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RedHat Starts "Open Source Now" Fund

Posted by Hemos on from the fight-for-the-right-to-code dept.

celston23 writes "According to this article (near bottom), RedHat is intending to use their Open Source Now Fund to support open-source (GPL) developers who are sued for copyright infringement. Might be used during the SCO legal battle."

3 of 240 comments (clear)

  1. Has been mentioned before by ldm · · Score: 5, Informative

    This is awfully familiar, don't you think? (again, near the bottom)

  2. This isn't news by pjack76 · · Score: 5, Informative
    This isn't news. There's no new info in the eetimes article, and that page at RedHat never contained information about the fund itself. The "Open Source Now" page is just an advocacy group apparently devoted to spotting laws that would prevent adoption of open source in government etc.

    This seems different (though related) to the "Open Source Now Fund", which would specifically target legal threats against Linux and related things, like the FSF does for GNU.

    I haven't been able to find any info on how to contribute to the fund. I spoke with many Red Hat people at Linux World about it, and they didn't know. I sent an email to opensourcenow@redhat.com, and they never replied. I've also been talking with Red Hat salesmen for the past week or two trying to put together a proposal, and they don't know either.

    What's the hold up Red Hat? TAKE MY MONEY DAMMIT.

    --

    Wow, a lucrative publishing contract! I don't have to be evil anymore. --Meteor

  3. Re:Unfortunate but needed by Ian+Wolf · · Score: 5, Informative

    Sorry, having worked as a paralegal for three years, "An understanding of the law, a stack of envelopes, and occasionally plane fare are more than enough" is rarely enough.

    As a defendant you *MUST* pay the costs of a stenographer for any depositions and you can rarely get a witness in without them being properly deposed. Also, expert witnesses are rarely free. You normally have to pay for those. Then there is the cost of multiple plane tickets, if the trial is out of your area. Plus board, meals, etc. Then there are the amount of money you spend at Kinko's. Its downright amazing how many hundreds or thousands of dollars you can spend just on making copies of briefs, depositions, and interrogatories which you MUST pay yourself. There are many hidden costs involved in even a minor case.

    The delays, the frivilous filings, the mountains of paperwork, hyperbole, press leaks, etc. That is what you are actually paying a lawyer for these days.

    That's like saying I only pay my sysadmin to backup some files, reset my password, post on slashdot, and forget to apply patches. hmmm... Then again, I guess some places do pay their sysadmins to do just that.

    --
    "The words of the prophets are written on the Slashdot walls."