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Stallman Claims Linux Trademark Doesn't Matter
Tontoman writes "ZDNet UK reports on an interview with Richard Stallman with the Sydney Morning Herald. From the article: '"Free software means you're free to run it, study it, change it, redistribute it, and distribute modified versions the way cooks do with recipes. What names you're allowed to call a program is a side issue." The Linux trademark became an issue last month after a lawyer acting on behalf of Linux creator Linus Torvalds wrote to 90 Australian companies asking that they sign a statutory declaration waiving exclusive rights to the trademark's use.'"
Especially since those companies should be using the name GNU/Linux.
Richard Stallman? Pfh. What we all want to know is what Simon Cowell thinks!
Caesar si viveret, ad remum dareris.
The end of the article has this classic quote from Stallman:
"Most of the time, when people call something 'Linux', it's the GNU system with Linux as the kernel. Maybe this policy will encourage people to call it GNU,"
Which he follows up with:
"I prefer to say GNU/Linux' so as to give the kernel's developer a share of the credit."
My, how generous!
"What names you're allowed to call a program is a side issue."
Linux is now "Fluffy Marshmellow Prophylactic" I'm certain that'll do wonders for Linux's continued growth.
So, Stallman says that this issue is just blowing smoke, and that it distracts from the issue at hand, namely his pet causes...
Well, I would say that names are incredibly important, possibly even more so than all these political causes (simply because people can't be bothered to read long political theses, but can deal with name recognition).
Why do you think Linux has proven so much more "successful" that the *BSDs in the business sphere?
The name "Linux" has brand recognition - at the moment, it's trendy, hip and cool (go the Peter Russel reference =)...and companies want to be seen to be riding the wave. I've seen idiotic people say Linux is cool, I want to use Linux, with absolutely no idea what it is, simply because they've heard that all the geeky computer people are apparently using it.
Torvalds, and all the other contributors have worked hard to build up this name, and if companies can be made to respect this, then all the better.
cya,
Victor
Also, trademark protection isn't new. Why don't you phone Red Hat and ask to make a RHEL based distro, still keeping all Red Hat's insignia? Or maybe try Debian, or Firefox, or anyone else. I don't understand why people have a problem with this.
Don't worry, Stallman 2.0 is being released in September.
Never trust journalism that seeks to promote conflict between parties. It is too easy to take words out of context, to ask people to make statements on subjects they would rather ignore, and to do what journalists are generally paid to do - fill the pages with controversy and "news".
Point 1: RMS is the genius behind the GPL, the FSF tools, and has dedicated his life to making Linux, however you call it, come true. Insulting RMS is a sign of ignorance, bad manners, or bad faith.
Point 2: Linux is a mark and a commodity technology. The goal of trademarking Linux and enforcing that mark through licensing is to protect the "brand" from those who seek to harm it. But that is a short-term logic, and it ignores the underlying fact: a commodity technology needs no name, no brand, because it does not compete on that basis. No-one ever trademarked "TCP/IP" (afaik) and it would have been both ridiculous and counter-productive to have tried.
So RMS is spot-on, even if he does not explain it quite the way I'd like to hear. The name you give Linux is only meaningful if you're one of the vendors supporting it today. It's what Linux is, and does, not its name, that guarantees its place as the commodity OS of the future.
My blog
So Linux is open for modification and distribution..... as long as Linus feels that you aren't harming his trademark? [sarcasm] Wow, that's certainly open.[/sarcasm]
How does the trademark stop you from modifying and distributing Linux freely? The only thing it stops you from is using the name "Linux" commercially in ways he doesn't like.
Big. Difference.
You can't make your own OSS spreadsheet program either and name it "Microsoft Excel".
I guess with Linux's userbase (both corporate and private) continuing to grow, Linus (or at least a lawyer working on his behalf) feels that perhaps they need to begin regulating Linux a bit more closely.
FYI: "Linux" was trademarked in 1996 by a lawyer who didn't have anything to do with Linux and then proceeded to ask for royalties from companies using it.
After a legal scuffle, Linus Torvalds was assigned the copyright in 1997 (So this is news?), and has licensed it since. The Linux Mark Institute has been around for years as well. (Can't recall exactly when they started, but archive.org dates their page to at least 2002).
"Linux" is a term with commercial potential. If Linus didn't own the trademark, someone else would (and did). And they would hardly charge any less.
To you they may matter, but Stallman speaks for himself, not everybody, and, apparently, not you, ok?
To him the name doesn't matter, because he's not after being successful in the way you imply. He doesn't care what the companies use.
To Stallman only the existance of a free development platform matters, and that existance is practically guaranteed due to the GPL and GNU by now (Technically HURD isn't necessary anymore, because the Linux Kernel is GPL'ed). If everybody used it, that'd be a bonus, but the mere existance is the one-and-only goal.
Try to see him more as the philosopher he is, not caring about marketing and commercial success, but taking care his ideas (Specifically that it should always be possible to use a free development platform) continue to exist (And one website, hosted privately, practically could do that), no matter what.
Oh, and, everybody, please don't automacally assume I'm on Stallmans "side" here, I just don't like him being misunderstood. He's an idealist, which is not necessarily moronic.
Free Software / OSS should be a licensing model, not a philosophy. As a licensing model it has clear advantages and disadvantages over other licensing models.
As a philosophy it is fraught with problems, the most significant problem being the utter destruction of much of the financial incentives that exist today for people to sit down and build software. It is hypocritical to enjoy the fruits of someone's capitalist labor and then attempt to take those fruits (a form of looting) and claim some philosophical justification.
Amazing magic tricks
To add *some* weight to it...
1) GNU tools can be found in the following installations:
* FreeBSD, et al
* OS X
* SCO
* Solaris (GNU added by my IT department?)
2) However, I've not heard RMS insist these be called GNU/BSD, etc. -- only GNU/Linux.
Because 100% of the C/C++ programs are built with gcc, including the MIT/KDE software. People are forgetting that the FSF not only contributed the standard utilities and libraries, but ALSO gcc.
Without gcc being available to Linus, it is doubtful whether there would even have been a kernel to compile. Linus would have had to resort to a commercial compiler, which back then typically cost around $500.
The most common ones then came from either SCO or ATT.
The widespread adoption of Linux would've been slowed significantly if people had to fork over $500 for a development kit, and probably another $200-500 for a commercial OS, just so they could run Linux.
This is why we're indebted to the FSF for their efforts. And they are right to insist upon credit for themselves. Without the FSF, Linux wouldn't be nearly as far along as it is today. Giving the FSF due recognition seems quite appropriate; and frankly, I just don't see people giving the FSF the respect it deserves (witness your comments), let alone due credit.
And don't forget that it was RMS himself who encouraged Linus to adopt the GPL for his kernel. Without the GPL, it is also questionable how far along Linux would be today.
The best way to predict the future is to create it. - Peter Drucker.
Fade out, fade in. Today, we have the Free (as in freedom *and* beer) Operating System that is part GNU, part Linux, and even part BSD (I stumble upon the occasional BSD program running on my Linux system ), and part everything else. In a commercial world, there'd be trademarks and copyrights and logos and every other byte of binary on your disk would be the stupid trademark/OS EULA/NDA warning of legal repercussions, etc. Windows users, get *any* hex editor, open *any* Windows program, you'll see "Microsoft" written in the ASCII somewhere: this is what I'm talking about. But this is Linux. Nobody really owns it all per se, because we basement hackers and renegade computer users and indignant MIT lab rats wrote it all ourselves, and don't really care about becoming millionaires or dominating the world about it, so long as we have our free system.
Now, let's pull our heads into the Physical, Real World for a minute and quit worrying about hypothetically this and pedantic definition that: What we're talking about is what most of the world calls "Linux". So, when you go shopping for Linux distros, you don't type "free software distros" in Google, and when you need help installing Linux, you don't go into a #GNU chat and say, "I need help installing my free software". You call it Linux, Slashdot calls it Linux, we all found this discussion because we recognized the name of Linux.
Now, the copyright infringement you're hearing about has, in fact, already started. Porn sites are already trying to snag hits using the word "Linux". No, I'm not kidding, and I'm not about to post links to them and let them enjoy a lot of hits. Type "Linux" into search engines with the most unexpected keywords that would only imply you were looking for guides, HOWTOs, and such, and you'll get the occasional Easter Egg. This demonstrates the shaky legal ground that Linux is on, and why we're doing this.
PS, when you hear somebody blowing off their big bazoo about "Linux", "Open Source", "Free Software", or "GNU", take into account that Stallman, Torvalds, and their tribal bard, Eric S. Raymond, are 99% less likely to be full of hooey than anybody else.
Instead of watered-down ZDNet thing, you should read the original Sydney Morning Herald interview.
ZDNet failed to see the importance of the following paragraph (so they just omitted that):
Without this, ZDNet article might give a false impression that Mr. Stallman is inconsistent (i.e., on one hand he says that the name is irrelevant, on the other hand he implies that the name is important, i.e. GNU/this GNU/that).
Do you have some proof of this, or are you just making up facts ?
"Hmm. Picking GPL lets people redistribute and modify my software, but keeps them from preventing me from merging those changes back to the my version and keeps various companies from ripping off my work. It has also been used by lots of people for a long time, and was written by an actual lawyer who actually knows what the law says, so it is unlikely to have nasty surprises hidden in it. Yep, sounds good to me."
Despite the current emphasis on individuality, the tendency of humans to look what everyone else is doing and conform is actually a valid, well-working survival mechanism that only brokes down in exceptional circumstances or if taken too far. Most of the time, looking out your window and seeing what everyone else is wearing is a very good way of picking appropriate clothing for the current weather.
GPL, usually, for the reasons mentioned above.
Yes, I guess it really shows the importance of marketing in getting good ideas sold.
Readline is released under GPL and not LGPL for the exact reason that it would be available only to GPL'd programs. This makes being able to use readline an incentive to use GPL.
Why should Stallman care about how usefull some library is to people who license their programs under non-GPL-compatible licenses ? They are his competitors - one might even say enemies, considering his stated worldview. Why should he want to make it easier for his enemies to fight against him ?
It seems to me that the only people who have a problem with GPL are the people who want to make proprietary products that include GPL'd code; the very thing GPL was meant to prevent. The situation with readline, to me, seems like GPL working exactly as intended - giving software with GPL-compatible licenses an advantage over ones with noncompatible licenses, of being able to draw from other GPL'd programs and libraries.
Really ? What words has he redefined, exactly speaking ? What were their old and what are their new meanings ?
People usually argue against opinions and worldviews that conflict with theirs, especially if they are actively trying to promote theirs. One might even say that it is impossible to promote one worldview without arguing against those it conflicts with.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.