Re:DRM to be used in GNOME's multimedia backend
on
Gnome 2.14 Released
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· Score: 1
It's clear that RMS feels that in some cases it is better to use the GPL than the LGPL.
I think RMS would say the GPL is preferable in the vast majority of cases. Else why would he urge developers -- in bold letters -- to release their libraries under the GPL?
But getting back to the topic of this thread: should GNOME's multimedia backend be licensed under the weak LGPL, when we know that the entertainment cartel has been one of the most vocal advocates of Digital Restrictions Management and Treacherous Computing?
The answer is absolutely no, and I daresay the FSF is of the same opinion, since they will include anti-DRM provisions in the GPLv3.
Developers of Free and Open Source Software should use every legal tool at their disposal to protect the users' freedom. One of the best tools is to license music and video apps under the GPL, so that the entertainment cartel can't poison their hard work with draconian DRM. Otherwise, the developers might as well be working for the RIAA and MPAA!
Open Source developers who care about the users' freedom should help out multimedia projects that are licensed GPL (such as Xine, MPlayer, and VideoLAN).
Re:DRM to be used in GNOME's multimedia backend
on
Gnome 2.14 Released
·
· Score: 1
Not quite the damning of the LGPL that his link suggests.
To further quote from the Free Software Foundation website: ...If we amass a collection of powerful GPL-covered libraries that have no parallel available to proprietary software, they will provide a range of useful modules to serve as building blocks in new free programs. This will be a significant advantage for further free software development, and some projects will decide to make software free in order to use these libraries.
Proprietary software developers, seeking to deny the free competition an important advantage, will try to convince authors not to contribute libraries to the GPL-covered collection. For example, they may appeal to the ego, promising "more users for this library" if we let them use the code in proprietary software products. Popularity is tempting, and it is easy for a library developer to rationalize the idea that boosting the popularity of that one library is what the community needs above all.
But we should not listen to these temptations, because we can achieve much more if we stand together. We free software developers should support one another. By releasing libraries that are limited to free software only, we can help each other's free software packages outdo the proprietary alternatives. The whole free software movement will have more popularity, because free software as a whole will stack up better against the competition.
The GNOME Foundation didn't listen to Richard Stallman or the FSF and started to cater to the business interests that are pushing proprietary software infested with treacherous computing and DRM to handcuff users.
Re:DRM to be used in GNOME's multimedia backend
on
Gnome 2.14 Released
·
· Score: 1
the PDF viewer is no longer "fully functional" when it can't read the DRMed file somebody sent you
Have you actually tried opening up a DRMed file with KPDF? Of course you can still read it after you've disabled the DRM.
You're never going to have a legal and free-as-in-speech mp3 plugin.
In most of the world it is legal to have a free-as-in-speech mp3 player. As for the US, just wait till some senator's grandkid gets hauled to jail for listening to music on his Linux desktop. Then we'll start seeing the laws change:-)
Oh, and about the FSF warning against the LGPL. Isn't Gnome part of the GNU project, and thus FSF-sponsored?
How long do you think that sponsorship will last, given that the FSF is ready to release GPLv3, which contains anti-DRM provisions? It is the business interests that have taken over GNOME and that are currently advocating DRM and the LGPL. Sooner or later the FSF will have to distance itself from GNOME.
Re:DRM to be used in GNOME's multimedia backend
on
Gnome 2.14 Released
·
· Score: -1, Troll
KPDF has an option to enable reading DRMed files but I dont hear anyone complaining about that.
KPDF is licensed under the GNU General Public License, and benefits from the GPL's strong copyleft protection. Therefore, the user will always have access to the KPDF source code (including any DRM components), allowing the user can remove the DRM and be left with a fully-functional PDF viewer.
This is less than can be said about GStreamer's plugins, which are proprietary and closed-source in order to prevent users from modifying them (ie. removing the DRM and being left with a functional plugin). GStreamer, being licensed as LGPL, allows proprietary and closed-source plugins to link to it, while KPDF, being licensed as GPL, does not. That's the fundamental difference, and that's why the Free Software Foundation warns against using the LGPL for any project.
GStreamer has hurt the multimedia effort on Linux and the Free Desktop because they stole talented developers from mature mutimedia projects such as Xine, MPlayer, and VideoLAN, all of which were started before GStreamer and all of which have strong copyleft protection by being licensed under the GPL. In other words, GStreamer further fragmented the Linux multimedia developer base purely for the selfish, immoral purpose of ramming DRM down Linux users' throats.
Ximian, a company instrumental in founding GNOME, sold out to big business in 2002 by switching Mono's license from the GPL to the weaker MIT X11 license. Instead of helping out the myriad of established multimedia apps such as Kaffeine, AmaroK, and KMPlayer, Ximian started a whole new app called Banshee, whose only claim to fame is that its license (MIT X11) allows linking to proprietary DRM plugins.
These are just some example of an increasing problem GNOME is experiencing: it is pandering (and in some cases outright selling out) to companies that don't necessarily have the users' best interest in mind. One can say that the whole reason GNOME was started was to allow proprietary software (including draconian DRM) to use the hard work of open source developers.
KDE, on the other hand, is licensed solely under the GPL because the toolkit it is based on (Qt) is also GPL. KDE is also committed to preventing DRM from infesting their user's computers: for KDE4, they are building a multimedia framework called Phonon that does not depend on GStreamer, but which can use any number of backends, including DRM-free ones.
If so, where can I download the modified Linux kernel?
Is Forbes going to let RMS tell his side?
on
Linus on GPL3 In Forbes
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· Score: 1, Informative
I hope Forbes will let Richard Stallman explain his reasons for including anti-DRM provisions in GPLv3.
Otherwise, it seems that Forbes is biased and acting in the interests of the Intel, Sony, Tivo and other business interests that want to hijack the hard work of open source developers in order to hancuff users and consumers with draconian treatcherous computing.
But then again, writing stories that are merely disguised propaganda for the business cartels is nothing new for Forbes.
KDE will be equally supported on SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop. Stephan Binner, a Novell engineer who is also a lead KDE developer, confirmed this on his blog.
Richard Stallman correctly predicted many of the ways in which Big Corporations and Big Brother will use DRM (also known as Digital Restrictions Management, Treacherous Computing, or Handcuffware) to enslave people. Just read the essay he wrote, titled "Can you trust your computer?" and look at some of the recentSlashdotstories and you'll see that he's been all along.
I have nothing but respect for Stallman's courage to take on the powerful and wealthy interests that want to subjugate the populace. This is the time to show our gratitude for his uncompromising ideals by donating to the Free Software Foundation (which Richard Stallman founded and leads) and to the Electronic Frontiers Foundation.
The Education Suite of the K Desktop Environment (KDE) has made great strides in providing high-quality educational software for schoolchildren aged 3 to 18. The educational applications range from ones that teach vocabulary and foreign languages to math, physics, chemistry, astronomy and computer programming.
This goes to show that the educational sector is considered a high priority by many KDE developers, which is good because contracts with educational institutions account for a great percentage of software revenue. And of course, they have the satisfaction of making the kids (and consequently our future society) smarter, better informed, and more ready to tackle the challenges they'll face.
The K Desktop Environment (KDE) has an education suite focused on creating high-quality educational software for children ages 3 to 18. They've also developed specialized programs to aid teachers in planning lessons. Here are some of the specific programs and their targetted are of teaching:
KLatin, KVerbos, and Kiten to teach Latin, Spanish, and Japanese respectively.
KMPlot to plot mathematical functions and Kig to explore geometric constructions.
Kalzium to teach Chemistry KStars to teach astronomy.
Last July, Apple asked Anton Altaparmakov, lead developer of the Linux-NTFS project, to dual license the Linux-NTFS driver under the APL so that the Intel version of OS X can read/write files on Windows partitions (presumably for dual-boot computers). The problem pointed out by other Linux-NTFS developers is that the APL is not GPL compatible, and any changes made by Apple to the driver will be unusable in Linux. As one person put it:
This would open up a one-way street: towards OS X and away from GNU/Linux and any other OS based on the GPL.
Not to mention the Konqueror / Safari fiasco where Apple complied to the terms of the LGPL by the skin of their teeth, making it impossible for open source developers to port changes upstream.
In November, Apple has again tried to hijack Linux-NTFS code, this time by suggesting that it be licensed under the LGPL. This was promptly rejected by one main developer, who threatened lawsuits.
Supporting the Summer of Code would enable Google to positively impact education in numerous ways. Educating the younger generation is an investment in the world's future, yet it so often seems to fall off the radar of those in charge.
How can Google support education with Free and Open Source Software? By improving apps that make it fun for elementary, junior high and high school students to learn. And how do you make it fun? By intertwining technology and using computers to their full potential as teaching tools. Take the KDE Education Suite for example: it has open source programs that teach Math, Chemistry, Physics, Foreign Languages and many more. Wouldn't it be nice if every third-world child had access to these?
By supporting college students who work on Free Software, Google would be raising awareness of its many advantages, not to mention giving participants the satisfaction that they've authored something that will be used by millions of people throughout the world. The Free Software foundation has compiled a list of testimonials from people at various educational institutions who have benefited greatly from using Free Software. But more importantly, using Free Software in educational settings teaches students about freedom and cooperation. Richard Stallman and FSF Europe have written great essays on this topic, titled:
Through Free and Open Source software, Google has the power to make the world a smarter place, enabling its people to make intelligent decisions that will affect all of us.
I'd love to see Google continue and expand its Summer of Code program, which last summer funded 400 students worldwide to work on the Free and Open Sourceprojects of their choice. Each student was rewarded $4,500 and the project they were improving received $500 to cover the mentors' time and expenses.
By enabling students to contribute to Free Software at an early age, Google would not only be doing society a favor, but it would also introduce those students to the concept of working with a large group of talented, motivated contributors coming from vastly different backgrounds.
So what happened to the OpenGraphics.org project that aimed to create a graphics card with fully published specs and open source drivers? If they actually get it working, there will be no more debate as to what video card Linux users (and manufacturers of Linux-capable computers) should buy.
Given the fact that the best open source drivers currently available are those for ATI cards, and that those cards are 15% as efficient in Linux as in Windows, the Open Graphics card will have no competition.
Re:GNOME's audio backend GStreamer to use DRM
on
A Look at GNOME 2.14
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· Score: 2, Insightful
Noone is forcing anything on you. DRM plugins will be in the "ugly" module.
The whole reason why GStreamer started was to create a framework that would enable these "ugly" DRM plugins. GStreamer has hurt the multimedia effort on Linux and the Free Desktop because they stole talented developers from much more mature projects like Xine, MPlayer, and VLC. In other words, they further fragmented the developer base purely for the selfish, immoral purpose of ramming DRM down Linux users' throats.
Of course, they've tried to sugar coat this in order to attract developers (heck, their propaganda machine is quite good) but the fact remains that GStreamer is technologically inferior to Xine even now (Xine has a much cleaner, light-weight, robust API than GStreamer can hope to achieve in a long time).
Re:GNOME's audio backend GStreamer to use DRM
on
A Look at GNOME 2.14
·
· Score: 1
One big reason Qt is GPL'd is that it allows them to sell licenses to those who want to develop proprietary Qt applications. This, using your reasoning, makes them no better than Fluendo.
By licensing Qt as Free and Open Source Software under the GPL, Trolltech is encouraging developers to also release derivative work to the community as Free Software.
If a third-party wants to develop proprietary apps on the Qt framework, then they are not sharing back to the community and it is only fair that they compensate Trolltech. Share and share alike, but if you don't want to share, pay up. Qt licensing makes perfect sense, and it is how Free Software was designed to work and be self-funding.
This is in stark contrast with how Fluendo operates -- its business model is based on handcuffing users and denying them the right to use, study, modify, redistribute, and improve the source code of GStreamer's DRM, proprietary plugins. Not only that, Fluendo actually pays patent licensing fees to the RIAA and MPAA, making those monopolies even richer and more powerful than they already are.
So if you're Fluendo customer, you can be sure part of your money goes into the pockets of the media barons. And if you're a GStreamer developer, you can be sure that your code will be used by the same entertainment moguls to rip off and spy on their users through DRM.
Re:GNOME's audio backend GStreamer to use DRM
on
A Look at GNOME 2.14
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· Score: 4, Interesting
Gstreamer is GPL
Wrong, GStreamer is LGPL only. The GStreamer website is adamant about denying developers the right to license contributed code under the GPL: We require that all code going into our core package is LGPL. For the plugin code, we require the use of the LGPL for all plugins written from scratch or linking to external libraries.
Fluendo, the company that controls GStreamer, wants to link their DRM plugins to LGPL code contributed by the naive independent developers, who don't realize that by writing LGPL multimedia code, they might as well be working for the RIAA and MPAA.
Xine on the other hand is GPL, and any code that links to Xine must also be GPL. So even if someone decides to make DRM plugins or apps for Xine, they will have to give users the source code to those plugins. There will inevitably be some users who know how to extract the useful part of the codec while leaving out the DRM restrictions. As the KDE developer Aaron Seigo eloquently put it: DRM + source code = no DRM
Now I realize why Richard Stallman warned against using LGPL for any code, including libraries. Too bad the makes of GTK and GNOME didn't listen. But thank God the makers of Qt and KDE did!
GNOME's audio backend GStreamer to use DRM
on
A Look at GNOME 2.14
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· Score: 3, Informative
GStreamer, the official audio backend for GNOME, will include DRM plugins developed by a company called Fluendo, which hopes to make money by restricting the users' rights and turning GNOME/Linux/"the Free Desktop System" into a Vista-like nightmare controlled by the entertainment cartel. Why? Because Fluendo is on the GNOME Foundation's Advisory Board. I can't believe I've been so stupid to actually give them money, so that they can turn around and stab Free Software in the back! Never again will I trust the GNOME Foundation after they sold out the community like this.
I hope KDE is smart enough to avoid DRM by choosing a multimedia backend that is GPL. This will ensure that users can change the code of any plugin, remove the DRM, and be left with a functional product. Xine would be an excellent choice for a multimedia backend, since it is light-weight, works with more codecs that Gstreamer (not to mention better) and can be included as a library in any program, like Kaffeine and Amarok have already done.
KDE is the default on Google Desktop Linux
on
Google And Open Source
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· Score: -1, Offtopic
Novell was initially reluctant to release this code -- after all, they didn't have to because the X11 license doesn't contain any forced sharing, copyleft provisions. The Open Source community had to complainloudly before Novell decided it didn't want to risk losing support from independent developers.
One reason they might have wanted to keep the modifications closed was to make a big splash for the release of the Novell Linux Desktop. Another possible reason is that Ximian (and Nat Friedman, who was Ximian's CEO before Ximian was bought by Novell) that long tried to undermine KDE, the Free Desktop System that currently has a slight edge in terms of popularity. By keeping the source closed, they would have prevented KDE developers from incorporating XGL into their windowing system, leaving KDE slightly behind Gnome in terms of eyecandy for a period of time.
Krita, the painting and image editing application for KOffice is probably a better alternative to Adobe Photoshop on the Linux desktop. It is nicely integrated in KDE and its codebase is cleaner than that of GIMP, so it is easier to add features at a fast rate. In fact, even GNOME devs have been amazed by how fast it's growing.
All native Windows applications will easily run on Linux, with Mono?
I seriously doubt it. It would be a titanic effort to recreate the full API that M$ has created with its hundreds of billions of dollars. Instead, all Mono will achieve is to steal FOSS developers from other projects that strive to provide a programming language with a clean-syntax and a low learning curve, most notably Python. I think that would be a shame, as Python is farther along in terms of its syntax, speed, and availability of specialized modules.
.NET on W$ also benefits from being able to programatically control with IIS and SQL Server, both of which have beginner-friendly GUI administrative tools and neither of which are available on Linux.
I know a lot of.NET developers, and frankly what they like about it is the intuitive IDE, which provides code completion and which is GUI-based, allowing developers to do a lot of work simply by point-&-click. Incidentally, Trolltech is making good progress in this regard with the release of Qt Designer.
It's hard to get excited about any tool based on Ruby because it inherits so much confusing syntax from Perl. To many programmers, Perl code looks like gibberish, and that's part of the reason it's falling out of favor. I'm afraid the same will happen to Ruby, which is too bad since its strict adherence to object-oriented concepts is admirable.
I much prefer Python and Mod_Python for web programming, since its syntax is cleaner closer to plain English.
Slashdot Mirror
It's clear that RMS feels that in some cases it is better to use the GPL than the LGPL.
I think RMS would say the GPL is preferable in the vast majority of cases. Else why would he urge developers -- in bold letters -- to release their libraries under the GPL?
But getting back to the topic of this thread: should GNOME's multimedia backend be licensed under the weak LGPL, when we know that the entertainment cartel has been one of the most vocal advocates of Digital Restrictions Management and Treacherous Computing?
Preventing users from skipping computers
Controlling your computer over the internet with rootkits
Instilling fear by suing innocent people
Suing independent competitors out of business
Bullying witnesses into perjury
and the list goes on...
The answer is absolutely no, and I daresay the FSF is of the same opinion, since they will include anti-DRM provisions in the GPLv3.
Developers of Free and Open Source Software should use every legal tool at their disposal to protect the users' freedom. One of the best tools is to license music and video apps under the GPL, so that the entertainment cartel can't poison their hard work with draconian DRM. Otherwise, the developers might as well be working for the RIAA and MPAA!
Open Source developers who care about the users' freedom should help out multimedia projects that are licensed GPL (such as Xine, MPlayer, and VideoLAN).
Not quite the damning of the LGPL that his link suggests.
...If we amass a collection of powerful GPL-covered libraries that have no parallel available to proprietary software, they will provide a range of useful modules to serve as building blocks in new free programs. This will be a significant advantage for further free software development, and some projects will decide to make software free in order to use these libraries.
Good job selectively quoting the FSF site, which is titled: Why you shouldn't use the Library GPL for your next library. How much more explicitly can it be stated than that?
To further quote from the Free Software Foundation website:
Proprietary software developers, seeking to deny the free competition an important advantage, will try to convince authors not to contribute libraries to the GPL-covered collection. For example, they may appeal to the ego, promising "more users for this library" if we let them use the code in proprietary software products. Popularity is tempting, and it is easy for a library developer to rationalize the idea that boosting the popularity of that one library is what the community needs above all.
But we should not listen to these temptations, because we can achieve much more if we stand together. We free software developers should support one another. By releasing libraries that are limited to free software only, we can help each other's free software packages outdo the proprietary alternatives. The whole free software movement will have more popularity, because free software as a whole will stack up better against the competition.
The GNOME Foundation didn't listen to Richard Stallman or the FSF and started to cater to the business interests that are pushing proprietary software infested with treacherous computing and DRM to handcuff users.
the PDF viewer is no longer "fully functional" when it can't read the DRMed file somebody sent you
:-)
Have you actually tried opening up a DRMed file with KPDF? Of course you can still read it after you've disabled the DRM.
You're never going to have a legal and free-as-in-speech mp3 plugin.
In most of the world it is legal to have a free-as-in-speech mp3 player. As for the US, just wait till some senator's grandkid gets hauled to jail for listening to music on his Linux desktop. Then we'll start seeing the laws change
Oh, and about the FSF warning against the LGPL. Isn't Gnome part of the GNU project, and thus FSF-sponsored?
How long do you think that sponsorship will last, given that the FSF is ready to release GPLv3, which contains anti-DRM provisions? It is the business interests that have taken over GNOME and that are currently advocating DRM and the LGPL. Sooner or later the FSF will have to distance itself from GNOME.
KPDF has an option to enable reading DRMed files but I dont hear anyone complaining about that.
KPDF is licensed under the GNU General Public License, and benefits from the GPL's strong copyleft protection. Therefore, the user will always have access to the KPDF source code (including any DRM components), allowing the user can remove the DRM and be left with a fully-functional PDF viewer.
This is less than can be said about GStreamer's plugins, which are proprietary and closed-source in order to prevent users from modifying them (ie. removing the DRM and being left with a functional plugin). GStreamer, being licensed as LGPL, allows proprietary and closed-source plugins to link to it, while KPDF, being licensed as GPL, does not. That's the fundamental difference, and that's why the Free Software Foundation warns against using the LGPL for any project.
Aaron Seigo, a lead KDE developer, has written extensively on this: DRM + source code = no DRM
Oh, and you can turn off the KPDF DRM at compile time and by unchecking "Obey DRM limitations" in Settings->Configure KPdf->General.
Ever since a company called Fluendo joined the GNOME Foundation's Advisory Board, GNOME is obligated to use GStreamer (a software product sponsored by Fluendo) as its audio and video backend. This wouldn't be bad, if it weren't for the fact that GStreamer uses Digital Restrictions Management (DRM) to handcuff users and leave them at the mercy of the entertainment cartel. In order to do this, GStreamer is denying its developers the right to license their constribution under the GPL, so that Fluendo can sell closed-source, proprietary DRM plugins that let the MPAA and RIAA control the users' viewing habits.
GStreamer has hurt the multimedia effort on Linux and the Free Desktop because they stole talented developers from mature mutimedia projects such as Xine, MPlayer, and VideoLAN, all of which were started before GStreamer and all of which have strong copyleft protection by being licensed under the GPL. In other words, GStreamer further fragmented the Linux multimedia developer base purely for the selfish, immoral purpose of ramming DRM down Linux users' throats.
Ximian, a company instrumental in founding GNOME, sold out to big business in 2002 by switching Mono's license from the GPL to the weaker MIT X11 license. Instead of helping out the myriad of established multimedia apps such as Kaffeine, AmaroK, and KMPlayer, Ximian started a whole new app called Banshee, whose only claim to fame is that its license (MIT X11) allows linking to proprietary DRM plugins.
These are just some example of an increasing problem GNOME is experiencing: it is pandering (and in some cases outright selling out) to companies that don't necessarily have the users' best interest in mind. One can say that the whole reason GNOME was started was to allow proprietary software (including draconian DRM) to use the hard work of open source developers.
KDE, on the other hand, is licensed solely under the GPL because the toolkit it is based on (Qt) is also GPL. KDE is also committed to preventing DRM from infesting their user's computers: for KDE4, they are building a multimedia framework called Phonon that does not depend on GStreamer, but which can use any number of backends, including DRM-free ones.
Does that mean that the hardware drivers that interface the Sony PlayStation 3 will be released as Free and Open Source Software under the GNU General Public License?
If so, where can I download the modified Linux kernel?
I hope Forbes will let Richard Stallman explain his reasons for including anti-DRM provisions in GPLv3.
Otherwise, it seems that Forbes is biased and acting in the interests of the Intel, Sony, Tivo and other business interests that want to hijack the hard work of open source developers in order to hancuff users and consumers with draconian treatcherous computing.
But then again, writing stories that are merely disguised propaganda for the business cartels is nothing new for Forbes.
KDE will be equally supported on SUSE Linux Enterprise Desktop. Stephan Binner, a Novell engineer who is also a lead KDE developer, confirmed this on his blog.
Richard Stallman correctly predicted many of the ways in which Big Corporations and Big Brother will use DRM (also known as Digital Restrictions Management, Treacherous Computing, or Handcuffware) to enslave people. Just read the essay he wrote, titled "Can you trust your computer?" and look at some of the recent Slashdot stories and you'll see that he's been all along.
I have nothing but respect for Stallman's courage to take on the powerful and wealthy interests that want to subjugate the populace. This is the time to show our gratitude for his uncompromising ideals by donating to the Free Software Foundation (which Richard Stallman founded and leads) and to the Electronic Frontiers Foundation.
The Education Suite of the K Desktop Environment (KDE) has made great strides in providing high-quality educational software for schoolchildren aged 3 to 18. The educational applications range from ones that teach vocabulary and foreign languages to math, physics, chemistry, astronomy and computer programming.
This goes to show that the educational sector is considered a high priority by many KDE developers, which is good because contracts with educational institutions account for a great percentage of software revenue. And of course, they have the satisfaction of making the kids (and consequently our future society) smarter, better informed, and more ready to tackle the challenges they'll face.
The K Desktop Environment (KDE) has an education suite focused on creating high-quality educational software for children ages 3 to 18. They've also developed specialized programs to aid teachers in planning lessons. Here are some of the specific programs and their targetted are of teaching:
KLatin, KVerbos, and Kiten to teach Latin, Spanish, and Japanese respectively.
KMPlot to plot mathematical functions and Kig to explore geometric constructions.
Kalzium to teach Chemistry KStars to teach astronomy.
KGeograhy to teach gegraphy KTouch to teach typing.
I would encourage you to install Kubuntu or SUSE instead, since these distros have good support for KDE.
Last July, Apple asked Anton Altaparmakov, lead developer of the Linux-NTFS project, to dual license the Linux-NTFS driver under the APL so that the Intel version of OS X can read/write files on Windows partitions (presumably for dual-boot computers). The problem pointed out by other Linux-NTFS developers is that the APL is not GPL compatible, and any changes made by Apple to the driver will be unusable in Linux. As one person put it:
This would open up a one-way street: towards OS X and away from GNU/Linux and any other OS based on the GPL.
Not to mention the Konqueror / Safari fiasco where Apple complied to the terms of the LGPL by the skin of their teeth, making it impossible for open source developers to port changes upstream.
In November, Apple has again tried to hijack Linux-NTFS code, this time by suggesting that it be licensed under the LGPL. This was promptly rejected by one main developer, who threatened lawsuits.
Supporting the Summer of Code would enable Google to positively impact education in numerous ways. Educating the younger generation is an investment in the world's future, yet it so often seems to fall off the radar of those in charge.
How can Google support education with Free and Open Source Software? By improving apps that make it fun for elementary, junior high and high school students to learn. And how do you make it fun? By intertwining technology and using computers to their full potential as teaching tools. Take the KDE Education Suite for example: it has open source programs that teach Math, Chemistry, Physics, Foreign Languages and many more. Wouldn't it be nice if every third-world child had access to these?
By supporting college students who work on Free Software, Google would be raising awareness of its many advantages, not to mention giving participants the satisfaction that they've authored something that will be used by millions of people throughout the world. The Free Software foundation has compiled a list of testimonials from people at various educational institutions who have benefited greatly from using Free Software. But more importantly, using Free Software in educational settings teaches students about freedom and cooperation. Richard Stallman and FSF Europe have written great essays on this topic, titled:
Why schools should use exclusively free software
Why give precedence to Free Software at school?
Through Free and Open Source software, Google has the power to make the world a smarter place, enabling its people to make intelligent decisions that will affect all of us.
I'd love to see Google continue and expand its Summer of Code program, which last summer funded 400 students worldwide to work on the Free and Open Source projects of their choice. Each student was rewarded $4,500 and the project they were improving received $500 to cover the mentors' time and expenses.
By enabling students to contribute to Free Software at an early age, Google would not only be doing society a favor, but it would also introduce those students to the concept of working with a large group of talented, motivated contributors coming from vastly different backgrounds.
So what happened to the OpenGraphics.org project that aimed to create a graphics card with fully published specs and open source drivers? If they actually get it working, there will be no more debate as to what video card Linux users (and manufacturers of Linux-capable computers) should buy.
Given the fact that the best open source drivers currently available are those for ATI cards, and that those cards are 15% as efficient in Linux as in Windows, the Open Graphics card will have no competition.
Noone is forcing anything on you. DRM plugins will be in the "ugly" module.
The whole reason why GStreamer started was to create a framework that would enable these "ugly" DRM plugins. GStreamer has hurt the multimedia effort on Linux and the Free Desktop because they stole talented developers from much more mature projects like Xine, MPlayer, and VLC. In other words, they further fragmented the developer base purely for the selfish, immoral purpose of ramming DRM down Linux users' throats.
Of course, they've tried to sugar coat this in order to attract developers (heck, their propaganda machine is quite good) but the fact remains that GStreamer is technologically inferior to Xine even now (Xine has a much cleaner, light-weight, robust API than GStreamer can hope to achieve in a long time).
One big reason Qt is GPL'd is that it allows them to sell licenses to those who want to develop proprietary Qt applications. This, using your reasoning, makes them no better than Fluendo.
By licensing Qt as Free and Open Source Software under the GPL, Trolltech is encouraging developers to also release derivative work to the community as Free Software.
If a third-party wants to develop proprietary apps on the Qt framework, then they are not sharing back to the community and it is only fair that they compensate Trolltech. Share and share alike, but if you don't want to share, pay up. Qt licensing makes perfect sense, and it is how Free Software was designed to work and be self-funding.
This is in stark contrast with how Fluendo operates -- its business model is based on handcuffing users and denying them the right to use, study, modify, redistribute, and improve the source code of GStreamer's DRM, proprietary plugins. Not only that, Fluendo actually pays patent licensing fees to the RIAA and MPAA, making those monopolies even richer and more powerful than they already are.
So if you're Fluendo customer, you can be sure part of your money goes into the pockets of the media barons. And if you're a GStreamer developer, you can be sure that your code will be used by the same entertainment moguls to rip off and spy on their users through DRM.
Gstreamer is GPL
Wrong, GStreamer is LGPL only. The GStreamer website is adamant about denying developers the right to license contributed code under the GPL:
We require that all code going into our core package is LGPL. For the plugin code, we require the use of the LGPL for all plugins written from scratch or linking to external libraries.
Fluendo, the company that controls GStreamer, wants to link their DRM plugins to LGPL code contributed by the naive independent developers, who don't realize that by writing LGPL multimedia code, they might as well be working for the RIAA and MPAA.
Xine on the other hand is GPL, and any code that links to Xine must also be GPL. So even if someone decides to make DRM plugins or apps for Xine, they will have to give users the source code to those plugins. There will inevitably be some users who know how to extract the useful part of the codec while leaving out the DRM restrictions. As the KDE developer Aaron Seigo eloquently put it:
DRM + source code = no DRM
Now I realize why Richard Stallman warned against using LGPL for any code, including libraries. Too bad the makes of GTK and GNOME didn't listen. But thank God the makers of Qt and KDE did!
GStreamer, the official audio backend for GNOME, will include DRM plugins developed by a company called Fluendo, which hopes to make money by restricting the users' rights and turning GNOME/Linux/"the Free Desktop System" into a Vista-like nightmare controlled by the entertainment cartel. Why? Because Fluendo is on the GNOME Foundation's Advisory Board. I can't believe I've been so stupid to actually give them money, so that they can turn around and stab Free Software in the back! Never again will I trust the GNOME Foundation after they sold out the community like this.
I hope KDE is smart enough to avoid DRM by choosing a multimedia backend that is GPL. This will ensure that users can change the code of any plugin, remove the DRM, and be left with a functional product. Xine would be an excellent choice for a multimedia backend, since it is light-weight, works with more codecs that Gstreamer (not to mention better) and can be included as a library in any program, like Kaffeine and Amarok have already done.
Aaron Seigo, a KDE developer who just returned from the Southern California Linux Expo, was told by presenters at the Google booth that the default desktop for the version of GNU/Linux used internally by Google employees is KDE.
Novell was initially reluctant to release this code -- after all, they didn't have to because the X11 license doesn't contain any forced sharing, copyleft provisions. The Open Source community had to complain loudly before Novell decided it didn't want to risk losing support from independent developers. One reason they might have wanted to keep the modifications closed was to make a big splash for the release of the Novell Linux Desktop. Another possible reason is that Ximian (and Nat Friedman, who was Ximian's CEO before Ximian was bought by Novell) that long tried to undermine KDE, the Free Desktop System that currently has a slight edge in terms of popularity. By keeping the source closed, they would have prevented KDE developers from incorporating XGL into their windowing system, leaving KDE slightly behind Gnome in terms of eyecandy for a period of time.
Krita, the painting and image editing application for KOffice is probably a better alternative to Adobe Photoshop on the Linux desktop. It is nicely integrated in KDE and its codebase is cleaner than that of GIMP, so it is easier to add features at a fast rate. In fact, even GNOME devs have been amazed by how fast it's growing.
If you don't like Firefox's attempt to give away your privacy, there is a perfectly good FOSS browser you can use:
Konqueror
In some instances, it may render web pages even better than Firefox, since Konqueror passed the Acid2 test.
All native Windows applications will easily run on Linux, with Mono?
.NET on W$ also benefits from being able to programatically control with IIS and SQL Server, both of which have beginner-friendly GUI administrative tools and neither of which are available on Linux.
.NET developers, and frankly what they like about it is the intuitive IDE, which provides code completion and which is GUI-based, allowing developers to do a lot of work simply by point-&-click. Incidentally, Trolltech is making good progress in this regard with the release of Qt Designer.
I seriously doubt it. It would be a titanic effort to recreate the full API that M$ has created with its hundreds of billions of dollars. Instead, all Mono will achieve is to steal FOSS developers from other projects that strive to provide a programming language with a clean-syntax and a low learning curve, most notably Python. I think that would be a shame, as Python is farther along in terms of its syntax, speed, and availability of specialized modules.
I know a lot of
It's hard to get excited about any tool based on Ruby because it inherits so much confusing syntax from Perl. To many programmers, Perl code looks like gibberish, and that's part of the reason it's falling out of favor. I'm afraid the same will happen to Ruby, which is too bad since its strict adherence to object-oriented concepts is admirable.
I much prefer Python and Mod_Python for web programming, since its syntax is cleaner closer to plain English.