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Microsoft Treating "Windows-Only" As Open Source
mjasay writes "The Register is reporting that Microsoft is hosting Windows-only projects on its 'open source project hosting site,' CodePlex. Miguel de Icaza caught and criticized Microsoft for doing this with its Microsoft Extensibility Framework (MEF), licensing it under the Microsoft Limited Permissive License (Ms-LPL), which restricts use of the code to Windows. Microsoft has changed the license for MEF to an OSI-approved license, the Microsoft Public License, but it continues to host a range of other projects under the Ms-LPL. If CodePlex wasn't an 'open source project hosting site,' this wouldn't be a problem. But when Microsoft invokes the 'open source' label, it has a duty to live up to associated expectations and ensure that the code it releases on CodePlex is actually open source. If it doesn't want to do this — if it doesn't want to abide by this most basic principle of open source — then call CodePlex something else and we'll all move on."
This is most likely a tactic to try to get people to associate "open source" with Microsoft and not Linux.
I don't think it is fair that you got first post, I wish I had got first post, my first post was going to be quite good. Someone (perhaps the shashdot editors should fix this). Maybe in retrospect I should have realised that an Anonymous Coward by nature would try to get first post, but I didn't, my hope was that the Anonymous Coward would change his behaviour this time so that everyone would get to read my post - but I guess the Anonymous Coward can't be trusted to do the right thing after all. Its a shame though. I really hope that from this chastisement Anonymous Coward will get message and change his spots. Irrelevant first posts are selfish and spoil things for everyone.
Before adopting WHATWG, read the moonlight.NET EULA [http://www.microsoft.com/interop/msnovellcollab/moonlight.mspx]
It is not a matter of ownership. Words have a particular meaning and this is a case of MS trying to throw its weight around to change the popular understanding of the meaning of "Open Source" to something that is favorable for them. Last time I checked, "Open Source" does NOT mean "something that is only legal to use on Windows".
Or Linux-only, or Mac-only, or Plan9-only. The point is that if someone wants to modify the code so it runs on an Atari 800, they're legally free to do so. Publishing the code, and saying, "You may do this, only, and no more", is certainly within their rights, but it ain't open.
Open Source is what is defined by the Open Source Definition.
A number of microsoft dweebs and/or campaigners would like to have it otherwise. But then Microsoft would like to have a lot of things. It's called corporate totalitarianism.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
They weren't bastardizing the concept. They were working with the community to provide a definition big companies like IBM, Sun, or Microsoft, and lawyers could understand.
And in the past they even registered "open source" as a service mark for protection of the thriving community against dilution by people who wanted to twist the concept of open source.
To protect against companies who want to just make the source visible without actually opening it for others to use or change without undue restrictions protective corporate lawyers would normally demand upon (things like written approval).
Code with source-code available but without the particular set of rights defined in the OSD is called "Disclosed Source Code". It is possible to have disclosed source code with "All Rights Reserved", such that nobody would ever have rights to compile the code. Thus, it makes sense to have a name that is specific to the rights attached, not just the fact that there is source code. That's what "open source" and "Open Source" mean. The capital letters are not significant, if it says it's open source it has to have the rights specified by the OSD.
Bruce Perens.
From http://www.opensource.org
Emphasis mine.
That's not even the point. When someone says "open source", what do YOU think of? Let me tell you, it's not anything Microsoft related.
Their publicity agencies are here on Slashdot pumping that angle every day.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
It's the rights that are important. You're missing that entirely.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
The big difference in this case is that it affects how you *use* the software.
Many OSI approved licenses affect how you may redistribute the software, but none of them AFAIK limit how you may use or alter it.
technically you are right about what licenses are. but what open source licenses all have in common is that they aim to make the software source code the most freely available to others, thus maximizing its utility, with the minimal licensing restrictions to achieve this goal.
Microsoft's use of "open source" not only goes against the spirit of FOSS, but also violates the basic definition of "Open Source" used by the OSI:
5. No Discrimination Against Persons or Groups - The license must not discriminate against any person or group of persons.
6. No Discrimination Against Fields of Endeavor - The license must not restrict anyone from making use of the program in a specific field of endeavor. For example, it may not restrict the program from being used in a business, or from being used for genetic research.
8. License Must Not Be Specific to a Product - The rights attached to the program must not depend on the program's being part of a particular software distribution. If the program is extracted from that distribution and used or distributed within the terms of the program's license, all parties to whom the program is redistributed should have the same rights as those that are granted in conjunction with the original software distribution.
9. License Must Not Restrict Other Software - The license must not place restrictions on other software that is distributed along with the licensed software. For example, the license must not insist that all other programs distributed on the same medium must be open-source software.
in the end, what "open source" means is defined by the community. it is what the community finds acceptable and conducive to the goals of the Open Source movement. if they decide that they are willing to accept Microsoft's definition of "open source" then the Ms-LPL can be called a genuinely open source license. however, that would require changing the current accepted definition of open source. but not only would that require arriving at a new consensus, but it would likely destroy the open source movement by undermining its original aim of fostering open collaboration and combat the increasingly restrictive IP laws and cultural attitudes.
The OSD is related to what people had tried to do with licenses at the time. For example, there was Alladin Ghostscript, which prohibited its distribution on the same medium with software that wasn't freely distributable. And there was the Berkeley Spice License, for their electrical engineering software, which prohibited the use of the software by the Police of South Africa, and still did a decade after apartheid was over.
I was trying to define what was Free Software for Debian's social contract. FSF didn't promote a definition of Free Software at the time, although they'd published one in their newsletter a long time before. RMS even said in a personal email that he liked my definition.
Then 7 or 8 months after this was all written and in use by Debian, Eric Raymond brought me the news of the meeting where a bunch of people had decided to promote Free Software as Open Source, and asked me to work on that. So, I filed off the Debian references and it became the Open Source Definition, and I announced Open Source to the world, including here on Slashdot (and that announcement still survives online today). That announcement was the first real use of "Open Source" to the public.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
We need more than you think for something to be open even by your over-restrictive definition of "open". Consider that the report on the security of Sequoia voting machines has been supressed by the court. In that case, the software was trade secret and all rights reserved. But what if it had been source code that was disclosed but still "all rights reserved"? Since that prohibits compilation and use, it would be difficult for security testers to legally do their work at all. Since it prevents derivative works and redistribution, we'd be unable to include code snippets in any report. We would be legally unable to modify the software for the purpose of testing bug fixes. And we'd be unable to distribute fixes.
The rights are a lot more important than you think. Even to have a kind of code that is disclosed mainly for the purpose of increasing trust, we'd have to design a license to convey significant rights, if the examiners were not to be placed at legal risk.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
If I were to rewrite it today, it would say what you can do, rather than what you can't. But it's held up really well. There is a tremendous amount of software conveyed as having that particular set of rights, and it touches everybody's lives daily. I can't complain :-)
Bruce Perens.
As if that one count of 10 wasn't important.
At one point or another, my main coding platform was an Apple II, Commodore Vic-20, Commodore 64, PDP-11, VAX, Sun, SGI, PC Clone, and I've had a number of secondary coding platforms, including CHAP (something Pixar made), 6809, PIC, AVR, and so on. And all of the various operating systems for those things.
Any code that I have been given with platform restrictions, during that entire time, for various employers, is dead code today. No users, probably can't even be built if someone could find it, and I can't use it either.
In contrast, essentially all of the work I've done under an Open Source license is still living and has a vibrant user community.
You really need to think about this rights thing more.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
There is no affirmative fair use right in copyright law. Go look for it in the copyright title, it's not there. Fair use is a defense in copyright case law. And it has been substantially eroded, and continues to be. If we're talking about books, a number of software manuals place substantial restrictions on the use of the information in their licenses. For example, the Java manuals from Sun restrict use of the knowledge to create an incompatible implementation. There is some dispute regarding whether these things can be enforced, but not enough.
Bruce Perens.