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New Legal Center for Open Source Projects
NW writes "According to a News.com story well known OSS lawyers Lawrence Lessig and Eben Moglen are launching a new "Software Freedom Legal Center" to assist open source developers with legal issues for free." You can view the website at Softwarefreedom.org.
IBM could have used these guys against SCO and saved a fortune.
Trolling is a art,
Though I cannot see how much trial work a staff of 4 will be able to handle. One major suit could tie them all up.
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
Well, I doubt it is with all free intentions. Lawyers are required to do a certain amount of probono work a year, maybe this is their segment of it? Granted it is a great idea and will help many people, I doubt they have the resources to fight lengthly big battles for OSS.
but a little legal help is better than none.
"to assist open source developers with legal issues for free"
now all we need is someone that work for free to go after people that abuse the GPL
ie: Sveasoft (http://slashdot.org/~Featureless/journal/ )
Buddie, some people doesn't understand your humor sense. Err, wait, I trapped myself talking to myself *again*. I will finish my autoconversation in other ocasion, better ran to visit the psycoanalyst. Sorry for the inconvenience. Arg! Dub dub.
Free Software Foundation founder Richard Stallman is working to update the General Public License (GPL) that governs Linux and hundreds of other open-source projects. The law center said it will help with that work.
A crucial task, in my opinion. More specifially, Stallman and co. are planning to protect GPL code better legally from the threat of patent litigation. Software patents are a relatively recent, and (in the opinion of many, including myself) harmful phenomenon. Updating the GPL to somehow lessen their potential impact on Free Software would be a major accomplishment.
I hear there's rumors on the Slashdots
Are there any legal centers for Open projects that aren't software? Has anyone even taken on a project such as an openbook or openmusic? I believe Lessig has released a book under a CC licence, but are there any others?
The first thing they should post is a detailed explanation of why nobody releases software into the public domain.
Oh spare us the whining and the condescension. "Hijacking" words? I was going to post a rebuttal to that idiotic proposition but I suddenly realized I shouldn't waste my time responding. So I'll play along, yes, we're hijacking words, and you're going to sit there and take it because you can't do anything about it.
hello Americans there is a whole world out there so stop hijacking words and understand that free software is a global thing , the sooner you get it the better for everybody
And why do dumb fucks like you keep trying to read more into an anouncement than people are actually saying. What part of that anouncement states that they are a "world" protection or anything of the sort. Cause I shure as hell didn't read it. As for "free software" exclusively an American thing now ? I don know where the fuck you got this from but you might as post the link since it sure as hell wasn't he same article I read. The foundation was set up in the US to protect NPOs from Software Patents in the US. Quit trying to read more into it than is actually there. And quit assuming that no one in the US doesn't know about the rest of the world. As for you comments? You show equal ignorance by using "Americans" which applys to anyone in the western hemisphere seeing as how everyone there is in "the Americas". So stop wasting your breath.
Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
Yeah, I admit it, I didn't know off the top of my head where Bengal is. I do know where Calcutta is, just didn't know the relation.
What's funny is that the number 1 google result for Bengal is The International Bengal Cat Society.
So after some digging down in the result list, I learn that it's in India and is the state whose capital I know as Calcutta---and has a literacy rate of 57.7%.
Amikor valaki ilyen modortalan hulyesegeket ir, azt kivanom barcsak ne hordoznak magyarsagukat a nick-jukon.
Szomoru.
Is having Lessig on board a good thing? Has he ever won a case? I stopped following his blog after he started to wig-out over the 2004 election. And I find his message harder to relate to. Stallman, etc. are focused on *creating* new Free Software, not trying to get free access to previously copyrighted work (which seems to be the message of Lessig's two latest books). That's a much harder flag to rally around IMHO. (Yeah, I'm well aware of CC). He also seems to be to much of a do-gooder. What's the point of having a lawyer if he's not going to draw from the lawyer's little bag of dirty tricks? (There's a reason people don't like lawyers.)
Well, my real name is Levente, what do you expect?
I do agree with you. Not sure where the parent poster is getting "hijacking" from. Does the poster mean to say that no one can legally represent a person/group concerning free software unless they deal with all forms of law in the world?
Yes, "Americans" can mean "anyone in the western hemisphere" since that consists of North America, Central America, and South America. However, do Mexicans, Canadians, or Brazillians refer to themselves as Americans? (I'm just curious). Technically "Americans" can mean anyone in the west hemisphere, but it's not used that way in practice.
Having a smoking section in a public restaurant is like having a peeing section in a public swimming pool.
Because the 6th amendment* in the bill of rights only covers criminal trials, not civil trials. I assume that most open source cases are civil matters.
*Yes, I intentionally made this US centric since that was the subject of the article.
At the bottom of the endless pile of paper work which characterizes all regulation lies a gun.
Alan Greenspan
Though I agree that "American" can be interpreted to mean "from/of the Americas" (and it is used that way in biology), it is NOT generally used that way to refer to people anywhere in the Americas. No Canadians would refer to themselves as Americans, nor would we refer to citizens of any other western hemisphere country (except the United States, of course) as Americans.
There are two kinds of sysadmins: paranoids and losers. I'm both kinds.
That is exactly my point in the original post. "American" can be interpreted that way, but as I said, "it's not used that way in practice."
Having a smoking section in a public restaurant is like having a peeing section in a public swimming pool.
Well the catch is... it's free up until you end up looking at exhibit A. At that point, the code analysis will not be up to the lawyer. That's for sure.
What, lawyers can't understand code? Please. I will graduate from law school in May and I am perfectly capable of understanding code. You see, before we can get in to law school, we have to get at least a bachelors degree. Some of us, like myself, have degrees in computer science. I may not be a regular contributor to the Linux kernel, but I am more than capable of parsing and understanding code. Granted, that won't always be the best use of my time as an attorney, but not every case is SCO v. IBM and not every case will require super secret code analysts from MIT.
There was Cowboy Neal at the wheel of a bus to never-ever land.
Did anyone notice that none of the lawyers on that site have any technical experience? It's all wonderful to talk about patents from the point of view of "legal" freedoms and history, but our world is a little more complicated than that.
Yet another bunch of "Intellectual Property" lawyers that aren't even admitted to practice before the US Patents and Trademarks office.
You show equal ignorance by using "Americans" which applys to anyone in the western hemisphere seeing as how everyone there is in "the Americas". So stop wasting your breath.
Actually, for some reason I do recall that the term "American" was implied (since my childhood by otheer Americans) to mean only those born in the US of A. Maybe I was just educated stupid just like all the other Americans... Oh wait...
"I am the king of the Romans, and am superior to rules of grammar!"
-Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor (1368-1437)
"No Canadians would refer to themselves as Americans...."
That's for the same reason you might be quick to distinguish yourself from someone else carrying your name: "Heh, uh, no not THAT Trump. NO relation. In fact, I mostly use my mother's name Gnizprtzky. It's just easier."
Somewhat related: The following appeared in a 1970s edition of National Lampoon entitled 'Canada - The Retarded Giant on our Doorstep':
Q: Why is Canada always pink on the map?
A: From embarrassment
Crumb's Corollary: Never bring a knife to a bun fight.
Because it's impractical. Besides, there are many OSS/FS developers who are paid for their work (Novell employees, for instance).
"You show equal ignorance by using "Americans" which applys to anyone in the western hemisphere seeing as how everyone there is in "the Americas"."
Europe is generally in what is considered the "Eastern Hemisphere." Unless Europeans are working from a different definition than those of us in the Americas.
And here I thought the stereotype was that Americans didn't know geography.
Agreed, but you should also understand that most Americans come accross as if they don't.
Ah, more stereotyping. I think you are watching far too much television, rather than seeing the real world. Many Americans are idiots. So are many Europeans (I ran into one example while seeing my girlfreind off at the airport, an arrogant Dutch prick who shoved his way -- literally, by physical force -- into the queue in front of us. I would have enjoyed watching him experience the consiquences of such behavior had he done something like that on the south side of Chicago, but I digress).
Certainly we have an imbecel for president, but let's not forget that Europe has turned out its fair share of imbecellic leaders as well, and while I will grant you ours is far worse than those in Europe at this time, I doubt Europeans' intelligence suddenly tripled the moment you got rid of Margaret Thatcher, Franco, or Milosevic, nor did ours suddenly plummet when Baby Bush stole the first election and organized the dumbest of the dumb through bigotry (may Our Lord and Savior(tm) keep the gays out of the churches!) and fear ("9/11, 9/11, 9/11, terrorist, terrorist, "god bless America(tm)).
It's annoying have an ignoramous as a leader humiliating the country abroad at every turn, but I imagine you'll get to experience that in your country at some point, if you haven't already. It is an unfortunate aspect of allowing the vote of the dumbest, most ignorant person to count equally with that of the smartest, most well educated, and the fact that half the population is by defition "below average" in intelligence and knowledge of current events, and is more likely to vote how the media manipulates them than how a reasoned, thoughtful consideration of the facts would suggest.
My experience, having lived on both continents, is that by and large people are equally as knowledgable, and equally as ignorant, equally as bigoted, equally as idealistic, and equally as mistaken about those across the sea on both sides of the pond.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
cases dealing with software (ip, facilitating piracy, and patents) can be extremely complex... how much can these guys possibly handle at one time?
Get your torrents...
..Open Bar opens its doors. It's founded by current Montavista counsel Jason Wacha and ex-VA Legal VP Gwyn Murray. Mozilla's Mitchell Baker is also involved. Looks like there is finally some more activity to build a more focused effort on legal issues rather than just a lot of IANAL threads in /.
??? Uh, no--it's Hungarian. Levente was Arpad's son (Magyar).
And, I was actually born in the USA. While I don't know much about caves per se, I do know all about your H1Bs and how the quality of software and support provided by "Aknad" is about the same quality as the average mud-hut in Bengal.