Your interpretation of the APSL termination clause
is wrong. Go read the license -- or, better yet,
find a friendly lawyer and have him/her explain it
to you.
Actually the definition of "open source" according to the Open
Source Movement is pretty close to our definition of "free software",
but they interpret it in a somewhat lax way, so that they have
accepted some licenses that we in the Free Software Movement consider
too restrictive.
Until early 1999, the definitions of "open source" and "free software"
were, as far as anyone but RMS knew, identical. The set of necessary
freedoms described in the Open Source Definition was (and was intended
to be) the same as the set of necessary freedoms described in the FSF's
white papers and propaganda.
Then Richard started announcing additional requirements nobody had ever heard
about before, including prohibitions on certain kinds of license termination
clauses and on clauses requiring changes to the code to be disclosed to the
vendor. It is due to these additional requirements that RMS says the
definitions of "free software" and "open source" no longer coincide.
Richard's claim is that these requirements were implicit in the definition
of "free software" all along, and that people who use the Open Source
Definition as a standard have fallen away from the path of virtue by not
also adopting them. But bear in mind when you think about this that until
less than eighteen months ago, nobody except possibly RMS knew that the OSD's
"lax" definition was any different from his -- and if RMS knew, he wasn't
talking.
When I first presented "The Cathedral and the Bazaar" in 1997 at Linux Kongress in Bavaria, I predicted that if I had done my job right people
would someday come to take my crazed, radical,
bleeding-edge anarchist ideas about the hacker culture and software development as conventional wisdom and wonder why I had to write down anything so obvious.
You're living in the generative myth I created
and you don't even know it. But that's OK with me. It means I succeeded at what I was trying to do. Go write some code, kid.
I agree with you, Linus certainly did validate
the many-developer approach (gee, seems to me I
remember writing something about this once upon
a time...).
Now I suggest you go think about "business model
or ideology" for a while. Consider the following
question: does a revolution start with a change
in action, or a chasnge in thought?
dgris is correct; Tiemann's claim to have started
the open-source movement is actually quite a strong one if you look at the history. That's why I was gentle with him in my response.
Linus has done many wonderful things, but he actually has less claim on this mantle than Tiemann. Linus invented a kernel, not a business
model or an ideology -- he supplied the movement's most important object lesson, but didn't invent the movement.
"Cygnus (Michael's company before Red Hat bought it) has a claim to
have started the open-source revolution; so does Richard Stallman,
and for that matter so do I. It all depends on what moment in the unfolding
process you want to pick as "start", like designating the year zero on
your calendar."
My point, of course, was that trying to pin down
a single start of the movement would be foolish
and false to history.
CatB was never an argument that leadership or management isn't required -- it certainly is.
It was an argument against using secrecy and
traditional management structures for purposes
that decentralized peer review fulfills better.
Perhaps for the upcoming second edition I shall
have to write in more detail about the Benevolent Dictator role, if only to prevent the kind of
misundestanding this article is founded upon.
I meant the term in the technical sense an earlier
poster in this thread. In Gnosticism, one achieves
communion with God not through faith but through
gnosis, a shattering knowledge of the true nature
of things.
"It's obviously cleaner, more efficient, and easier to use"
Actually, that's not obvious at all. Low-density power sources like solar, biomass, wind etc. have
serious scaling problems. When you get less energy yield per pound of generator or square foot
of plant space, you have to compensate by building
more power infrastructure.
The construction costs (in money, environmental
impact, and human lives lost) blow up a helluva
lot faster than most alternate-energy fans realize. They're extrapolating from demonstration
projects without thinking about second-order effects.
That is asinine. All of your rights are precious, and just as you wouldn't tolerate me trying to restrict a right that you value, I won't tolerate you trying to restrict a right that I value.
Let's have an end to tiresome political correctness. Turing blabbed his "darkest secret" to a pair of bobbies who had come to his house to solve a burglary, and subsequently offed himself in a particularly theatrical way that there is strong evidence he'd been fascinated with since his teens.
Next time you want a martyr, try to pick one whose foolishness and self-destructive streak is less obvious.
We're not as far apart as you think. I actually talked about threat monitoring in the essay, though I didn't include it in my recap. I accept your criticism of point (c) as a friendly amendment and have changed the Web version of the essay accordingly.
On point (d), we will have to agree to disagree. Situations in which small-group peer review of closed source works are so rare that they make a perversely bad guide to development practice.
I think I'm a moderator now. If I have the capability when I finish this reply, I'm going to moderate you up.
Slashdot Mirror
Actually the definition of "open source" according to the Open Source Movement is pretty close to our definition of "free software", but they interpret it in a somewhat lax way, so that they have accepted some licenses that we in the Free Software Movement consider too restrictive.
Until early 1999, the definitions of "open source" and "free software" were, as far as anyone but RMS knew, identical. The set of necessary freedoms described in the Open Source Definition was (and was intended to be) the same as the set of necessary freedoms described in the FSF's white papers and propaganda.
Then Richard started announcing additional requirements nobody had ever heard about before, including prohibitions on certain kinds of license termination clauses and on clauses requiring changes to the code to be disclosed to the vendor. It is due to these additional requirements that RMS says the definitions of "free software" and "open source" no longer coincide.
Richard's claim is that these requirements were implicit in the definition of "free software" all along, and that people who use the Open Source Definition as a standard have fallen away from the path of virtue by not also adopting them. But bear in mind when you think about this that until less than eighteen months ago, nobody except possibly RMS knew that the OSD's "lax" definition was any different from his -- and if RMS knew, he wasn't talking.
You're living in the generative myth I created and you don't even know it. But that's OK with me. It means I succeeded at what I was trying to do. Go write some code, kid.
the many-developer approach (gee, seems to me I
remember writing something about this once upon
a time...).
Now I suggest you go think about "business model
or ideology" for a while. Consider the following
question: does a revolution start with a change
in action, or a chasnge in thought?
Rob was joking. He told me so himself.
We've both contributed. That's good enough for us -- and I'm quite willing to believe that his quote was truncated or mangled worse than mine.
...and obviously trolling, so I'll say nothing more.
Unfortunately, I don't have access to the full text of Tiemann's remarks.
I'd moderate the parent up if I could.
Linus has done many wonderful things, but he actually has less claim on this mantle than Tiemann. Linus invented a kernel, not a business model or an ideology -- he supplied the movement's most important object lesson, but didn't invent the movement.
"Cygnus (Michael's company before Red Hat bought it) has a claim to have started the open-source revolution; so does Richard Stallman, and for that matter so do I. It all depends on what moment in the unfolding process you want to pick as "start", like designating the year zero on your calendar."
My point, of course, was that trying to pin down a single start of the movement would be foolish and false to history.
Perhaps for the upcoming second edition I shall have to write in more detail about the Benevolent Dictator role, if only to prevent the kind of misundestanding this article is founded upon.
Exactly.
I meant the term in the technical sense an earlier
poster in this thread. In Gnosticism, one achieves
communion with God not through faith but through
gnosis, a shattering knowledge of the true nature
of things.
Actually, that's not obvious at all. Low-density power sources like solar, biomass, wind etc. have serious scaling problems. When you get less energy yield per pound of generator or square foot of plant space, you have to compensate by building more power infrastructure.
The construction costs (in money, environmental impact, and human lives lost) blow up a helluva lot faster than most alternate-energy fans realize. They're extrapolating from demonstration projects without thinking about second-order effects.
I believe that's more where ESR is coming from.
Eric, correct me if I'm wrong, please.
You got it right.
...if there aren't enough Geeks With Guns alumni :-)
already volunteering, that is
I've had one for months. It sits next to the
bronze Buddha on my bookshelf. Never occurred to
me to post about it.
Let's have an end to tiresome political correctness. Turing blabbed his "darkest secret"
to a pair of bobbies who had come to his house
to solve a burglary, and subsequently offed himself in a particularly theatrical way that
there is strong evidence he'd been fascinated with
since his teens.
Next time you want a martyr, try to pick one whose
foolishness and self-destructive streak is less
obvious.
You are correct, Frank.
m l
I haiku'd incorrectly.
The shame is bitter.
That is what I get
for posting while I am tired.
I will mend my ways.
(See also
http://www.netaxs.com/~esr/poetry/five-haiku.ht
)
Many Slashdot kiddies
think earth revolves around them;
they're assholes too.
Not considering
my posts might be here only
as side effect...
The true target is
all the mainstream media;
and CEOs' heads.
Pointless chattering.
Vast `Operation Mindfuck'.
The sage susses out both.
"Scientific socialism"
On point (d), we will have to agree to disagree. Situations in which small-group peer review of closed source works are so rare that they make a perversely bad guide to development practice.
I think I'm a moderator now. If I have the capability when I finish this reply, I'm going to moderate you up.
UnclPedro is correct.
They were correct.