But you can't get the software without agreeing to their support terms. If you compile it from source, they claim distribution would violate their trademark rights. (Mandrake argued this before.)
The end result is that if you assert your rights under the GPL you've voided your support contract. RedHat hasn't put a penalty on voiding the contract, but it's a sure bet that future copycat agreements will.
These efforts to restrict the GPL with additional licensing terms are building on one another. The trademark issue is something mandrake came up with which the FSF never addressed. (The problem is that if I can't distribute your software without removing your trademarks, how can I distribute it at all since your trademarks are in the credits?) If the FSF doesn't believe that wrapping distribution of software with a required support contract that goes against the GPL is a violation of the GPL, then what exactly is?
We're sure to see other companies come along with even more restrictive versions of this scheme. At what point will the FSF decide that the line has been crossed and the GPL has been violated?
But the problem is that update support is considered to be part of the service contract. To ge updates you need a service contract, and once you have a service contract you lose some of the core rights the GPL gives you (namly distribution.) If this is legal then the GPL simply has no teeth. Let me give you an example.
Let's say I touch up openoffice and combine it with a replacement for MS Access. All of the software I've used is GPL, so I'll have to leave my product under the GPL license. Let's say I put up a click-though license on my download server that requires a $100 credit card payment and states that by downloading this software you are agreeing to a $100 support contract. The terms of that contract state that any additional installations must be covered by their own $100 support contract and that distributing the software to anyone who is not covered by a support contract is a violation of the terms of the contract. Violating the terms of the contract will carry a nice $1 million US penalty.
Is this software still GPL in anything other than name? Of course not.
The saddest part of this story is that so many people feel they need to be apologists for RedHat. This is a terrible scheme that, if allowed to stand, will simply encourage other companies to release more proprietary software masquerading as GPL software. If you want to use proprietary software, that's your own business...just don't muddy the waters about what the GPL does and doesn't allow.
On the flip side, imagine that Microsoft releases WinXP under the GPL. Installing it requires you to agree to a free "service contract" that states distribution or modification is a violation of the service terms and subject to a $100,000,000,000 contract violation penalty.
It's easy to imagine that the GPL will become meaningless if you can wrap whatever terms you want around the GPL. Branden Robinson has been arguing this point for a while now.
Personally, I think this line takes the award for shoddy reporting.
Linux... is a version of Unix that can be copied and modified freely.
This presupposes that SCO is correct. Sort of like saying "Abbie Normal was charged with the murder of 12 infants today. Abbie is a 28 year old mother of 3, homemaker and serial killer."
I was under the obviously mistaken impression that Reuters did more than regurgitate press releases.
MySQL makes a terrible replacement for Access. The idea of using MySQL in place of Access seems to be pushed quite a bit, but it's just dead wrong when you're talking about simple file based databases instead of an Access server.
Fire up Gnutrition and you'll see what I mean. Gnutrition would make a great Access database, but it makes a terrrible MySQL frontend. Basing it on MySQL makes the setup complicated, leaves you with another daemon chewing up processor cycles when you're not using it, and virtually assures that some unsuspecting fools will leave MySQL open to the public.
Don't get me wrong, I administer a MySQL database, and it's a central component in some of the work I do. It's not an Access replacement though. A good frontend to SQLite could be an Access replacement, but I've yet to see one.
And if you click on the "Maintenance Program" link you'll notice that updates are listed as a part of that service. If you don't care about patching your boxes you'll find Win98 to be quite a bit cheaper.
And since SuSE will be charging you annually for update support, at 366 days the SuSE pricetag jumps up to $38079...$6579 more than WinXP. At 731 days SuSE has hit you for $47069...$15569 more than Microsoft. And, of course, you know that somewhere along the line SuSE will change their support terms and price. It may be more, it may be less, the only thing you know for certain is that they're going to expect you to pay for it.
$99 for the media. 499 for a 1 year maintenance license for FIVE clients. You only have to buy the $99 media kit once, so essentially its $100 per client for all the crossover stuff.
You left out the key part that it's $100 per client per year. WinXP + OOo is quite a bit cheaper over the life of the OS. Debian/Slack/Gentoo/etc + OOo completely blow it away. Do you honestly expect $99 support to amount to much more than eratta packages, forums, mailing lists and email access to the package maintainers? You can get all that for free without any fear that they'll change the terms on you down the road.
Hans original email was direct and to the point. "Hey guys, give credit where credit is due, don't change MY license"
But the license he is using is the GPL. Hans wants to further restrict the GPL so that he can spam users of his filesystem with advertizements for his sponsors and company. Further, it seems that he's incredibly interested in making sure HE gets credit but doesn't really care for acknowledging the work of others.
So my question is, if you don't like the way the GPL is worded and don't feel that it allows you to demand enough credit for your work, why in the world did you choose the GPL for a license?
There are IP spiders crawling the web looking for trademark infringement. Even if the RIAA doesn't bother with you, those folks will. Put the word "bardex" on a crawlable page and see for yourself.
There was little of interest during the conference. They only allowed reporters to ask questions.
There was a question about whether or not yesterdays stock movement was caused by insider trading.
There was a question about why SCO is making it difficult to see the source code.
There was a question about why SCO took so long to locate this second agreement.
None of the answers to these questions were particularly interesting or revealing.
What I wanted to know, and of course was not allowed to ask, is...if SCO wins it's case against IBM and isn't bought out, what is the ultimate end state they'd like to see for the code in the Linux kernel. Do they want it removed, do they want to kill the kernel, or do they want to license their SCO IP to Linux users?
On the other hand, under section 7 of the GPL, everyone must cease distributing Linux immediately, kind of a GPL catch-22. I guess everyone would have to start using one of the BSDs or GNU/HURD.
And I'm sure "killing the Linux kernel" comes in third place on SCO's Christmas wish list. If Linux died suddenly it would certainly put a kink in the plans of companies planning to migrate from Unix to Linux. The BSD's are good, and it's likely your favorite distro would convert to a BSD kernel (Debian has BSD and Hurd ports in the works for unrelated reasons), but how many business would be willing to live with the possiblity that BSD is exposed to the same risks.
I was under the impression that the BIG companies just cross-license all the stupid patents like this. That way it provides a nice barrier to entry for upcoming companies. A new company will have to develop a product, find a market, and fight it's way through 300 obvious, stupid patents...or they can just sell out to the big boys.
Amazon's One-Click patent was never invalidated. Faced with a certain defeat in court, Amazon licensed the patent to Barnes and Noble, and as a result if YOU want to compete with Amazon YOU will have to shell out for a legal team to prove the patent is bullshit.
It's very simple to come up with the counter argument. SCO didn't put the code in. SCO's position is that the code is not GPL. The GPL kernel doesn't take over SCO's "trade secret" code, SCO's "trade secret" code takes over the GPL kernel. It's also easy enough to imagine them claiming that the "trade secrets" are protected by not being identified...that removing the code would immediately reveal the secrets.
Whether or not this position holds up over the course of a 2 or 3 year trial hardly matters. During that time frame plenty of business will license the SCO Unix IP simply to cover their own asses....or migrate to WinXP/BSD/Solaris.
We've seen other GPL software fall into an IP black-hole. Lame, Giflib, DeCSS, Avifile all suffer similar fates due to patents. They're GPL but not legal to use unless you buy a patent license, and if you buy a patent license you've just invalidated portions of the GPL.
I don't agree with it...I don't like it...I voted for the other guy...but what can you or I really do about it. IBM, Linus or the FSF has to force a resolution to this issue ASAP. Whether or not SCO is really the victim in this scenario, when they don't allow us to correct the problem they turn into just another bunch of a-holes trying to make free software illegal to use without tithing them.
When the offending code is removed from linux, what do SCO expect will happen? It will simply be rewritten by the community and improved as a result.
That's why you can't see the code without a draconian NDA and why they will not show you all of the code. They want the code to STAY IN LINUX so they can license their Unix IP to Linux users.
Where is RMS in this whole saga? I suppose it's difficult to take a stand on the different views of the GPL regarding all of this while the PR newswires are being used like an IRC server, but I'd still be very interested in hearing SOMETHING from the FSF.
I write GPL code too...and I'm counting on the FSF to defend that license. Whether it's the Linux kernel or GCC, if it's GPL the FSF has a stake in the legal outcome.
Different company, but don't buy it anyway. After an influx of cash from Microsoft, Corel dropped all of it's Linux development. Their winelib based products were left in a very buggy state, customers were left to just deal with it, and their Wine development team went off to start Transgaming.
Corel Draw somewhat works on my Debian Stable desktop system. Wordperfect 2000 barely works on the same system. Neither comes close to being usefully reliable though, and there are reliable alternatives to both products.
Corel Draw may have more features than OpenOffice.org when it comes to vector graphics, but what's the point when it crashes all the time? If someone would recompile the damn thing with a newer winelib, GCC and GlibC...and do away with the custom font server...it might be something more than a novelty item. As is, it's a waste of money.
They seem to think the PR newswires are instant messenger services. I won't be at all suprised if the next tidbit from SCO mentions that all UNIX IP licenses will come with a free 3 day pr0n membership.
They really need to take a step back and make up their minds about what IP they have and who they're going to sue. Lashing out with threats of lawsuits for anyone who questions SCO's WMD...er...IP claims hardly bestows confidence in the merit of those claims or the intent behind these lawsuits. Sounds more like a pump-and-dump stock scheme to me.
The fact of the matter is that SCO is simply trying to run up their share price so that SCO management can make a buck on the implosion of their company.
This news doesn't seem to have changed anything in that respect. SCO is selling for $8.60 right now, down only $0.11 for the day. By contrast, news of the lawsuits pushed their stock up from $3.40 to $8.40 over a 2 week time frame. Obviously many investors are doubting that this announcement from Novell will have any impact on the IBM lawsuit.
I think their strategy is better thought out than that. You will never ever see this mythical SCO code and it will never go to a trial where the code will be revealed. If the code is disclosed it will immediately be removed from the kernel, and if it's removed from the kernel SCO can't demand licensing fees for use of that code. This is a brilliant new business model that works like this.
1) develop or purchase a product
2) product flops
3) claim your competitors have stolen your code
4) demand that USERS license your code in order to use your competitor's product
5) make certain the code is never disclosed (your competitors will remove it if you tell them what it is.)
Of course, I can't imagine this would work in any country other than the US. It's sort of like being accused, imprisoned and tried for a crime that you aren't told about. SCO expects you to cough up licensing fees based on IP violations they will not disclose to you. Three years back this would have sounded impossible. Today? It just might work.
The real problem isn't that the Linux kernel might fall into an IP twilight zone...there's always the BSD kernel and Hurd to fall back on. The real problem is that if this works for SCO you're bound to see the same sort of "we can't tell you what it is, but you better license it anyway" accusations against Apache, Perl, Python, PHP, etc.
Slashdot Mirror
But you can't get the software without agreeing to their support terms. If you compile it from source, they claim distribution would violate their trademark rights. (Mandrake argued this before.)
The end result is that if you assert your rights under the GPL you've voided your support contract. RedHat hasn't put a penalty on voiding the contract, but it's a sure bet that future copycat agreements will.
These efforts to restrict the GPL with additional licensing terms are building on one another. The trademark issue is something mandrake came up with which the FSF never addressed. (The problem is that if I can't distribute your software without removing your trademarks, how can I distribute it at all since your trademarks are in the credits?) If the FSF doesn't believe that wrapping distribution of software with a required support contract that goes against the GPL is a violation of the GPL, then what exactly is?
We're sure to see other companies come along with even more restrictive versions of this scheme. At what point will the FSF decide that the line has been crossed and the GPL has been violated?
But the problem is that update support is considered to be part of the service contract. To ge updates you need a service contract, and once you have a service contract you lose some of the core rights the GPL gives you (namly distribution.) If this is legal then the GPL simply has no teeth. Let me give you an example.
Let's say I touch up openoffice and combine it with a replacement for MS Access. All of the software I've used is GPL, so I'll have to leave my product under the GPL license. Let's say I put up a click-though license on my download server that requires a $100 credit card payment and states that by downloading this software you are agreeing to a $100 support contract. The terms of that contract state that any additional installations must be covered by their own $100 support contract and that distributing the software to anyone who is not covered by a support contract is a violation of the terms of the contract. Violating the terms of the contract will carry a nice $1 million US penalty.
Is this software still GPL in anything other than name? Of course not.
The saddest part of this story is that so many people feel they need to be apologists for RedHat. This is a terrible scheme that, if allowed to stand, will simply encourage other companies to release more proprietary software masquerading as GPL software. If you want to use proprietary software, that's your own business...just don't muddy the waters about what the GPL does and doesn't allow.
On the flip side, imagine that Microsoft releases WinXP under the GPL. Installing it requires you to agree to a free "service contract" that states distribution or modification is a violation of the service terms and subject to a $100,000,000,000 contract violation penalty.
It's easy to imagine that the GPL will become meaningless if you can wrap whatever terms you want around the GPL. Branden Robinson has been arguing this point for a while now.
Personally, I think this line takes the award for shoddy reporting.
... is a version of Unix that can be copied and modified freely.
Linux
This presupposes that SCO is correct. Sort of like saying "Abbie Normal was charged with the murder of 12 infants today. Abbie is a 28 year old mother of 3, homemaker and serial killer."
I was under the obviously mistaken impression that Reuters did more than regurgitate press releases.
MySQL makes a terrible replacement for Access. The idea of using MySQL in place of Access seems to be pushed quite a bit, but it's just dead wrong when you're talking about simple file based databases instead of an Access server.
Fire up Gnutrition and you'll see what I mean. Gnutrition would make a great Access database, but it makes a terrrible MySQL frontend. Basing it on MySQL makes the setup complicated, leaves you with another daemon chewing up processor cycles when you're not using it, and virtually assures that some unsuspecting fools will leave MySQL open to the public.
Don't get me wrong, I administer a MySQL database, and it's a central component in some of the work I do. It's not an Access replacement though. A good frontend to SQLite could be an Access replacement, but I've yet to see one.
Where can you still buy Win98?
Try pricewatch.com.
And if you click on the "Maintenance Program" link you'll notice that updates are listed as a part of that service. If you don't care about patching your boxes you'll find Win98 to be quite a bit cheaper.
And since SuSE will be charging you annually for update support, at 366 days the SuSE pricetag jumps up to $38079...$6579 more than WinXP. At 731 days SuSE has hit you for $47069...$15569 more than Microsoft. And, of course, you know that somewhere along the line SuSE will change their support terms and price. It may be more, it may be less, the only thing you know for certain is that they're going to expect you to pay for it.
$99 for the media. 499 for a 1 year maintenance license for FIVE clients. You only have to buy the $99 media kit once, so essentially its $100 per client for all the crossover stuff.
You left out the key part that it's $100 per client per year. WinXP + OOo is quite a bit cheaper over the life of the OS. Debian/Slack/Gentoo/etc + OOo completely blow it away. Do you honestly expect $99 support to amount to much more than eratta packages, forums, mailing lists and email access to the package maintainers? You can get all that for free without any fear that they'll change the terms on you down the road.
Hans original email was direct and to the point. "Hey guys, give credit where credit is due, don't change MY license"
But the license he is using is the GPL. Hans wants to further restrict the GPL so that he can spam users of his filesystem with advertizements for his sponsors and company. Further, it seems that he's incredibly interested in making sure HE gets credit but doesn't really care for acknowledging the work of others.
So my question is, if you don't like the way the GPL is worded and don't feel that it allows you to demand enough credit for your work, why in the world did you choose the GPL for a license?
There are IP spiders crawling the web looking for trademark infringement. Even if the RIAA doesn't bother with you, those folks will. Put the word "bardex" on a crawlable page and see for yourself.
There was little of interest during the conference. They only allowed reporters to ask questions.
There was a question about whether or not yesterdays stock movement was caused by insider trading.
There was a question about why SCO is making it difficult to see the source code.
There was a question about why SCO took so long to locate this second agreement.
None of the answers to these questions were particularly interesting or revealing.
What I wanted to know, and of course was not allowed to ask, is...if SCO wins it's case against IBM and isn't bought out, what is the ultimate end state they'd like to see for the code in the Linux kernel. Do they want it removed, do they want to kill the kernel, or do they want to license their SCO IP to Linux users?
On the other hand, under section 7 of the GPL, everyone must cease distributing Linux immediately, kind of a GPL catch-22. I guess everyone would have to start using one of the BSDs or GNU/HURD.
And I'm sure "killing the Linux kernel" comes in third place on SCO's Christmas wish list. If Linux died suddenly it would certainly put a kink in the plans of companies planning to migrate from Unix to Linux. The BSD's are good, and it's likely your favorite distro would convert to a BSD kernel (Debian has BSD and Hurd ports in the works for unrelated reasons), but how many business would be willing to live with the possiblity that BSD is exposed to the same risks.
I was under the impression that the BIG companies just cross-license all the stupid patents like this. That way it provides a nice barrier to entry for upcoming companies. A new company will have to develop a product, find a market, and fight it's way through 300 obvious, stupid patents...or they can just sell out to the big boys.
Amazon's One-Click patent was never invalidated. Faced with a certain defeat in court, Amazon licensed the patent to Barnes and Noble, and as a result if YOU want to compete with Amazon YOU will have to shell out for a legal team to prove the patent is bullshit.
Imagine I put up a website claiming I fucked your mother, complete with photoshopped pics, eyewitness accounts, etc.
Now you get a restraining order forcing me to take down the site because it's all complete BS. I made everything up.
The story gets posted on Slashdot and as a result half a million idiots assume the story must be true because you tried to shut me up.
One patent to rule them all, one patent to find them.
One patent to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.
It's very simple to come up with the counter argument. SCO didn't put the code in. SCO's position is that the code is not GPL. The GPL kernel doesn't take over SCO's "trade secret" code, SCO's "trade secret" code takes over the GPL kernel. It's also easy enough to imagine them claiming that the "trade secrets" are protected by not being identified...that removing the code would immediately reveal the secrets.
Whether or not this position holds up over the course of a 2 or 3 year trial hardly matters. During that time frame plenty of business will license the SCO Unix IP simply to cover their own asses....or migrate to WinXP/BSD/Solaris.
We've seen other GPL software fall into an IP black-hole. Lame, Giflib, DeCSS, Avifile all suffer similar fates due to patents. They're GPL but not legal to use unless you buy a patent license, and if you buy a patent license you've just invalidated portions of the GPL.
I don't agree with it...I don't like it...I voted for the other guy...but what can you or I really do about it. IBM, Linus or the FSF has to force a resolution to this issue ASAP. Whether or not SCO is really the victim in this scenario, when they don't allow us to correct the problem they turn into just another bunch of a-holes trying to make free software illegal to use without tithing them.
When the offending code is removed from linux, what do SCO expect will happen? It will simply be rewritten by the community and improved as a result.
That's why you can't see the code without a draconian NDA and why they will not show you all of the code. They want the code to STAY IN LINUX so they can license their Unix IP to Linux users.
Bruce Perens as Cooter. That's pretty good.
Where is RMS in this whole saga? I suppose it's difficult to take a stand on the different views of the GPL regarding all of this while the PR newswires are being used like an IRC server, but I'd still be very interested in hearing SOMETHING from the FSF.
I write GPL code too...and I'm counting on the FSF to defend that license. Whether it's the Linux kernel or GCC, if it's GPL the FSF has a stake in the legal outcome.
Different company, but don't buy it anyway. After an influx of cash from Microsoft, Corel dropped all of it's Linux development. Their winelib based products were left in a very buggy state, customers were left to just deal with it, and their Wine development team went off to start Transgaming.
Corel Draw somewhat works on my Debian Stable desktop system. Wordperfect 2000 barely works on the same system. Neither comes close to being usefully reliable though, and there are reliable alternatives to both products.
Corel Draw may have more features than OpenOffice.org when it comes to vector graphics, but what's the point when it crashes all the time? If someone would recompile the damn thing with a newer winelib, GCC and GlibC...and do away with the custom font server...it might be something more than a novelty item. As is, it's a waste of money.
They seem to think the PR newswires are instant messenger services. I won't be at all suprised if the next tidbit from SCO mentions that all UNIX IP licenses will come with a free 3 day pr0n membership.
They really need to take a step back and make up their minds about what IP they have and who they're going to sue. Lashing out with threats of lawsuits for anyone who questions SCO's WMD...er...IP claims hardly bestows confidence in the merit of those claims or the intent behind these lawsuits. Sounds more like a pump-and-dump stock scheme to me.
Ouch.. Looks like I spoke too soon. It's a shame my trading account is dry. Shorting SCO would have made a bundle today.
It's supprising that the markets took so long to react.
The fact of the matter is that SCO is simply trying to run up their share price so that SCO management can make a buck on the implosion of their company.
This news doesn't seem to have changed anything in that respect. SCO is selling for $8.60 right now, down only $0.11 for the day. By contrast, news of the lawsuits pushed their stock up from $3.40 to $8.40 over a 2 week time frame. Obviously many investors are doubting that this announcement from Novell will have any impact on the IBM lawsuit.
I think their strategy is better thought out than that. You will never ever see this mythical SCO code and it will never go to a trial where the code will be revealed. If the code is disclosed it will immediately be removed from the kernel, and if it's removed from the kernel SCO can't demand licensing fees for use of that code. This is a brilliant new business model that works like this.
1) develop or purchase a product
2) product flops
3) claim your competitors have stolen your code
4) demand that USERS license your code in order to use your competitor's product
5) make certain the code is never disclosed (your competitors will remove it if you tell them what it is.)
Of course, I can't imagine this would work in any country other than the US. It's sort of like being accused, imprisoned and tried for a crime that you aren't told about. SCO expects you to cough up licensing fees based on IP violations they will not disclose to you. Three years back this would have sounded impossible. Today? It just might work.
The real problem isn't that the Linux kernel might fall into an IP twilight zone...there's always the BSD kernel and Hurd to fall back on. The real problem is that if this works for SCO you're bound to see the same sort of "we can't tell you what it is, but you better license it anyway" accusations against Apache, Perl, Python, PHP, etc.
Where did I put my foil hat?
And how exactly is this better than a binary newsgroup harvester?