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'Open Source Security' Loses in Court, Must Pay $259,900 To Bruce Perens (theregister.co.uk)
Bruce Perens co-founded the Open Source Initiative with Eric Raymond -- and he's also Slashdot reader #3872. Now he's just won a legal victory in court. "Open Source Security, maker of the grsecurity Linux kernel patches, has been directed to pay Bruce Perens and his legal team almost $260,000 following a failed defamation claim," reports The Register. Slashdot reader Right to Opine writes:
The order requires Spengler and his company to pay $259,900.50, with the bill due immediately rather than allowing a wait for the appeal of the case. The Electronic Frontier Foundation's attorneys will represent Perens during OSS/Spengler's appeal of the case.
Perens was sued for comments on his blog and here on Slashdot that suggested that OSS's Grsecurity product could be in violation of the GPL license on the Linux kernel. The court had previously ruled that Perens' statements were not defamatory, because they were statements by a non-attorney regarding an undecided issue in law. It is possible that Spengler is personally liable for any damages his small company can't pay, since he joined the case as an individual in order to preserve a claim of false light (which could not be brought by his company), removing his own corporate protection.
Perens was sued for comments on his blog and here on Slashdot that suggested that OSS's Grsecurity product could be in violation of the GPL license on the Linux kernel. The court had previously ruled that Perens' statements were not defamatory, because they were statements by a non-attorney regarding an undecided issue in law. It is possible that Spengler is personally liable for any damages his small company can't pay, since he joined the case as an individual in order to preserve a claim of false light (which could not be brought by his company), removing his own corporate protection.
"Bruce Perens defamed the plaintiffs" and "the plaintiffs violated copyright law" is not a true dichotomy. Zero, one, or both statements could be true in the abstract. This court case only resolved the first question.
Some of you trolls are real assholes. Bruce has worked tirelessly on the OSS world. His name is obviously well known amongst the top 10 in it.
/.,
For some of you to rip into him, is just sad.
Seriously, it is long past time to make the code so as to lower the trolls. Make it so that unless we are moderating, that we can skip ACs below a certain point. Hey, if a moderator brings them up to say 2 or 3, I will want to see them. OTHERWISE, why bother. I get sick of reading so many lies and crap from the trolls.
I prefer the "u" in honour as it seems to be missing these days.
He's standing up not just for himself but everybody.
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The idiotic drama surrounding Linux "security" shows a large area for improvement that few have cared about during the lifetime of Linux. OpenBSD, MINIX, seL4 and others are very successful for pursuing security without drama, due to security being a clear goal that is designed for.