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Eben Moglen — GPLv3 Not About MS and Novell

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the having-to-restate-the-obvious dept.

Linux.com's Joe Barr was recently able to sit down with Professor Eben Moglen at the San Diego Red Hat Summit and discuss the GPLv3 and what it means beyond the Microsoft/Novell deal on video. "Professor Moglen explains briefly about GPLv3's work on globalization of the software license, preventing harm to others by members of the community, and the most contentious in earlier drafts, DRM."

6 of 163 comments (clear)

  1. Opensource software sucks. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Go to hell, communists. You democrats are trying to destroy the United States' only hold over China: They need Microsoft software. When they can get crappy free solutions to do the same, the United States will just continue to become indebted to China and other countries. And it will be all your fault, you Hillary fanboys. For the sake of national security, free software efforts must become against the law. Besides, free software destroys our free market, creating monopolies, by selling at excessively low prices. Would Microsoft get away with giving away free products to take competitors' market share away? No. Neither should these ****ing tree-hugging, Prius-driving free software zealots. The captcha is appropriately "planking."

  2. Re:GPLv3 Not About MS and Novell by Tovok7 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I should hope not... I expected it to be about open-source software and Linux... The GPL isn't about "Open Source" and Linux either. It is about securing people's freedom. Unfortunately, most people are not aware of this important issue.
  3. Novell may have big problems by PoliTech · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Novell views GPLv3 as a danger to its agreement with MS to resell SUSE Linux certificates. Novell comments that if "the Free Software Foundation releases a new version of the GNU General Public License with certain currently proposed terms, our business may suffer harm." That verbiage is from the annual report's risk factors section.

    http://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/758004/0000 95013407012375/0000950134-07-012375.txt

    The FSF has as much as said that they will target the Microsoft-Novell deal. http://gplv3.fsf.org/rationale, and since it's not a matter of "if" GPLv3 becomes more than a draft, as much as it is "when"...

    The current draft of GPLv3 can affect Novell's biggest source of cash - Microsoft. (and may also affect SUSE gaining more market share in the enterprise) If the final GPLv3 impacts the patent agreement between Microsoft and Novell, Novell has big problems. And (IMHO) increasing SUSE acceptance among enterprise customers suffers a setback.

    1. Re:Novell may have big problems by sharperguy · · Score: 5, Insightful

      The entire aim of the GPLv3 is to baisically fix "bugs" and loopholes present in the GPLv2 in order to make sure that the four software freedoms are always present in GPL-licenced software.

      Any company that claims their business may suffer harm should either point out why certain points in the licence are unfair, or accept that the reason they will "suffer harm" is because they were exploiting the errors within the GPL for their own means and therefor going against the spirit of Free Software.

      The FSF may be specifically targeting the M$-Novell deal in some areas, but it is not the only rational, because the creation was already underway before it was apparent the deal had even been agreed apon. Also if they target this deal then it is because of areas of the agreement which are not in the spirit of Free Software, and should only affect these areas.

      --
      "sudo rm -rf your-face"
  4. Re:GPLv3 Not About MS and Novell by Tovok7 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I said that the GPL is not about Open Source, because most people I know (also many non-computer guys) think of Open Source as having the source code available somewhere. They mostly don't care whether that's the case or not. They do not know that the trademark "Open Source" meant originally Free/Libre Software. They do not know that it is their freedom which is at stake here. Even Bruce Perens one of the founders of the Open Source movement said that It's Time to Talk About Free Software Again. We should listen to him!

  5. Re:GPLv3 Not About MS and Novell by jbn-o · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "Open Source" is about securing people's freedom...

    No, "open source" is not about software freedom and it never was. The open source development methodology has to do with writing more reliable software, more quickly, and at lower cost. To understand why this misses the point the free software movement raises, consider this excerpt from "Why "Open Source" misses the point of Free Software":

    "The idea of open source is that allowing users to change and redistribute the software will make it more powerful and reliable. But this is not guaranteed. Developers of proprietary software are not necessarily incompetent. Sometimes they produce a program which is powerful and reliable, even though it does not respect the users' freedom. How will free software activists and open source enthusiasts react to that?

    A pure open source enthusiast, one that is not at all influenced by the ideals of free software, will say, "I am surprised you were able to make the program work so well without using our development model, but you did. How can I get a copy?" This attitude will reward schemes that take away our freedom, leading to its loss.

    The free software activist will say, "Your program is very attractive, but not at the price of my freedom. So I have to do without it. Instead I will support a project to develop a free replacement." If we value our freedom, we can act to maintain and defend it."

    I'm glad open source proponents use the GNU GPL and help secure software freedom for the users of those programs, I'm also glad open source proponents work together with free software activists on a variety of issues. I'm even glad that people go into depth on how to make money and license software under free software licenses (most notably: the GPL and LGPL). But these business-oriented discussions are not the most critical issues—human rights for software users and building community are more substantial issues. The open source movement was defined in part to get away from the "freedom talk" free software activists engage in, thus it's no surprise that when some people talk about "open source" they're not calling attention to freedom very much. Some open source proponents, such as Eric Raymond, want to talk about what the two groups have in common which means often talking about only the open source movement's values. The organization founded to champion open source's values, the Open Source Initiative, has considerable work to do to reframe the debate such that software freedom is an important part of that movement, assuming they want to make that a goal in the first place.

    --
    Digital Citizen