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Why We Still Need OSI
ChiefMonkeyGrinder writes "In response to a comment on yesterday's blog, Simon Phipps writes about the old rivalry between the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative (OSI). 'I have been (and in plenty of ways still am) a critic of OSI, as well as a firm supporter and advocate of the FSF. I believe OSI should be a member organisation with a representative leadership. ... But the OSI still plays a very important and relevant role in the world of software freedom.' For instance: Licence approvals have become a much more onerous process, with the emphasis on avoiding creation of new licences, updating old or flawed ones, and encouraging the retirement of redundant ones. It would be great to see the stewards of some of the (in retrospect) incorrectly approved licences ask for their retirement."
Licence approvals have become a much more onerous process
Apparently, so have spell checkers.
Living With a Nerd
Sure, it turns out that S.P.H.I.N.X. is not quite the threat they once were thought to be, but the Guild of Calamitous Intent still lives!
"I guess the moral of the story is, don't paint your airship with rocket fuel." -- Addison Bain
I so love a good geek slap-fight. Though this is not as good as a true geek throwdown, it's entertaining nonetheless.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
The FSF should talk to Cisco about bringing the OSI to their IOS, maybe even presenting a paper to the ISO in regards to their CLI. That would help us PHBs CYA when dealing with their IPV6 routers.
Who the heck was in charge of the OSI when all these stupid licenses were being approved? I know there was a huge fuss about some of the crap being approved back in the day. I always felt it was somewhat of a sham meant to give cover to commercial organizations wanting to create "almost open source" licenses. Anyone really desiring to release open source already had a plethora of valid and tested licenses to choose from.
the growth in cynicism and rebellion has not been without cause
http://blogs.the451group.com/opensource/2009/10/06/the-open-source-initiatives-corporate-status-is-suspended-a-caos-theory-qa/
OSI is getting exactly what they pushed: open code tied to closed devices. When you fight for open as a key to business success rather than user freedom, we get Android and their closed phones, we get devices running Linux that are essentially black boxes because you can't get them to run anything else, etc.
What OSI has pushed forward has taken hold. However, I think we can all agree now that GPL V3 was a good idea because it would prevent our current situation of half-open devices.
Taxation is legalized theft, no more, no less.
This license governs use of the accompanying software. If you use the software, you accept this license. If you do not accept the license, do not use the software.
(emphasis mine)
But the remaining part of the license only talks about distribution and derivatives. Why does a end-user have to agree to this? They should have worded this one a bit more precise.
The thing that always bothered me about OSI was the pomposity. They come out late in the game, years after the creation of the open source process, after Linux, Apache, etc. are all mature, and then have tried to take credit for basically everything open source since. Then have the nerve to frequently post on slashdot how horrible it is that they're not recognized for their tremendous accomplishments, and that anyone who is skeptical of OSI's claims is just completely ignorant of the history of the organization.
wow, that would be a thought provoking discussion. ...wait, what?
The quote in question:
I think we can all agree now that GPL V3 was a good idea because it would prevent our current situation of half-open devices.
BSD leaves us with completely closed devices (OSX, i, etc.) not exactly the solution to 'half-open devices' that GPLv3 advocates are looking for.
we may be trolls, but I agree. I think that GPL is bush league.
I was thinking OSI Model when I ready the title of the article....a little confusing.
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It was a great company for its time.
Some might even say that the OSI plays a bigger role in the world of OSS than it does in the world of Free Software. Who'd have thought it.
I disagree. I much prefer our current situation of "half-open" devices that actually exist and that I can use over the mythical fully open devices that apparently are used by the tooth fairy and santa claus.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
Is the GPL redundant? If not, then you are just being a lame license troll.
It may pain you to consider this but some coders actually choose the GPL. It's their call, not yours.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Redefining well-known words and acronyms is something the OSI and FSF can agree upon.
I respectfully disagree. Oscar Goldman's organization is still quite relevant in the fields of hostage negotiation, Bigfoot sightings and Russia oriented plot-lines.
Really, a license that prohibits integration of third-party code is not free software (it renders improved NOSA code non-free).
I argue that's against freedom 3:
The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
...the OSI(R) I trust was run by Max headroom himself! Dan Aykroyd used to intro the show,
The problem I see with using GPL is they are using it on releasing individual branches of an original code tree. They should publich GPL'd code for consumption slightly inferior to public domain because it has such commercial restrictions, while maintaining a more desirable privileged code that is not licensed.
Of'course, disclosure somewhat dispels all viable value in maintaining this bifurcative approach, yet that is what a GPL was supposed to achieve; it's supposed to allow modular codes to compete under that licensing scheme while keeping it from an original closed-source code tree (we'll call it pseudocode, if you like).
In this regard, BSD licenses truly are a more *proper* licensing mechanism for an actual product to which maintenance is administered by whomever grants the use. GPL is nothing more than a paradigm-shift meant to mediate in an authoritarian world where everyone is responsible for their actions but aren't willing to hold free software to the same standard.
This is why LGPL was somewhat created, but it still fails in regards of liability; for this is why OSI would practically advocate for a BSD style license. Just look at Richard Stallman: he's a chickenhawk criticizing others yet plaguing the world and market on research grants that never amounted to any productive application in any society but to debase the entire industry. Because of him, the perception of Unix as originally being a light footprint on an efficient architecture has become a giant behemoth where everyone needs more than a BusyBox environment to do menial tasks.
It's use in courts recently doesn't even address the non-complex facts that just by GNU as a dis-organization asserting itself on anyone it claims to be a derivative work would be the leverage of these communistic judges to force another proprietor to disclose the reverse-compiled art or pseudocode to whomever asks. GPL takes already-existing concepts and misplaces itself as a competing proprietor, much less than what would call public domain. In this regard, GNU and it's LGPL only creates the facade of a free software mobilized by a slave community forever indebted by virtue of parasitizing an architecture that it contributes no royalties or charity to progress in any patronage, but compel all hardware to bend to the monolithic threaded form of human perception called software and "intellectual property."
OSI got it right, BSD proved it profitable, and a public domain would prove that only GNU and it's GPL would be the most willing to steal software rather than allow developers to actually sell their work as a custom solution on hardware. Do you really want a hardware vendor like IBM arriving on your front-door demanding you disclose them your Source pseudo-code and art just because you circulated a compiled binary that runs on someone's operating system on their architecture? Get a life, RMS. Entire countries have been founded on their nature of having a lifestyle, means, ethic, and culture that only adherents participate with eachother, not for some foreigners to mimic the appearance of another world to what they can only discern; it's like a jew calling hisself White because he likes to eat saurkraut, and it's like a negro calling hisself Aryan because he got a black'n'blue eye in a fistfight.
We believe everything is now up to date - the IRS filings were part of the same issue we inherited from the early days of OSI. We (mainly OSI's Treasurer Danese Cooper actually) worked on these issues last year with the help of DLA Piper (law firm donating their service) and today we are completely in the good graces of both the IRS and the California State Franchise Tax Board.
If you are aware of other issues that haven't popped up on our radar, please tell osi (at) opensource (dot) org so we can fix them. I realise that's not so much fun as posting them on Slashdot first, but it will help get things fixed faster just like filing a fix on Subversion fixes software faster than writing to The Register about it.
I'm sorry, drinky, but your poo is still stinky. Open Source, per the Open Source Definition, requires redistribution rights. But I admire your creativity with the facts. Say, are you still a member of the Flat Earth Society?
Are you one of my common trolls? For anyone interested in my position on this issue, see my journal entry on why neither Bruce Perens nor any other member of the OSI is entitled to rewrite the meaning of the phrase "Open Source".
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"