If the FSF released version 3.0 the following could happen when the Linux kernel had the 'or later' clause: Someone contributes code and insists its being GPL version 3 or later. Hence all the other code at a whole (as binary) is also distributed under either GPL version 2 and 3 and/or later or GPL version 3 and/or later and the changes of GPLv3 apply to the Linux kernel images!
That scenerio (and others like it) is dealt with trivially.
Currently there exists a condition that code which is contributed to the kernel must be released under Version 2.0 of the GPL.
Instead, simply require all code contributed to the kernel contain the phrase "Released under GPL Version 2.0 or greater" as a condition for acceptence into the kernel. Anyone contributing code under "GPL Version 3.0 or later" will not have their code accepted. Thus, the kernel NEVER becomes restricted to GPL Version 3.0 or later until and unless the developers (Linus et al) change the policy to accept "GPL Version 3.0 or later" code, which they would only do once they were satisfied that they liked GPL Version 3.0.
Suddenly you don't trust the masses anymore. First you want to give everyone a certain set of freedoms which you define as 'free software' or 'open source' (although with restrictions to make sure the freedoms remain) and now you don't want to give the developers who programmed the software the freedom to define those rules forever.
What a load of nonsense.
Using the "..or later" clause does not assign copyright to the FSF or create a single authority in any way, any more than using the FreeBSD license assigns copyright of your project to Berkeley.
I'm not "extending trust to the masses and then taking it away." The leadership of any project is authoritative on the project, up until someone forks it into a new project. Don't like it that Linus has decided to accept code under terms of the "GPL Version 3.0 or later" clause? Fork the project under the old "GPL Version 2.0 or later" clause and let "the masses" decide. Even if no one comes, you lose nothing... you have all the code ever released under the terms you like, and the freedom to add to it under those same terms for as long as you like.
No one is granting anyone draconian authority to do anything by using the "..or later" clause. One is simply hedging one's bets against the need for future change. Povray got burned by something like this through the simple misfortune of being such an early project in the free software world. Linus did this because he didn't like or trust RMS, and he didn't think any of the details through. He simply said "I like things as they are," dumped the "..or later" cluase, and thereby completely failed to future-proof the licensing of the Linux kernel.
Well, guess what. The world has changed since 1991, software patents are a real issue in the US, the world wide web, webapps, and new dynamic architectures have muddied the concepts of derivative code and linking to a library, and the GPL is starting to show its age in trying to grapple with these things. Not a problem for most GPLed software, that can update to a more current license if and when it is released and meets the approval of those whove written the code, or are using the code. But for Linux, updating the Linux kernel's license will be a nightmare at best, and probably not possible at all.
You know what the problem with people like you is? Its the misplaced belief that the FSF is an inherently Good Thing which cannot do Evil plus not including the other side of the story.
Oh good Lord you make alot of assumptions about myself and a great many other people you are utterly unqualified to comment on.
I do not and never have assumed the FSF, or any other organization (including the core Linux kernel development team) will remain "good" in perpetuity. Someday Linus et. al. will be gone and for all we know Bill Gate's grandson will have taken over kernel developmen
The Linux kernel is an exception. Linux Torvalds licensed it only under GPLv2 and he removed the 'or later' part. So the Linux kernel won't be (automagically) GPLv3, as intended by Torvalds. From my understanding he doesn't trust Stallman / FSF on this one.
It was a really boneheaded move on Torvald's part. The wording is quite clear "version two or any later version", not "version two but to be superceded by any later version."
Had the Linux kernel been licensed as the FSF recommended, Version 2.0 of the GPL OR any later version would have applied, forever. So if RMS or the FSF ran amok with version 3.0, everyone could have kept happilly applying Version 2.0 forever.
Now, however, if conditions change and version 2.0 becomes untenable because of legal changes (e.g. the emergence of software patents, changes in copyright law, what have you) or technical changes (e.g. the web and changes in how programs dynamically link to libraries), then the Linux kernel folks have a real problem on their hand. They'll have to track down EVERY SINGLE contributer to the kernel and get their permission to upgrade to version 3.0 (or whatever), or rip any questionable code out and rewrite it. Povray is being completely rewritten from the ground up so that it can become GPLed, because finding every contributer and getting their permission to change the license has proven to be impossible. (This wasn't the povray folks' fault... their wonderful app either predates the GPL, or was written long before the GPL was very widely known).
Anyone taking bets on whether SCO (a contributer to the kernel under the terms of the GPL license version 2.0) will give permission to upgrade to a newer license? Because as things stand right now, either they'll have to, or every line of code their employees contributed will have to be removed and rewritten before any such change can occur. Multiply that difficulty a thousandfold, and you have an idea of the licensing nightmare that could be facing the Linux kernel if the developers ever find themselves in a position of needing to upgrade the license.
This is where Linus' myopia ("I'm not a visionary," and "I'm a big picture guy, I don't pay attention to detail") could really fuck Linux in the big picture.
Yeah, it's almost like the slashdot editors are allowed to voice their own views and not follow a company line set out by the people who own the site. Imagine that, editorial freedom in a news site! What a novel idea!
maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.
Maybe humor is a difficult concept.:-)
Seriously, I'm about as ardently anti-sexist as they come, and even I understood the humor (that BTW was clearly intended as much as a tongue-in-cheek criticism of sexism in the technical fields as anything else)
Not trying to knock peoples beliefs here, but seriously...for sheer return on investment, isn't there a bunch more useful things to get angry about?
Yes, the expansion of copyright law and patents.
Seriously, these three things (ubiquitious governance/tracking of citizens through RFID-tagged IDs, restriction of expression either outright or more commonly via expanded copyright law, and restriction of our ability to enrich our lives technologically through patents) are the three pillars with which absolute authoritarian control can, has, and may well again be exercized by our government or, increasingly more likely, corporate entities.
You're not even going the be able to SPEAK about Monsanto, starving children, or any of a million other injustices if you (1) can't publish the information (copyright/DMCA take-down-without-a-trial style restrictions), (2) can't use technology others (e.g. MS) haven't locked you out of (TCPA/"trusted" computing initiatives and software patents), or (3) assemble peacefully and protest (ubiquitious governance and monitoring of citizens, which these electronic IDs help facilitate).
So no, there really aren't more important or fundamental things to worry about than your freedom to speak, to be heard, or to assemble, and by extention, to develope the technologies that allow you to do so as other interests develope technologies designed to restrict your ability to do so. These concerns are fundamental because the rights and freedoms that are threatened are fundamental, without which you won't even be able to criticize monsanto (tongue in cheek) for processing third world babies into soylant green for the masses (/tongue in cheek)
"You show equal ignorance by using "Americans" which applys to anyone in the western hemisphere seeing as how everyone there is in "the Americas"."
Europe is generally in what is considered the "Eastern Hemisphere." Unless Europeans are working from a different definition than those of us in the Americas.
And here I thought the stereotype was that Americans didn't know geography.
Agreed, but you should also understand that most Americans come accross as if they don't.
Ah, more stereotyping. I think you are watching far too much television, rather than seeing the real world. Many Americans are idiots. So are many Europeans (I ran into one example while seeing my girlfreind off at the airport, an arrogant Dutch prick who shoved his way -- literally, by physical force -- into the queue in front of us. I would have enjoyed watching him experience the consiquences of such behavior had he done something like that on the south side of Chicago, but I digress).
Certainly we have an imbecel for president, but let's not forget that Europe has turned out its fair share of imbecellic leaders as well, and while I will grant you ours is far worse than those in Europe at this time, I doubt Europeans' intelligence suddenly tripled the moment you got rid of Margaret Thatcher, Franco, or Milosevic, nor did ours suddenly plummet when Baby Bush stole the first election and organized the dumbest of the dumb through bigotry (may Our Lord and Savior(tm) keep the gays out of the churches!) and fear ("9/11, 9/11, 9/11, terrorist, terrorist, "god bless America(tm)).
It's annoying have an ignoramous as a leader humiliating the country abroad at every turn, but I imagine you'll get to experience that in your country at some point, if you haven't already. It is an unfortunate aspect of allowing the vote of the dumbest, most ignorant person to count equally with that of the smartest, most well educated, and the fact that half the population is by defition "below average" in intelligence and knowledge of current events, and is more likely to vote how the media manipulates them than how a reasoned, thoughtful consideration of the facts would suggest.
My experience, having lived on both continents, is that by and large people are equally as knowledgable, and equally as ignorant, equally as bigoted, equally as idealistic, and equally as mistaken about those across the sea on both sides of the pond.
Is that a fault of Russians or a "dreamer" like Marx? I think a dictatoral state is the end result of any system that advocates "from each according his ability, to each according to his needs." You need a ruling class to start handing out rations as no one has a right to private property.
Not any more than you need a ruling class for capitalism to work (someone owns the land, someone works for someone else).
There has been at least one working communist system that was inherently democratic... the communal communes of Spain in the early 20th century. The country as a whole was a dual system, half capitalist, half communist. The local communists were very democratic and outcompeted their capitalist competitors (Note: communism != centrally planned).
Both Washington and Moscow had strong interest in undermining this particular example of communism. Washington because it showed communism could outcompete capitalism under the right circumstances (small, democratic, self-organized communes and cooperatives trading with one another) and Moscow because it undermined their argument that communism required authoritarianism to work (this was particularly troublesome as the Spanish democratic variant was working far better than stalinism ever did).
The Spanish government coopted the communists into their system legally, then modified the laws to make them uncompetative and ultimately illegal. Kind of like what is happening to the internet vis-a-vis the expanded copyright laws today.
The way i see it, it's a sign that Open Source is finally growing up. Fanatics like ESR might do good to the cause in the early stages of revolution, but in the longer run, they will always prove to be an annoyance and will be dealt with.
1. ESR is hardly a fanatic. He is much more of a pragmatist, falling somewhere between RMS and Torvalds, but much closer to Torvalds than Stallman.
2. OSI is an organization intended to promote Open Source software. As such it behooves OSI to have someone at the help that WON'T compromise the open source initiative's goals and philosophy, so arguing that his successor (who I know nothing about and wouldn't assume to be a great deal different than ESR) should be willing to change the organization's philosophy, political, or technical stance for some short term gain is very short sighted and ultimately destructive to the entire movement.
3. Having said all that, OSI has always been vulnerable to a "corporate takeover." Whether or not this is the case here (I kind of doubt it is), the position they've sought out as "mediator" between the corporate mindset and the free software movement certainly makes them vulnerable to that kind of thing.
4. I sleep much better knowing that RMS heads up the Free Software Foundation. These folks definite the stance of the movement. It isn't their job to compromise with those who oppose their philosophy, it is there job to articulate their philosophy and argue effectively for it. It is then up to the rest of us to choose our own stance, either 100% one or the other, or some middle-of-the-road mixture of the two. OSI falls somewhere in the middle, but to imply that moving toward the business end of the spectrum to the point where they become indistinguishable means the movement has "grown up" is to miss the whole point of the movement entirely.
Revolutions only eat their children when the revolution betrays its own ideals and becomes something very, very different. Contrast for example the Bolshevik/Communist revolution is Russia, which ran amok and never established communism, merely a dictatorship that called itself communist without practicing any of the economic or social advocated by Karl Marx, and the American revolution, which did remain true to its ideals for the most part and did in establish a democracy in its wake.
One became a monster with an entirely different agenda than the revolution and its revolutionaries while the other did not. One did "eat its children," while the other did not.
A more accurate statement would be to say that
"Each evoluton which betray itself and its ideals had ended uyp eating its children." In which case I can see every reason to expect the Free Software movement (and hopefull the Open Source movement with which it shares some adherents) should be different.
As a corallary, I would say that if history is any lesson, and if the Open Source (or Free Software) movmements do in fact "eat their children" we can pretty much understand that, at that point, they have betrayed themselves and everything they stand for, whith only the rhetoric remaining to gloss over an entirely different, probably very detrimental, agenda.
Luckilly I don't see any evidence of anything like that happening just yet.
I will be the first to admit that eventually there will be some limit to how small we can make a transistor (or transistor replacement) it seems that we still have a ways to go.
I knew all that research I did for my novel might come in handy one day.:-)
The theoretical limits of information and computational density (based on quantum density limitations and reletavistic constraints on signalling, i.e. speed-of-light limits) are Bremermann's Limit and the Bekenstein Bounds, and we're one hell of a long way away from that. Practical limitations may be an order of magnitude or two less... which we're also nowhere near.
The laws of reaction still apply to the emiiter, but at these levels it should be negligable (most of the thrust on the other end is coming from the boiling gas).
Okay, I am not a physiscist, and its been 13 years or more since my last physics course, but...
The thrust which isn't is due to electromagetic radiation, i.e. photons, which have no mass. The microwave transmitter won't have any back thrust, any more than a flashlight hanging in a perfect vacuum is going to produce "thrust" opposite the direction of the flashlight's beam.
The photons hit the sail, experience redshift as they reverse direction (thereby imparting some energy on the sail, which pushes it forward). They aren't particles with mass hitting the sail the way ions would be, or molecules of air in the wind against a sailboat. The exchange of energy is reletavistic (red shifting) IIRC, not Newtonian.
I don't believe a space based microwave transmitter will experience any thrust due to the emission of electromagnetic radiation, any more than a laser would if we were using Dr. Forward's solar sail design.
Gregory Benford of the University of California, Irvine, and his brother James, who runs aerospace research firm Microwave Sciences in Lafayette, California, envisage beaming microwave energy up from Earth to boil off volatile molecules from a specially formulated paint applied to the sail. The recoil of the molecules as they streamed off the sail would give it a significant kick that would help the craft on its way.
Why does this seem incredibly wasteful of energy?
Wouldn't it be far wiser to build solar panels in orbit, use them to power Microwaves, and avoid the attenuation in the atmosphere? This would have the added advantage of not draining power from the Earth to power the spacecraft: we would get our power from the Sun and pipe it directly to the spacecraft as Microwaves, without involving the planet at all (except, of course, as controlling entity).
Evolution is trivially falsifiable. It not only requires specific facts to fall out in a particular way to hold true (so fact contradicting said expectations would in fact "falsify" or disprove the theory), but makes predictions that can be observed (or not). Evolution has been supported rather than falsified by the mountains of evidence, observation, and even experimentation (with microbes), so it is a very solid theory, but any of those observations, collections of evidence, or experiments could concievably have had a different outcome, and if that had been so, evolution would have been disproven. That makes the theory falsifiable, by definition.
Do not fall for the religious right's ploy of redefining religious assumptions as science, so they can claim that science backs religion. It is deception of the lowest kind, and something any rational, critically thinking person should see through right away. It would be amusing to watch creationists and other "junk"-science sharlatans redefinte the paramters of scientific theory to not include falsifiabilty and other fundamentals of science to be more vague, in order to sneak their patently unscientific nonsense under the radar and lend it the credibility of science, were it not proving so effective at befuddling the gullible masses.
The Christians brought us a thousand years of darkness once before, a period that only ended with the renaissance, secular enlightenment, and the birth of modern science. If we allow the kind of doublethink described above to prevail, we can probably look forward to another thousand years of darkness to follow... or maybe more.
I know people keep posting stuff along the lines of "oh deary me... this might kill Google", but no. It doesn't have to. MSN Search may take market share away from Google, but the people using it will be the ones who haven't figured out how to change the default search in IE, or set the homepage to something other than MSN.
You're talking about well over 90% of all Windoze Lusers. Seriously, the same argument was made when Microsoft came out with IE to wipe out Netscape, and history shows that the argument was WRONG, that the overwhelming majority of people do not change their defaults, and that Microsoft nearly always succeeds in leveraging its desktop monopoly into overwhelming marketshare in other areas.
The anti-trust folks should be all over this... but they won't be, since the current administration is dead set on upholding that particular set of laws, and has already made sweet backroom deals with Microsoft to let them get away with murder.
I'm all for competition, and Google should have competitors, but Microsoft doesn't represent competition, they represent a monopolist whose decided to annex another market into their monopoly and has the power to do so. I do not think this is going to have a very happy outcome for anyone...not that there's much we can do about it.
That's kinda funny, because it's a bad thing when they get all control-freakish over other areas of thought, but it would be a good thing if they only pushed the official party line for science.
No. It's bad when they present non-scientific hypothesis (such as creationism/intelligent design) as "scientific theories" when in fact they are anything but scientific.
It's one thing to say "There are two prevailing views on how we came to be here. One is religious, and you'll learn about it on Sundays in Church, and the other is the scientific theory of evolution, which you'll learn about in this science class." (an appropriate disclaimer prior to teaching students about the theory of evolution) and presenting creationist psuedo-science that fails the basic test of falsifiability and the most basic definitions of science on an even footing with the theory of evolution, when one is a philosophical hypothesis that is not scientific, and the other is science.
If you want religious education in school, go to a religious school (the country's lousy with them), but keep your religious dogma and pseudo-science out of our public, secular schools.
With ATI you have to worry about what specific card you have, and the performance of those drivers is generally inferior (the xfree drivers don't have any hardware acceleration at all).
Check out this article for acomparison of ATI vs. NVIDIA under linux.
I don't disagree that the nvidia drivers may be better than current ati drivers (certainly they're better with celestia, and worse at 1920x1200). I haven't done any benchmarking to compare actual 3d performance precisely.
However, the Anandtech article you reference is out of date (it refers to version 3.x of the ATI drivers, and the article is dated last year). ATI released version 8.8.25 of their drivers in mid-January of this year, and the difference between them and the old drivers is night and day.
The ATI drivers either work with the vast majority of ATI cards out there... there may be some very old hardware they don't support, but anything in the last few years is supported (modulo the HDTV stuff) and works pretty well.
Nvidia may still be ahead of the game (it wouldn't surprise me if their drivers are still superior), but I wouldn't call the the "hands down" winner anymore. Last month (Dec 2004) you bet, but ATI is definitely back in the game with their new driver release.
BTW, How is your novel coming along? I read the first many chapters of it at one point, and bookmarked it to read later. I see it's still in 3rd draft. Being the author, could you tell me if I should read it now, or would you recommend waiting for further revision?
Thanks for the interest!:-)
It's still being actively edited, and getting quite a bit better along the way. I'm up to Chapter 15 (out of 50... a couple of pointless chapters have been dropped and a couple combined into one). I'd wait a bit before reading it... everything after Chapter 15 is in really rough shape still. I'm hoping to get this edit done by spring, then I'll go through it one more time and add some polish, but it should be quite readable (and quite a bit better than it currently is) after this iteration.
I use 8.8.25 with R9800Pro under Gentoo and can safely say it still sucks. And I gladly say "screw compositing manager" and settle for faux transparency, but Celestia 1.3.2 does not work and I miss my trips to space.
I've found the drivers to be quite good for everything I've done (blender, mild 3d-gaming a la tuxracer, and solid, flicker-free performance at 1920x1200 which I still cannot get from any of my nvidia cards), but I agree wholeheartedly with your celestia gripe. They really need to fix that, either in their drivers, or by providing a patch to the celestia folks. I too miss my trips to space, and will be firing up another box with my nvidia card connected to the Samsung DLP (720p), as nvidia does work fine, without the incessent flicker, at resolutions less than 1920x1200. Then I can at least enjoy the trips to space from my couch, even if I have to wait a while for the desktop to catch up.
I think this point bears repeating. If you care about celestia support, go with nvidia for now. If not, ATI works fine for everything else as far as I can tell (it works fine for everything else I do, and from reading the threads at the forums, seems to be doing ok for most everything else as well).
That's a very good question, and unfortunately one I cannot answer personally. I am very happy with the performance of the new drivers (except for celestia, which has rendering issues), but frankly I haven't had time to mess around with Doom 3, unreal tournament, or other games (beyond a quick zip down the slopes with tuxracer). I do use blender a fair amount, which works great for what it's worth. For better information than I can give there is a pretty lively thread on the Gentoo Forums here where people compare results, problems, and the like.
The ATI drivers in question came out around Jan 17th IIRC, so many other threads talking about lousy ATI support refer to the older drivers that had been rotting for a year or two, and their comments are quite frankly out of date and no longer accurate. Prior to Jan 17th ATI support for Linux was abysmal, but I've been very happy with the new drivers (except for celestia issues, which I noted before), and ATI has committed to continuing to update the drivers every couple of months. Still, there are never any guarantees with closed-source, proprietary software that releases will keep coming, be it nvidia or ati.
However, given their stance on Linux drivers, my next purchase will be Nvidia. I don't like the fact that I can't use my DVI port because ATI doesn't feel like it.
or do whatever the equivelent is for your distribution to install the ati-drivers version 8.8.25, and run fglrxconfig to configure X accordingly.
I've got ATI drivers running on a dual DVI card, on multiple heads in one case, and on a single 1920x1200 on another, and have used them in both 64-bit (opteron) and 32-bit (athlon/intel) environments. For ati 9250 and less I use the xfree drivers, for anything above that I use the new binary drivers.
I've done the same with nvidia cards (although I've yet to find an nvidia card that doesn't flicker incessently at 1920x1200 resolution, despite using the DVI port rather than the analog port -- go figure).
ATI is now releasing driver updates for Linux every 2 months... similiar to nvidia. So get either one... I've used both, and both have their strengths and weaknesses (e.g ATI drivers and celestia have issues and nvidia can't hold a stable image at 1920x1200 under Linux), and now that ATI has finally gotten their act together WRT Linux drivers, they are a viable competitor to nvidia in that market.
In other words, you can pick whatever card you like the best and expect driver support on Linux for it now, on both 32-bit intel and 64-bit opteron at least. PPC users are stuck with the free drivers (which work fine on my powerbook 17" BTW), and unfortunately other platforms are similarly limited, but for 99.99% of us the support is pretty damn good at this point.
maybe 30 years from now when we have nano-computers swimming around in our blood looking for stuff like cancer, we can count on someone like this ipodhacking guy to write the software for it. yes, too over-exadderated....but its to prove a point.
I don't find it the least bit overexaggerated... I find that notion entirely plausible.
But the point would remain. He doesn't work for the grandparent poster, so whether or not it is in his power to create a cure for cancer, old age, or religious hysteria is beside the point... if he'd rather do something else, his spare time is his own to do with as he pleases, and he should do something else. There is, after all, nothing preventing the rest of us from learning biochemistry in our spare time and searching for a cure ourselves... or studying nano-programming theory in anticipation of the (future) technology you allude to. After all, our spare time is our own, to do with as we please.
Re:That has as much to do with GPL as a Can of Tun
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Why I Love The GPL
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· Score: 1
Alfonso,
I'm sorry you used a license you didn't understand, and I find the flames you endured unfortunate.
But, had you used a different license you didn't understand, analogous results (i.e. unintended consiquences you object to and have given up the right to prevent would have occurred).
I'm going to bold this because it is important.
Releasing your hard work under any license you don't understand is "dangerous" in the sense that you will probably experience consiquences you didn't intend and may not like. THIS IS TRUE OF ANY LICENSE. You MUST understand the license you release your work under if you wish to avoid disappointments like this.
I am not familiar with the Amiga OS architecture, or how linking from libraries works on that platform. I would suggest you ask the folks at the FSF for clarification on how the GPL applies in your case. Depending on how "tightly" the code in your GPLed libraries link to a 3rd party app, the GPL may or may not apply to that third party app. This is one area of the GPL I am personally a little fuzzy on, so I would encourage you to get a clear answer from an authoritative source, such as the Free Software Foundation (fsf.org).
Generally, the GPL requires derivative products to also be GPLed. The question is, is the commercial version of this app using your code within its binary or is it only "loosely" linked to an external library (if your code is in the compiled binary, then they MUST provide access to source upon request, and the CANNOT restrict your rights to modify said source, use it in your projects, or share it with others so long as it remains under the GPL). This means, if the commercial version has your code in the binary, you can request the sources, modify them to not require a key, and distribute the modified version under the GPL for all to see and use. But, if it is only loosely linked to a library you wrote, we are back in the fuzzy area where this may not apply, and you'll need a more expert opinion than mine on the subject.
Pack your bags, we're going on a guilt trip!
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Piezo-Acoustic iPod Hack
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· Score: 4, Insightful
Could you please stop being silly and instead try and do something worth while. We're still looking for a cancer cure, aids cure and countless other things we need today.
Fuck You.
He doesn't work for you.
If you care about those things, get off your lazy ass and do something about it yourself, or pay someone else to do it for you. Don't expect any of us to give a rat's ass about your agenda when we're working for free, on our own time.
But of course, I doubt you're one tenth as capable, or creative, as this guy is.
That has as much to do with GPL as a Can of Tuna
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Why I Love The GPL
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· Score: 2, Interesting
First, I assume YOU were abiding by the GPL, and your derivative code was either in-house (not distributed) or likewise under the GPL.
So using GPL'ed software written by others can indeed be dangerous because when it's offered in a way to the public by someone but not meant to be used like described in the GPL - e.g. misunderstanding.
Dangerous? DANGEROUS? I do not think that word means what you think it means.
Using the GPL is very, very SAFE. If this person didn't understand the license they released their software in, they have only themselves to blame. The license is there, written in black and white, in plane English (and translated into assorted other languages). The FSF has detailed information on the GPL, how it works, what it implies, what freedoms it insures, etc.
The author was in no more danger using a license he didn't understand (the GPL) than he would have been using another license he didn't understand (a knockoff copy of Microsoft's license, edited for himself, the Artistic License, the FreeBSD license, or any of a dozen others).
You were in absolutely no more danger (other than having to endure an unpleasant social episode) than you would have been had you been using FreeBSD licensed code (if you think that idiot took exception to your using his code in your project, imagine if he'd licensed it under the FreeBSD license and you'd used it in a proprietary program... something that license gives you the right to do).
Can he sue you? In the USA, you bet! You can be sued by anyone, for any reason, and have to go through the trouble of going to court. I was sued by a dog owner who moved into our no-dog building with a pit-bull when the building decided to enforce the rules and started fining the prick. (The building had been a no dog building since the early 1980s, it was clearly stated in the condo docs, and the owner knew this. But, he was an intellectual property attorney and he knows how to bully. Not that it got him very far, but he did get to use his law partner at no cost while I and others in the building ran up legal bills defending ourselves against his frivolous suit. It was satisfying to put the nonsense to rest once and for all, however, even it the process was annoying as hell... and a little expensive)
The GPL certainly doesn't put you in any danger you aren't already in when you decide to crawl out of your home and face the public each day (or craw up to your computer and do so virtually, via the Internet), and it protects you against a great many things other licenses (mostly prorpietary ones) do not.
This doesn't mean there aren't incompetent jackasses in the world who will bluster, threaten, and maybe even sue, but implying that the license has anything whatsoever to do with their incompetence, or their litigiousness, is simply nonsense.
Oh, and by the way, if he had sued, your victory would have been a slam dunk. The GPL does offer you very potent protection, something many other licenses do not.
Slashdot Mirror
If the FSF released version 3.0 the following could happen when the Linux kernel had the 'or later' clause: Someone contributes code and insists its being GPL version 3 or later. Hence all the other code at a whole (as binary) is also distributed under either GPL version 2 and 3 and/or later or GPL version 3 and/or later and the changes of GPLv3 apply to the Linux kernel images!
... you have all the code ever released under the terms you like, and the freedom to add to it under those same terms for as long as you like.
That scenerio (and others like it) is dealt with trivially.
Currently there exists a condition that code which is contributed to the kernel must be released under Version 2.0 of the GPL.
Instead, simply require all code contributed to the kernel contain the phrase "Released under GPL Version 2.0 or greater" as a condition for acceptence into the kernel. Anyone contributing code under "GPL Version 3.0 or later" will not have their code accepted. Thus, the kernel NEVER becomes restricted to GPL Version 3.0 or later until and unless the developers (Linus et al) change the policy to accept "GPL Version 3.0 or later" code, which they would only do once they were satisfied that they liked GPL Version 3.0.
Suddenly you don't trust the masses anymore. First you want to give everyone a certain set of freedoms which you define as 'free software' or 'open source' (although with restrictions to make sure the freedoms remain) and now you don't want to give the developers who programmed the software the freedom to define those rules forever.
What a load of nonsense.
Using the "..or later" clause does not assign copyright to the FSF or create a single authority in any way, any more than using the FreeBSD license assigns copyright of your project to Berkeley.
I'm not "extending trust to the masses and then taking it away." The leadership of any project is authoritative on the project, up until someone forks it into a new project. Don't like it that Linus has decided to accept code under terms of the "GPL Version 3.0 or later" clause? Fork the project under the old "GPL Version 2.0 or later" clause and let "the masses" decide. Even if no one comes, you lose nothing
No one is granting anyone draconian authority to do anything by using the "..or later" clause. One is simply hedging one's bets against the need for future change. Povray got burned by something like this through the simple misfortune of being such an early project in the free software world. Linus did this because he didn't like or trust RMS, and he didn't think any of the details through. He simply said "I like things as they are," dumped the "..or later" cluase, and thereby completely failed to future-proof the licensing of the Linux kernel.
Well, guess what. The world has changed since 1991, software patents are a real issue in the US, the world wide web, webapps, and new dynamic architectures have muddied the concepts of derivative code and linking to a library, and the GPL is starting to show its age in trying to grapple with these things. Not a problem for most GPLed software, that can update to a more current license if and when it is released and meets the approval of those whove written the code, or are using the code. But for Linux, updating the Linux kernel's license will be a nightmare at best, and probably not possible at all.
You know what the problem with people like you is? Its the misplaced belief that the FSF is an inherently Good Thing which cannot do Evil plus not including the other side of the story.
Oh good Lord you make alot of assumptions about myself and a great many other people you are utterly unqualified to comment on.
I do not and never have assumed the FSF, or any other organization (including the core Linux kernel development team) will remain "good" in perpetuity. Someday Linus et. al. will be gone and for all we know Bill Gate's grandson will have taken over kernel developmen
The Linux kernel is an exception. Linux Torvalds licensed it only under GPLv2 and he removed the 'or later' part. So the Linux kernel won't be (automagically) GPLv3, as intended by Torvalds. From my understanding he doesn't trust Stallman / FSF on this one.
... their wonderful app either predates the GPL, or was written long before the GPL was very widely known).
It was a really boneheaded move on Torvald's part. The wording is quite clear "version two or any later version", not "version two but to be superceded by any later version."
Had the Linux kernel been licensed as the FSF recommended, Version 2.0 of the GPL OR any later version would have applied, forever. So if RMS or the FSF ran amok with version 3.0, everyone could have kept happilly applying Version 2.0 forever.
Now, however, if conditions change and version 2.0 becomes untenable because of legal changes (e.g. the emergence of software patents, changes in copyright law, what have you) or technical changes (e.g. the web and changes in how programs dynamically link to libraries), then the Linux kernel folks have a real problem on their hand. They'll have to track down EVERY SINGLE contributer to the kernel and get their permission to upgrade to version 3.0 (or whatever), or rip any questionable code out and rewrite it. Povray is being completely rewritten from the ground up so that it can become GPLed, because finding every contributer and getting their permission to change the license has proven to be impossible. (This wasn't the povray folks' fault
Anyone taking bets on whether SCO (a contributer to the kernel under the terms of the GPL license version 2.0) will give permission to upgrade to a newer license? Because as things stand right now, either they'll have to, or every line of code their employees contributed will have to be removed and rewritten before any such change can occur. Multiply that difficulty a thousandfold, and you have an idea of the licensing nightmare that could be facing the Linux kernel if the developers ever find themselves in a position of needing to upgrade the license.
This is where Linus' myopia ("I'm not a visionary," and "I'm a big picture guy, I don't pay attention to detail") could really fuck Linux in the big picture.
Yeah, it's almost like the slashdot editors are allowed to voice their own views and not follow a company line set out by the people who own the site. Imagine that, editorial freedom in a news site! What a novel idea!
It's downright unamerican!
maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.
:-)
Maybe humor is a difficult concept.
Seriously, I'm about as ardently anti-sexist as they come, and even I understood the humor (that BTW was clearly intended as much as a tongue-in-cheek criticism of sexism in the technical fields as anything else)
So chill.
Not trying to knock peoples beliefs here, but seriously...for sheer return on investment, isn't there a bunch more useful things to get angry about?
Yes, the expansion of copyright law and patents.
Seriously, these three things (ubiquitious governance/tracking of citizens through RFID-tagged IDs, restriction of expression either outright or more commonly via expanded copyright law, and restriction of our ability to enrich our lives technologically through patents) are the three pillars with which absolute authoritarian control can, has, and may well again be exercized by our government or, increasingly more likely, corporate entities.
You're not even going the be able to SPEAK about Monsanto, starving children, or any of a million other injustices if you (1) can't publish the information (copyright/DMCA take-down-without-a-trial style restrictions), (2) can't use technology others (e.g. MS) haven't locked you out of (TCPA/"trusted" computing initiatives and software patents), or (3) assemble peacefully and protest (ubiquitious governance and monitoring of citizens, which these electronic IDs help facilitate).
So no, there really aren't more important or fundamental things to worry about than your freedom to speak, to be heard, or to assemble, and by extention, to develope the technologies that allow you to do so as other interests develope technologies designed to restrict your ability to do so. These concerns are fundamental because the rights and freedoms that are threatened are fundamental, without which you won't even be able to criticize monsanto (tongue in cheek) for processing third world babies into soylant green for the masses (/tongue in cheek)
"You show equal ignorance by using "Americans" which applys to anyone in the western hemisphere seeing as how everyone there is in "the Americas"."
Europe is generally in what is considered the "Eastern Hemisphere." Unless Europeans are working from a different definition than those of us in the Americas.
And here I thought the stereotype was that Americans didn't know geography.
Agreed, but you should also understand that most Americans come accross as if they don't.
Ah, more stereotyping. I think you are watching far too much television, rather than seeing the real world. Many Americans are idiots. So are many Europeans (I ran into one example while seeing my girlfreind off at the airport, an arrogant Dutch prick who shoved his way -- literally, by physical force -- into the queue in front of us. I would have enjoyed watching him experience the consiquences of such behavior had he done something like that on the south side of Chicago, but I digress).
Certainly we have an imbecel for president, but let's not forget that Europe has turned out its fair share of imbecellic leaders as well, and while I will grant you ours is far worse than those in Europe at this time, I doubt Europeans' intelligence suddenly tripled the moment you got rid of Margaret Thatcher, Franco, or Milosevic, nor did ours suddenly plummet when Baby Bush stole the first election and organized the dumbest of the dumb through bigotry (may Our Lord and Savior(tm) keep the gays out of the churches!) and fear ("9/11, 9/11, 9/11, terrorist, terrorist, "god bless America(tm)).
It's annoying have an ignoramous as a leader humiliating the country abroad at every turn, but I imagine you'll get to experience that in your country at some point, if you haven't already. It is an unfortunate aspect of allowing the vote of the dumbest, most ignorant person to count equally with that of the smartest, most well educated, and the fact that half the population is by defition "below average" in intelligence and knowledge of current events, and is more likely to vote how the media manipulates them than how a reasoned, thoughtful consideration of the facts would suggest.
My experience, having lived on both continents, is that by and large people are equally as knowledgable, and equally as ignorant, equally as bigoted, equally as idealistic, and equally as mistaken about those across the sea on both sides of the pond.
Is that a fault of Russians or a "dreamer" like Marx? I think a dictatoral state is the end result of any system that advocates "from each according his ability, to each according to his needs." You need a ruling class to start handing out rations as no one has a right to private property.
... the communal communes of Spain in the early 20th century. The country as a whole was a dual system, half capitalist, half communist. The local communists were very democratic and outcompeted their capitalist competitors (Note: communism != centrally planned).
Not any more than you need a ruling class for capitalism to work (someone owns the land, someone works for someone else).
There has been at least one working communist system that was inherently democratic
Both Washington and Moscow had strong interest in undermining this particular example of communism. Washington because it showed communism could outcompete capitalism under the right circumstances (small, democratic, self-organized communes and cooperatives trading with one another) and Moscow because it undermined their argument that communism required authoritarianism to work (this was particularly troublesome as the Spanish democratic variant was working far better than stalinism ever did).
The Spanish government coopted the communists into their system legally, then modified the laws to make them uncompetative and ultimately illegal. Kind of like what is happening to the internet vis-a-vis the expanded copyright laws today.
The way i see it, it's a sign that Open Source is finally growing up. Fanatics like ESR might do good to the cause in the early stages of revolution, but in the longer run, they will always prove to be an annoyance and will be dealt with.
1. ESR is hardly a fanatic. He is much more of a pragmatist, falling somewhere between RMS and Torvalds, but much closer to Torvalds than Stallman.
2. OSI is an organization intended to promote Open Source software. As such it behooves OSI to have someone at the help that WON'T compromise the open source initiative's goals and philosophy, so arguing that his successor (who I know nothing about and wouldn't assume to be a great deal different than ESR) should be willing to change the organization's philosophy, political, or technical stance for some short term gain is very short sighted and ultimately destructive to the entire movement.
3. Having said all that, OSI has always been vulnerable to a "corporate takeover." Whether or not this is the case here (I kind of doubt it is), the position they've sought out as "mediator" between the corporate mindset and the free software movement certainly makes them vulnerable to that kind of thing.
4. I sleep much better knowing that RMS heads up the Free Software Foundation. These folks definite the stance of the movement. It isn't their job to compromise with those who oppose their philosophy, it is there job to articulate their philosophy and argue effectively for it. It is then up to the rest of us to choose our own stance, either 100% one or the other, or some middle-of-the-road mixture of the two. OSI falls somewhere in the middle, but to imply that moving toward the business end of the spectrum to the point where they become indistinguishable means the movement has "grown up" is to miss the whole point of the movement entirely.
Revolutions only eat their children when the revolution betrays its own ideals and becomes something very, very different. Contrast for example the Bolshevik/Communist revolution is Russia, which ran amok and never established communism, merely a dictatorship that called itself communist without practicing any of the economic or social advocated by Karl Marx, and the American revolution, which did remain true to its ideals for the most part and did in establish a democracy in its wake.
One became a monster with an entirely different agenda than the revolution and its revolutionaries while the other did not. One did "eat its children," while the other did not.
A more accurate statement would be to say that
"Each evoluton which betray itself and its ideals had ended uyp eating its children." In which case I can see every reason to expect the Free Software movement (and hopefull the Open Source movement with which it shares some adherents) should be different.
As a corallary, I would say that if history is any lesson, and if the Open Source (or Free Software) movmements do in fact "eat their children" we can pretty much understand that, at that point, they have betrayed themselves and everything they stand for, whith only the rhetoric remaining to gloss over an entirely different, probably very detrimental, agenda.
Luckilly I don't see any evidence of anything like that happening just yet.
I will be the first to admit that eventually there will be some limit to how small we can make a transistor (or transistor replacement) it seems that we still have a ways to go.
:-)
... which we're also nowhere near.
I knew all that research I did for my novel might come in handy one day.
The theoretical limits of information and computational density (based on quantum density limitations and reletavistic constraints on signalling, i.e. speed-of-light limits) are Bremermann's Limit and the Bekenstein Bounds, and we're one hell of a long way away from that. Practical limitations may be an order of magnitude or two less
The thrust which isn't is due to electromagetic radiation, i.e. photons, which have no mass.
should read:
The thrust which isn't is due to material boiling off the sail is due to electromagetic radiation, i.e. photons, which have no mass.
The laws of reaction still apply to the emiiter, but at these levels it should be negligable (most of the thrust on the other end is coming from the boiling gas).
...
Okay, I am not a physiscist, and its been 13 years or more since my last physics course, but
The thrust which isn't is due to electromagetic radiation, i.e. photons, which have no mass. The microwave transmitter won't have any back thrust, any more than a flashlight hanging in a perfect vacuum is going to produce "thrust" opposite the direction of the flashlight's beam.
The photons hit the sail, experience redshift as they reverse direction (thereby imparting some energy on the sail, which pushes it forward). They aren't particles with mass hitting the sail the way ions would be, or molecules of air in the wind against a sailboat. The exchange of energy is reletavistic (red shifting) IIRC, not Newtonian.
I don't believe a space based microwave transmitter will experience any thrust due to the emission of electromagnetic radiation, any more than a laser would if we were using Dr. Forward's solar sail design.
Why does this seem incredibly wasteful of energy?
Wouldn't it be far wiser to build solar panels in orbit, use them to power Microwaves, and avoid the attenuation in the atmosphere? This would have the added advantage of not draining power from the Earth to power the spacecraft: we would get our power from the Sun and pipe it directly to the spacecraft as Microwaves, without involving the planet at all (except, of course, as controlling entity).
In a few years you'll be driving your google to the google to buy some google for your google.
I come from google. In our language we can express any thought with a single word. Indeed, our language only has one word: google.
The above, translated into google:
Google. Google. Google.
(With fond memories of my visit to Marklar)
Disclaimer: I am not a creationist.
... or maybe more.
Exactly how is the evolution theory falsifiable?
A few examples here and many more if you do a little googling.
Evolution is trivially falsifiable. It not only requires specific facts to fall out in a particular way to hold true (so fact contradicting said expectations would in fact "falsify" or disprove the theory), but makes predictions that can be observed (or not). Evolution has been supported rather than falsified by the mountains of evidence, observation, and even experimentation (with microbes), so it is a very solid theory, but any of those observations, collections of evidence, or experiments could concievably have had a different outcome, and if that had been so, evolution would have been disproven. That makes the theory falsifiable, by definition.
Do not fall for the religious right's ploy of redefining religious assumptions as science, so they can claim that science backs religion. It is deception of the lowest kind, and something any rational, critically thinking person should see through right away. It would be amusing to watch creationists and other "junk"-science sharlatans redefinte the paramters of scientific theory to not include falsifiabilty and other fundamentals of science to be more vague, in order to sneak their patently unscientific nonsense under the radar and lend it the credibility of science, were it not proving so effective at befuddling the gullible masses.
The Christians brought us a thousand years of darkness once before, a period that only ended with the renaissance, secular enlightenment, and the birth of modern science. If we allow the kind of doublethink described above to prevail, we can probably look forward to another thousand years of darkness to follow
I know people keep posting stuff along the lines of "oh deary me... this might kill Google", but no. It doesn't have to. MSN Search may take market share away from Google, but the people using it will be the ones who haven't figured out how to change the default search in IE, or set the homepage to something other than MSN.
... but they won't be, since the current administration is dead set on upholding that particular set of laws, and has already made sweet backroom deals with Microsoft to let them get away with murder.
You're talking about well over 90% of all Windoze Lusers. Seriously, the same argument was made when Microsoft came out with IE to wipe out Netscape, and history shows that the argument was WRONG, that the overwhelming majority of people do not change their defaults, and that Microsoft nearly always succeeds in leveraging its desktop monopoly into overwhelming marketshare in other areas.
The anti-trust folks should be all over this
I'm all for competition, and Google should have competitors, but Microsoft doesn't represent competition, they represent a monopolist whose decided to annex another market into their monopoly and has the power to do so. I do not think this is going to have a very happy outcome for anyone...not that there's much we can do about it.
That's kinda funny, because it's a bad thing when they get all control-freakish over other areas of thought, but it would be a good thing if they only pushed the official party line for science.
No. It's bad when they present non-scientific hypothesis (such as creationism/intelligent design) as "scientific theories" when in fact they are anything but scientific.
It's one thing to say "There are two prevailing views on how we came to be here. One is religious, and you'll learn about it on Sundays in Church, and the other is the scientific theory of evolution, which you'll learn about in this science class." (an appropriate disclaimer prior to teaching students about the theory of evolution) and presenting creationist psuedo-science that fails the basic test of falsifiability and the most basic definitions of science on an even footing with the theory of evolution, when one is a philosophical hypothesis that is not scientific, and the other is science.
If you want religious education in school, go to a religious school (the country's lousy with them), but keep your religious dogma and pseudo-science out of our public, secular schools.
With ATI you have to worry about what specific card you have, and the performance of those drivers is generally inferior (the xfree drivers don't have any hardware acceleration at all).
3 02
... there may be some very old hardware they don't support, but anything in the last few years is supported (modulo the HDTV stuff) and works pretty well.
Check out this article for acomparison of ATI vs. NVIDIA under linux.
http://www.anandtech.com/linux/showdoc.aspx?i=2
I don't disagree that the nvidia drivers may be better than current ati drivers (certainly they're better with celestia, and worse at 1920x1200). I haven't done any benchmarking to compare actual 3d performance precisely.
However, the Anandtech article you reference is out of date (it refers to version 3.x of the ATI drivers, and the article is dated last year). ATI released version 8.8.25 of their drivers in mid-January of this year, and the difference between them and the old drivers is night and day.
The ATI drivers either work with the vast majority of ATI cards out there
Nvidia may still be ahead of the game (it wouldn't surprise me if their drivers are still superior), but I wouldn't call the the "hands down" winner anymore. Last month (Dec 2004) you bet, but ATI is definitely back in the game with their new driver release.
BTW, How is your novel coming along? I read the first many chapters of it at one point, and bookmarked it to read later. I see it's still in 3rd draft. Being the author, could you tell me if I should read it now, or would you recommend waiting for further revision?
:-)
... a couple of pointless chapters have been dropped and a couple combined into one). I'd wait a bit before reading it ... everything after Chapter 15 is in really rough shape still. I'm hoping to get this edit done by spring, then I'll go through it one more time and add some polish, but it should be quite readable (and quite a bit better than it currently is) after this iteration.
Thanks for the interest!
It's still being actively edited, and getting quite a bit better along the way. I'm up to Chapter 15 (out of 50
I use 8.8.25 with R9800Pro under Gentoo and can safely say it still sucks. And I gladly say "screw compositing manager" and settle for faux transparency, but Celestia 1.3.2 does not work and I miss my trips to space.
I've found the drivers to be quite good for everything I've done (blender, mild 3d-gaming a la tuxracer, and solid, flicker-free performance at 1920x1200 which I still cannot get from any of my nvidia cards), but I agree wholeheartedly with your celestia gripe. They really need to fix that, either in their drivers, or by providing a patch to the celestia folks. I too miss my trips to space, and will be firing up another box with my nvidia card connected to the Samsung DLP (720p), as nvidia does work fine, without the incessent flicker, at resolutions less than 1920x1200. Then I can at least enjoy the trips to space from my couch, even if I have to wait a while for the desktop to catch up.
I think this point bears repeating. If you care about celestia support, go with nvidia for now. If not, ATI works fine for everything else as far as I can tell (it works fine for everything else I do, and from reading the threads at the forums, seems to be doing ok for most everything else as well).
How's the performance? How well does Doom 3 run?
That's a very good question, and unfortunately one I cannot answer personally. I am very happy with the performance of the new drivers (except for celestia, which has rendering issues), but frankly I haven't had time to mess around with Doom 3, unreal tournament, or other games (beyond a quick zip down the slopes with tuxracer). I do use blender a fair amount, which works great for what it's worth. For better information than I can give there is a pretty lively thread on the Gentoo Forums
here where people compare results, problems, and the like.
The ATI drivers in question came out around Jan 17th IIRC, so many other threads talking about lousy ATI support refer to the older drivers that had been rotting for a year or two, and their comments are quite frankly out of date and no longer accurate. Prior to Jan 17th ATI support for Linux was abysmal, but I've been very happy with the new drivers (except for celestia issues, which I noted before), and ATI has committed to continuing to update the drivers every couple of months. Still, there are never any guarantees with closed-source, proprietary software that releases will keep coming, be it nvidia or ati.
However, given their stance on Linux drivers, my next purchase will be Nvidia. I don't like the fact that I can't use my DVI port because ATI doesn't feel like it.
/etc/portage/package.keywords /etc/portage/package.keywords
... similiar to nvidia. So get either one ... I've used both, and both have their strengths and weaknesses (e.g ATI drivers and celestia have issues and nvidia can't hold a stable image at 1920x1200 under Linux), and now that ATI has finally gotten their act together WRT Linux drivers, they are a viable competitor to nvidia in that market.
echo "media-video/ati-drivers" >>
echo "media-video/ati-drivers-extra" >>
emerge -Du media-video/ati-drivers media-video/ati-drivers-extra
or do whatever the equivelent is for your distribution to install the ati-drivers version 8.8.25, and run fglrxconfig to configure X accordingly.
I've got ATI drivers running on a dual DVI card, on multiple heads in one case, and on a single 1920x1200 on another, and have used them in both 64-bit (opteron) and 32-bit (athlon/intel) environments. For ati 9250 and less I use the xfree drivers, for anything above that I use the new binary drivers.
I've done the same with nvidia cards (although I've yet to find an nvidia card that doesn't flicker incessently at 1920x1200 resolution, despite using the DVI port rather than the analog port -- go figure).
ATI is now releasing driver updates for Linux every 2 months
In other words, you can pick whatever card you like the best and expect driver support on Linux for it now, on both 32-bit intel and 64-bit opteron at least. PPC users are stuck with the free drivers (which work fine on my powerbook 17" BTW), and unfortunately other platforms are similarly limited, but for 99.99% of us the support is pretty damn good at this point.
maybe 30 years from now when we have nano-computers swimming around in our blood looking for stuff like cancer, we can count on someone like this ipodhacking guy to write the software for it. yes, too over-exadderated....but its to prove a point.
... I find that notion entirely plausible.
... if he'd rather do something else, his spare time is his own to do with as he pleases, and he should do something else. There is, after all, nothing preventing the rest of us from learning biochemistry in our spare time and searching for a cure ourselves ... or studying nano-programming theory in anticipation of the (future) technology you allude to. After all, our spare time is our own, to do with as we please.
I don't find it the least bit overexaggerated
But the point would remain. He doesn't work for the grandparent poster, so whether or not it is in his power to create a cure for cancer, old age, or religious hysteria is beside the point
Alfonso,
I'm sorry you used a license you didn't understand, and I find the flames you endured unfortunate.
But, had you used a different license you didn't understand, analogous results (i.e. unintended consiquences you object to and have given up the right to prevent would have occurred).
I'm going to bold this because it is important.
Releasing your hard work under any license you don't understand is "dangerous" in the sense that you will probably experience consiquences you didn't intend and may not like. THIS IS TRUE OF ANY LICENSE. You MUST understand the license you release your work under if you wish to avoid disappointments like this.
I am not familiar with the Amiga OS architecture, or how linking from libraries works on that platform. I would suggest you ask the folks at the FSF for clarification on how the GPL applies in your case. Depending on how "tightly" the code in your GPLed libraries link to a 3rd party app, the GPL may or may not apply to that third party app. This is one area of the GPL I am personally a little fuzzy on, so I would encourage you to get a clear answer from an authoritative source, such as the Free Software Foundation (fsf.org).
Generally, the GPL requires derivative products to also be GPLed. The question is, is the commercial version of this app using your code within its binary or is it only "loosely" linked to an external library (if your code is in the compiled binary, then they MUST provide access to source upon request, and the CANNOT restrict your rights to modify said source, use it in your projects, or share it with others so long as it remains under the GPL). This means, if the commercial version has your code in the binary, you can request the sources, modify them to not require a key, and distribute the modified version under the GPL for all to see and use. But, if it is only loosely linked to a library you wrote, we are back in the fuzzy area where this may not apply, and you'll need a more expert opinion than mine on the subject.
Could you please stop being silly and instead try and do something worth while. We're still looking for a cancer cure, aids cure and countless other things we need today.
Fuck You.
He doesn't work for you.
If you care about those things, get off your lazy ass and do something about it yourself, or pay someone else to do it for you. Don't expect any of us to give a rat's ass about your agenda when we're working for free, on our own time.
But of course, I doubt you're one tenth as capable, or creative, as this guy is.
First, I assume YOU were abiding by the GPL, and your derivative code was either in-house (not distributed) or likewise under the GPL.
... something that license gives you the right to do).
... and a little expensive)
So using GPL'ed software written by others can indeed be dangerous because when it's offered in a way to the public by someone but not meant to be used like described in the GPL - e.g. misunderstanding.
Dangerous? DANGEROUS? I do not think that word means what you think it means.
Using the GPL is very, very SAFE. If this person didn't understand the license they released their software in, they have only themselves to blame. The license is there, written in black and white, in plane English (and translated into assorted other languages). The FSF has detailed information on the GPL, how it works, what it implies, what freedoms it insures, etc.
The author was in no more danger using a license he didn't understand (the GPL) than he would have been using another license he didn't understand (a knockoff copy of Microsoft's license, edited for himself, the Artistic License, the FreeBSD license, or any of a dozen others).
You were in absolutely no more danger (other than having to endure an unpleasant social episode) than you would have been had you been using FreeBSD licensed code (if you think that idiot took exception to your using his code in your project, imagine if he'd licensed it under the FreeBSD license and you'd used it in a proprietary program
Can he sue you? In the USA, you bet! You can be sued by anyone, for any reason, and have to go through the trouble of going to court. I was sued by a dog owner who moved into our no-dog building with a pit-bull when the building decided to enforce the rules and started fining the prick. (The building had been a no dog building since the early 1980s, it was clearly stated in the condo docs, and the owner knew this. But, he was an intellectual property attorney and he knows how to bully. Not that it got him very far, but he did get to use his law partner at no cost while I and others in the building ran up legal bills defending ourselves against his frivolous suit. It was satisfying to put the nonsense to rest once and for all, however, even it the process was annoying as hell
The GPL certainly doesn't put you in any danger you aren't already in when you decide to crawl out of your home and face the public each day (or craw up to your computer and do so virtually, via the Internet), and it protects you against a great many things other licenses (mostly prorpietary ones) do not.
This doesn't mean there aren't incompetent jackasses in the world who will bluster, threaten, and maybe even sue, but implying that the license has anything whatsoever to do with their incompetence, or their litigiousness, is simply nonsense.
Oh, and by the way, if he had sued, your victory would have been a slam dunk. The GPL does offer you very potent protection, something many other licenses do not.