulders of giants without a return in contribution.
Wrong - the software has already been paid for by my tax dollars. If I want to modify it and not "give back" to the government, I should have every right to. Government created software should be BSD'd (or the like).
Finally, as long as I don't make any modifications and distribute those modifications I don't have to return for my contribution. This is the #1 problem I have with OSS - Microsoft can take the hard works of many, use it internally to increase efficiencies (say an Intranet app of some sort), and effectively profit off of my work, without me seeing a dime. No thanks!
There is no longer anything that can be done with computers that is nontrivial and clearly legal. -- Paul Phillips
And with a BSD license, the publicly funded code is still freely available for anyone to use. Do you think it disappears off the face of the earth once someone incorporates it into proprietary software?
No, I don't think that. But nevertheless, there are differences in how GPL'ed and BSD'ed software can and cannot be used, and that means that they accomplish different goals. Which license to pick for government funded projects should depend on considerations of what the government wants to accomplish with that funding.
So, my point is simply that there is no intrinsic reason to prefer BSD over GPL for publicly funded software development: imposing the kinds of restrictions that the GPL imposes on software is a perfectly legitimate thing to do for taxpayer-funded projects. Whether it is good public policy is a separate debate (I happen to think it is).
That the receiver may not want it is no reason to violate the GPL. If you distribute the binary code, you must distribute the source code.
Just include the source code in the "package".
I spend my life entertaining my brain.
The Bank of England has to fire its furnaces with something.
They don't consider that laws apply to them.
socialist "you scratch my back ..." for me.
"It's not your information. It's information about you" - John Ford, Vice President, Equifax
It's NOT less if you're poor - it's much, much more. Either way, you're still not paying 40% income tax - why is it that everyone who pays higher rate tax doesn't seem to understand either what marginal rates are or what "progressive taxation" means?
That was classic intercourse!
It's funny 'cause it's true!
Ceci n'est pas une
And at their discretion, anyone being harmed by such a missile may request to have the source code made available to them in the same fashion that the code was.
Note the lobby group includes BAE. The UK Government should be more careful. I remember one BAE software development contract with the government where the government gave BAE the IP rights, so BAE could market it internationally. More users means a lower price to all, right? Wrong. They didn't sell it anywhere else (and never would have anyway), and when the government tendered to upgrade, BAE told them that they, BAE, owned it, and no one else was touching it, that the government could only hire BAE to make changes. No wonder BAE are opposed to open software.
What a few well placed bribes can do!
Reminds me of the BSA on this side of the pond.
Professional Politicians are not the solution, they ARE the problem.
A Government more screwed up than the American government. I never thought the Brits would buy into this hogwash. At least in American we can expect Micro$haft to buy our congress and pass laws trying to force M$ as the "national" OS. The U.K. is buying this rubbish independently.
Looking at some payslips:
currently my wife loses around 17% total to tax.
I earn more and lose around 30%.
This year I took a pay cut - my net pay went down by 60% of the gross pay cut. That is what I understand by 40% marginal tax - what do you understand by it ?
I lose more both in percentage and actual than someone who earns less, and I know that rule carries on down to those who earn a lot less - I lived on benefits too at one time. That is what I understand by tax is less if you're poor - how do you get that it is much much more ?
Please explain it to me - put numbers down if need be. Seriously - I'm interested.
There's lots of X Window software running in military settings (multi-head monitors for radar, photo observation and other types of geographic information systems in aircraft).
... we use, and in some locations, rely on open source software. Agreed, this doesn't automatically mean GPL, but it's a worthwhile point I feel.
:)
... although there are moves afoot to understand the issue of licensing and what we should (and should not) do in this arena.
Big ticket items we use and REQUIRE are APACHE (as part of Oracle, as part of Solaris, and on it's own), SENDMAIL and SQUID. Without this software, we stop.
Additionally we use these in various locations and projects: PHP, Samba, Linux, NetBSD, phpBB2, TikiWiki, and a bunch of other systems and services.
Sorry for the use of the 'Post Anonymously' but I'm sure you can understand
Seriously, BAE SYSTEMS has no official standing *internally* to any form of open source software/license
It's clear from all the monopolistic tendencies in world markets and the use of suasion and threat to influence policy that BSD as we know it is dying ...
...
Err wait
:QUOTE: :ENDQUOTE:
"When the Government decides to develop software using a restrictive licensing base, such as the GNU GPL, (it) should be aware that this would prevent it from deriving commercial gain from any subsequent derivative programs and prevent or severely limit the opportunities to work with commercial companies on such projects," Intellect said in the response paper.
Ah.. so the GPL is a restrictive license eh? It prevents you from taking the code and using it in something propietary. We should definiately stick with licenses like the one's proprietary software companies use, which er.. not only dont you ever even SEE the source sode, and surely restrict you from incorporating it into your programs, but also place all sorts of restrictions on how you can USE the software.
Well, anyone whose native currency is the Euro, for example. If you decided to hold onto (hoard) dollars at the beginning of 2002, in the last 18 months your "money" has lost 30% of its value relative to holding Euros. Does this matter? At my local wine store, I've noticed that a couple of my favorite Italian vintages have increased more than 20% in price, while the California wines have stayed level.
I suppose it's possible that Microsoft and IBM and Oracle have something close enough to a monopoly in Europe that they've been able to increase the price (in local currencies) to offset the decrease in the value of the dollar. That's one of the indicators of a real monopoly -- the ability to change prices arbitrarily. Can anyone comment on MS product prices in Europe over the last 18 months? Does Office cost more now?
At least they show some humour in choosing their name.
"...industry body backed by Microsoft..."
Of course they would tell them not to buy open-source/GPL software, or any other software for that matter, because they aren't buying M$.
I wonder how IBM can support Linux development and then got to UK government and say itâ(TM)d be dangerous for you guys to use opensource software and GLP in particular. Or, is it that Linux for them is only as good as they define for it to be? In other words, it can run on mainframes but since governments use IBMâ(TM)s mainframes it is not ok to use Linux on them? A lot of questions, I guess the world of software is becoming increasingly complicated. Since close source and IP is about profits, ego and more profits, and GPL software is becoming widely available; their scare tactic is the business model that suits well Microsoft, but IBM is in the same boat with them, therefore IBM is no friend of GPL/Linux.
Guess what, the next thing we know is that IBM is going to replace all their AIX and Linux implementations with SCOâ(TM)s products.
IP was invented for the sake of lawsuits.
"I think she has a hidden agenda."
SCO/MS influence, by any chance? One does wonder...
SB
It's old. The more humans I meet, the more I like my cats. At least they are honest.
Because the politics of the BSD license closely match your personal politics, you are unable to see it as political. But how can it not be political?
What are the political values inherent in the BSD license? Freedom to do what you like with code. Freedom to not distribute the source to your modifications. Freedom to exploit that non-distribution in all the ways that companies like Microsoft do.
You might agree with those freedoms, but don't try and tell me they aren't political.
RIGHT ON BROTHER!
That's what these public licenses are.
Heaven forbid some critical military application get given out as open source by some programmer, FOR WHATEVER REASON.
Yeah, you made me laugh at myself. Very good. See me response below to see what I'm building.
"The user is already completely free to modify GPL code. They just have to supply the source code to the modifiations when they redistribute the binaries."
What part of "completely free" don't you understand?
The GPL is not in conflict with this. It allows you to modify as you like. It only has an effect if you want to redistribute.
I think my sig agrees with your sig.
There are reasons why democracy does not work nearly as well as capitalism.
-- David D. Friedman
How does the GPL prevent the corporation from getting R&D improvements?
If you (being a goverenment entity) just "distribute" the changes back to the corporation, that's all that's required of you.
BSD doesn't require you to do anything, period. How is that better?
Black holes are where the Matrix raised SIGFPE
I would find it highly doubtful (or at least, contradictory) if IBM was involved in this push, regardless of whether or not they are a member of this group. Considering that they are currently advocating Linux (as evidenced by the SCO lawsuit) - which is GPL software - while simultaneously advocating the UK government NOT to buy GPL software, it rather sounds like they'd be working against themselves by doing so.
Don't tell me what to think you sissy.
Go FUCK yourself.........!
Do you work for microsoft????? I agree that open source is not a good business model. However the only good business model is one that makes money. They(UK), however are trying to save money. PHP, MySQL and many other pieces of software are open source and they work very well and do what they say they are going to do. I dont know about you but Winodws has yet to do all the things that Microsoft says it is going to do. Now if Microsoft changes their advertising to say that Windows will crash( All the fucking time), That Microsoft will spy on you and then profit from your information, and that they will rob you blind with licensing fees then Windows will definately do what Microshit says it will do. You sir are a moron, and others like you are morons. If you would pull Bill Gates dick out your mouth long enough to see that he and many other greedy fucks like him are robbing you blind while selling you inferior crap then you might sing a different tune. If im going to get shitty software, you can bet your ass I would much rather get it for next to nothing where I have the right to alter andshare and do what I please with it as opposed to paying for crap. P.S. I agree LINUX sux, but not for why you think. It sucks because there are too many players....and each distribution feels the need to pack 5 cd's of crap with it. It takes days to go through all of it to decide what you want and dont want. They should just have one or two flavors and package only the best software out at that time. Other than that as soon as companies realize they need to write drivers for multiple platforms and not just for the Almighty AllPowerful Microsoft it'll be great. P.S again...By the way did I mention You are a MORON! :-) Have fun with your Windows...!
"You can also make BSD licensed software closed source"
Yeah, and so can anyone else. Or not. If you really want to make money using BSD licensed source, you're going to have to add some value. That source might give someone a start on a successful business, or let an existing business create better software than otherwise, and be more successful. Is that a bad side effect of government funded software development?
Oh, right, this is slashdot. We don't want to help software companies be successfull, because corporations are evil. Besides, we like complaining about the crappy job market.
BSD/Public domain software helps everybody. GPL software helps only open source. If government sponsored software is going to help people as a side effect, shouldn't it help everyone. Does OSS need to be on welfare?
SCO just called, and they're going to sue you for using words foundin SCO Unix. Seems "bash", "news", and "odd" are contained in the source. They're asking for a million dollars per letter, but they say they'd be willing to settle for a handful of lottery tickets. Seems the odds of winning are better...
*** *** You're just jealous 'cause the voices talk to me... ***
Due to its draconian viral characteristics, GPL software is open for use by only a subset of those who paid for the development of the software, namely the GNU and GNU/Linux community. Conversely, BSD software with its simplicity and freedom is open for use by the entire population. Only a GPL bigot would suggest that the government release code that only a percentage of the population will use. For government open source work it's BSD all the way, baby. It's the only rational choice.
................ kris
"I thought I could organize freedom. How Scandinavian of me."
Good point... Professional means your getting paid to do it. Hobbyist and Philanthropists do it for not pay.
I think it rather stems from rediculous deadlines and the need to cut corners. Tell me, what deadlines are so critical in the OSS community that if it's not completed by X date then you're out of a job and can't feed your family or make a house payment?
Drawing a comparison is futile. It doesn't take all things into consideration and I've seen my fair share of difficult to read OSS code. Of course, I've seen my share of difficult to read "professional" code also.
In fact, that's where I get into disputes often at work. I'm very discipled and do not compromise on my code and technique while most others do.
I turn in less defects from the get-go, I typically take less time writing it from the get-go, less time maintaining it, people have less troubles understanding it, and it works.
But, my coworkers complain that if *they* employ the same techniques it'll "take too long" and "introduce many defects". To which I agree. I've spent a few years getting it into my second-nature and trying to pick up best practices and techniques and put them to use. It won't happen from day one.
In any case, I'm a professional programmer because I get paid to do what I do, how else would I pay my bills??? I have not contributed to OSS but I have released my own software (source included) for use however except from re-selling it without my permission (which I think is quite reasonable).
I don't agree that professional programmers are worse programmers than OSS or vise-versa. I believe professional programmers are under time constraints and aren't concerned about employing the best techniques or most advanced when their paychecks may be in limbo if deadlines aren't met.
OSS programmers/contributers, on the other hand, can do whatever they want without managers breathing down their neck and can make it as pretty/advanced as they want, or as crappy as they see fit.
In my case, however, I'm "too" disciplined to compromise. I have left a company in the past because they were pushing on me something that would jeoperdize the integrity of the project and I will not be responsible for such. Not anyone else I've ever worked with in almost 7 years of programming and consulting (totaling about 10 different companies ranging from small to mid to fortune 500) have I encountered another that cares as much as I do.
Thanks,
Shawn
But, what if I produce a patching system that includes the GPL source, but also a bunch of closed source mods, and at install time it installs the mods to the GPL code?
I thought it was that if a distributable relied in any way on GPL code, that all of it had to be GPLed.
It is the LGPL that enables mix & match.
Which part of "completely free to modify" did you have trouble with. Pay attention, idiot.
How did you come with that crazy idea that developer can not develop further? Have you actually read BSD license? Here : http://www.freebsd.org/copyright/freebsd-license.
the requirement of open-source licences for software funded by the government could have a negative impact on competition for contracts, the quality of the resulting software and even the confidentiality of government departments.
Microsoft (a convicted monopoly) are discounting heavily and even offering 0 cost software to tempt people away from Linux. Is this bad for competition?
If MS and the like have actually have to make an effort at getting contracts is that bad? If they have to improve their software to compete with in house GPL development is that bad?
The US dept. of defence uses Linux but they aren't spilling information out to all and sundry because of the GPL.
Of course software quality obiously suffers from being GPL'd. It's common knowledge among those who don't understand the difference between their arse and their elbow that IIS is the most secure web server software in the world when compared to the obviously inferior Apache.
The reason I came to Linux in the first place is that I got sick of paying top money for what regularly turned out to be buggy, crash prone, second rate software and the more people that switch to the GPL/LGPL the harder proprietry companies will have to try and the better their end products will be. Evolution by competition - simple as that.
Of course eveolution by competition requires a level playing field and I'm sorry CKK but your judgement was feeble at best.
If Europe lets MS off the same way then Linux/GPL will be the only hope of keeping MS on the "making an effort path" and crap like this report can only set us back to the days when rushing out a half finished product to get the next hit of money was the accepted method of OS development.
Meanwhile I'm going to start looking around the immigration pages of several foreign countries that still seem to think for themselves 'cos if the UK gov fall for this one I'm getting outa here.
One last thing by the way, whoever came up with the name "intellect" should have considered the fact that it sounds arrogant and overbearing as if you are talking down to people, which funnily enough your report suggests that's exactly what you are doing.
Hmmmmmm..... Deep fried and look like Squirrel.
On the other hand if software is GPLed then no company give a damn about spending money on it's improvement if they can't benefit from it. Or benefit enough ;)
As I read it, they want the GPL to be an unacceptible license. They want it to be enforced that GPL is a no-go-area. F*ck 'm.
nosig today
Show us were it says that in the license.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Honestly, some people are willing to warp reality to fit their world view....
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
It is also about transparency and accountability.
If (and this is a huge if) OSS is more expensive, it is also more accountable, which is certainly more proper in a democratic way of life.
If I am in an opposition party and you tell me you are spending 6 billion pouns id a project you bet I want to check what wonders of code you are getting us with our tax money.
Accountability and transparency, protection agianst lock-in and forced obsolescence may inccur in additional cost, but that is a cost that would be worth paying.
IANAL but write like a drunk one.
Your analogy is flawed. The city park is limited resource. The software could be copied and is an unlimited resource.
The right analogy is a very big park, where is enough space for everybody. In case of GPL - business is allowed but nobody could keep business secrets, so anybody could copy successful business solutions and basically businesses are unprofitable (as Linux companies are). In case of BSD - business as usual and anybody can enjoy city park without using businesses.
Maybe a better analogy is that although the park is paid for with taxes, I cannot go to the park, cut the flowers and sell them by the bunch at the park entrance.
Damn, I hate when people do this..
"The software resulting from government contracts might include only basic features, since developers would be reluctant to allow their cutting-edge technology to be exposed to the public via an open-source licence, Intellect argued."
If you were to ask me I would say that if software companies did concentrate on the basic features rather than the "cutting-edge" stuff we might actually get a lot more IT projects finished in time, on budget and working properly. Which considering the history of all (UK) Government IT projects could only be an improvement.
And they will.
== Jez ==
Do you miss Firefox? Try Pale Moon.
Business can get GPLed work for free as well. Why do you think Linux companies are unprofitable? I know about RedHat - it got net income of $1.5 Mil in first quarter. It just ridiculous number for company with $1 billion capitalization.
As for LGPL, as far as I know it's not much different then GPL, it's just better suitable for libraries.
Less is more !
Whilst they would not use it in say military systems mainly because such things are highly sensitive. Normal office use is perfectly OK and infact much desired by the Gov.
The only thing delaying the complete roll out of linux in most GOV departments is training costs.
Saying Apple is better than MS is like saying Botulism is better than rabies.
Somebody is getting a clue.
That seems odd. I thought IBM was the great defender of the GPL. What with the IBM Linux servers, and SCOX vs IBM case, and all.
And copyright only covers public distribution.
Furthermore, military orders (and national security) take precedence over licenses. No license -- be it the GPL or the most draconian EULA -- is going to be upheld by a court when upholding it is contrary to national security.
social sciences can never use experience to verify their statemen
I'd be very surprised if this organization has 100% of it's members asking them to do this, since IBM aggressively markets Linux solutions.
Somebody in the media please ask IBM for a comment.
I hope that doesn't throw off the rest of the dependencies.
:-)
I want to drag this out as long as possible. Bring me my protractor.
GPL:
BSD:
So there are 3 main points to GPL and only 2 main points to BSD. 3 is greater than 2, therefor GPL is more limiting.
I think you assume that GPL's limitations are easy to accept. If all these points are easy to accept then both licenses are fine to use, but GPL would still place more limitations on you.
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
It was an anti-GPL rant. Few businesses, in my experiance were willing to risk using GPL because they don't want to, or cannot release their modifications. (usually due to an NDA with a partner).
.. Of course it's also NVidia's fault for not trying to negotiate with their own partners to get permission from all of them to release this stuff. My sources in NVidia have told me that it was never even attempted.
For example, A company licenses a propritary Voice-over-IP chipset. It comes with specs and drivers, but the company is under NDA not to release the specs in any way shape or form. And the NDA covers distributing source code that can drive their chipset. How do you propose I link this driver, which basically must run in supervisor mode/ring 0 into a GPL kernel?
VoIP isn't just a driver either, there is a huge set of libraries you need to do the protocol stack, software echo cancellation, etc. So of course the vendor provides this as well, but that's not under some open source license. So we just make it into a library and link applications to it. Let's say for example we want to allow the GPL webserver to control the VoIP state, but it would either have to call an external program or link dynamically.
Now since this is an embedded product, ideally we would not want to have dynamic linking. But because of the above mentioned library the company may have to enable dynamic linking. (which is horribly slow on the MIPS clone chip they use). So the solution has to be write some thin command-line program to interface to the propritary library, then fork/exec this application everytime you want to control it. (or set up a bi-directional link to it somehow. perhaps a daemon, or just redirect both input and output to pipes).
A GPL fan would blame the propritary software for these design hacks. Of course a GPL fan usually doesn't understand that if you make a chipset you have to keep most of it fairly secret before some company in Taiwan makes a knock-off clone of it and sells it for 1/10th the price. Patents could theoretically protect you, but you would need multiple patents to provide much protection. Most of the time you can work around patents when making a clone. Is has to only appear to work the same, it doesn't have to actually use the same patented techniques for getting there.
The whole signing an NDA thing is one of the reasons NVidia's drivers for Linux are not GPL, it's because NVidia has partners that they cannot break deals with. (NVidia doesn't own their own technology 100% unfortunetly for them.)
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
If you were running an intelligence agency and you aquired some sensitive software from annother country's intelligence agency, wouldn't you want the source code?
Would you even consider accepting the software without it?
Foreign* inetlligence agencies are so well known for being trustworthy.
NSA: Hey! I've got this new, fast, secure encryption chip! Why don't you use it!
Rest of world: OK, let's see the schematics and algorythim...
NSA: But it's classified. And I'm keeping the private keys, but the FBI will need a search warrant to get them, so it's ok.
Rest of world: No thanks, we'll just use PGP.
Sound familiar?
The requirement to distribute source code does not mean they have to distribute it publicly, just to those they distribute the binaries to.
*Foreign is of course a relative term in this context.
I agree, but I was responding to the Red-herring issue cited in the article.
The Intellect document has a number of inaccuracies and mischaracterisations in it. I've spent that last two evenings preparing a line-by-line commentary, which can be found here.
Comments welcome.
Gerv
The rest of this stuff is a real argument about how you cannot add to a GPL piece of software because of the fact that the original code is copyrighted and the rules where the GPL allows you to violate that copyright are not lenient enough to allow you to succeed in what you want to do. That is why almost any system I can think of where such additions are useful uses modifications of the GPL. For instance the Web server certainly has some sort of loadable modules where the modules may be closed. And Linux has loadable modules where the modules may be closed. In both cases I admit that I don't know if the technical requirements of your application can work inside the limits of these modules.
My personal preference over the GPL would be a license that allows any use as long as no source code is modified. You can add as many files as you want to it to make your program and as long as no original file is changed the you can treat the code as public domain. Depending on how the code is written it can be used in quite complex applications, for instance if it has any kind of callback-setting interface then it is legal for this code to call closed-source code.
If however you modify the files, you must release all the changed files. You can still use the resulting modified code in your closed source program. There has to be some rules so you can't just insert callbacks or macros so your modifications are really secret, but this may be solvable with peer review, ie anybody can look at your modifications and complain loudly if you seem to be cheating.
The point is to allow everybody to use the code, but avoid the "embrace and extend" problem, which is usually just caused by programmer errors, but that Microsoft has even stated is a weapon they plan to use.
Unfortunatley I don't know enough legal stuff to make this clear. What I do with my code is LGPL it with a special "exception" that says that programs that are linked with the code with no modifications to the code are not considered derived works and can do anything they want.
There is a precedence for the move by Microsoft with GPL abolishment in the UK. In the controls industry, as in the control of buildings air conditioning and heating LON was established as the standard by the UK and this forced many a company to âgo alongâ(TM) despite the free and open standard of BACnet or Building Automation Controls. Despite the Fact that LON is a proprietary and licensed and very difficult to configure for even the application programmer is has been forced onto the US market due to the UKâ(TM) adoption. BACnet is Open and works great BTW. Be the government adopted standard and be the peopleâ(TM) standard.
The Nvidia example was ment to show that if Linux was BSD or GPL then you wouldn't be "tainting" the kernel by linking it. My argument is that GPL does not mix well with propritary/commecial source, but Public Domain and BSD do. (and LGPL too, i think)
.. Some say this is fair. But it sounds like a 'gift, with strings attached'. That's no gift at all. Speaking of gifts, perhaps I shouldn't look a gift horse in the mouth. HAHA:)
It's not difficult to make a license like that clear. There are things like the Artistic License which basically say you can't modifiy it and distribute it under the same name. Which is roughly what you want.
The only problem is that bug fixes and things would have to go through you, nobody could release a non-buggy version of your code because they can't just go and modify your stuff.
Maybe you could make that license and call it the Free Linking License. That seems to be what it's aiming for, the source is controlled but you're allowed to link with it anyway you wish.
LGPL is a good comprimise and is especially important for libraries. You can staticly link an application that is not open source with an LGPL library, any modifications you make to the library itself is what matters.
I normally make everything BSD or PD. But I will admit, some things benefit greatly from GPL. The best example of GPL "guiding" vendors into contributing to the community is a compiler (gcc for example). Normally in a company, if you had some CPU you needed support for or invented; you would just do some quick hack on the compiler and never give anyone a copy of your changes (because if it's a hack you'd be embarassed to show it to your peers). The GPL saves the compiler because these vendor specific extensions make it's way into the main distribution of gcc much more quickly because of GPL's anti-propritary nature.
Of course gcc has some design flaws due to the GPL, it doesn't use a normal back-end/front-end model you'd see in any reasonably modern compiler. Because if the back-end/front-end were seperate applications that just piped data between you could still have propritary back-ends for the compiler that wouldn't get applied to GPL. But that's a small price to pay. Of course so few of the GCC ports are done by companies, most are done by private individuals in the open source community. So maybe GPL is not really that important.
The biggest problem I have with GPL is the attitude of "I wrote this, I'm giving it to the community, but you aren't allowed to use it in some profitable way without giving it back to the community."
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
Universities, and government institutions should therefore GPL their code. They can then get extra funding by dual licencing the code under say the BSD licence to large companies that believe they can make a profit from selling it.
The GPL could in fact help the government make money!
Considering the fact that these closed-source Nvidea drivers exist, apparently the GPL kernel is not causing any trouble. However that could be explained by the fact that the kernel explicitly allows closed-source modules.
The only problem is that bug fixes and things would have to go through you, nobody could release a non-buggy version of your code because they can't just go and modify your stuff.
You didn't understand what I was requesting, which is different than the Artistic license. The user is required to release their bug fixes just like they have to release the code in GPL or LGPL software. But after they do that they can use the fixed version of the library exactly as though it was public domain. The primary purpose of my license idea is that such fixes are not allowed to remain secret, and most importantly "extensions" are not allowed to remain secret.
Except for extremists (like RMS probably) most people using the GPL or LGPL are most concerned that their code continue to be free to be used by anybody, rather than hijacked and "extended" so that the only people who can benifit from the code is the closed-source company that took it, even the original author loses the ability to use their code if the standard becomes this extended one. I would love to have my code used as much as possible, in closed source as well as open, but I want to prevent "extension" if at all possible. In my opinion the ability of Microsoft to take my code and use it as a part of a product that will extend their monopoly, that is basically a theft of my work and I am sorry that my attempts to prevent it make it difficult to make closed source.
However it seems that there is room for a license that does what people want and does not attempt to cause everything to become opensource. But for now I am forced to trust what real lawyers have written, with minimal changes. IMNAL so I doubt anything I wrote as a license would stand up if Microsoft wanted to steal it.