Posted on 07/26/2004 8:35:06 AM PDT by GeorgiaFreeper
NOTE! This copyright does *not* cover user programs that use kernel services by normal system calls - this is merely considered normal use of the kernel, and does *not* fall under the heading of "derived work". Also note that the GPL below is copyrighted by the Free Software Foundation, but the instance of code that it refers to (the Linux kernel) is copyrighted by me and others who actually wrote it.
Also note that the only valid version of the GPL as far as the kernel is concerned is _this_ particular version of the license (ie v2, not v2.2 or v3.x or whatever), unless explicitly otherwise stated.
Yes, he disagrees on many larger issues with Stallman. But the Linus kernel code, copyright by Linus and others, is still bound by, and Linus and other copyright holders so choose it to be bound by, this particular version of the GPL license.
This disclaimer does not diminish or alter that legal binding on bit. It spells out a reasonable legal distinction between what is covered by the kernels copyrights, and what is not. Derived work is covered. Merely normal use isn't.
That Linus and co-authors reject later versions of the GPL doesn't diminish the legal bond of the version they have chosen. Nor would they want it to.
Of course that would be silly, because cars are composed of expensive materials. Giving them away is necessarily an act of charity, requiring the donor to take a loss. But software consists of bits which are free to copy. If I've determined that I'm not going to make a profit on a program that I've written, it costs me nothing to give it to anyone who wants it.
The term "open source" was in fact coined precisely to distance these efforts from Mr. Stallman and his "free software" philosophy.
But never mind that. The real issue is this: when you're done listening to the guy tell you how the world will go to ruin if people give away the stuff they do in their spare time, ask him what he proposes to do about it. Shall we pass a law that people cannot do volunteer work? Shall we prohibit people from disposing of their own property except at a "fair" price ('fair' to be determined by government)? Every time a parent hands down a piece of furniture to a newly-married son or daughter, some furniture store and some furniture manufacturer lose a sale. Shouldn't we ban that? Every time the Jaycees paint a house for an old lady living alone, some union housepainter gets robbed of a job. Should we ban that, too? If not, then why would we restrict or punish programmers who do volunteer stuff and toss it out there for people to use?
Open Source is not a company. It doesn't sell anything. There is no one in charge. It's no different than a bunch of musicians who get together to jam. Enjoy it, or walk away. Complaining that you didn't get to pick the songs is stupid.
These same guys will then paint themselves as capitalists, and have the nerve to call the open-sourcers communists. Meanwhile, the open source guys don't see anything wrong with tossing 50 kinds of shampoo out there and letting the market decide which ones will continue.
There is a professional side to the Microsoft PR effort which involves hiring think tanks, lobbying firms, industry research houses, and freeleance writers to wear the Cloak Of Objectivity while spewing a list of talking points provided by the Microsoft PR department.
These are generally recognizeable by applying the following two tests.
When a guy who advocates that calls somebody else a leftist, guard your wallet.
"""""
This is NOT intended to be "anti-OSS", but rather to generate real thought and discussion as opposed to the constant mindless re-iteration of the same old tired dogma
"""""
Well put. A place for every software and every software in its place (including putting Microsoft in its place).
Oh. So he spent five paragraphs crabbing about "free software" for the hell of it? What was his point then? He seemed to be trying real hard to explain to people all the harm that is being caused to the garment industry by grandmothers knitting sweaters and giving them away. Or maybe it was programmers. I forget. Whichever it was, people who give stuff away for free are a menace. That part I do remember.
Please do, but next time don't pretend you've done it by positing a different totalitarian government. The alternative to a government that restricts people's ability to make gifts of their handiwork is not a government that seizes everything from everyone. In fact, that's almost the same thing. Consider other, non-totalitarian possibilities. Like just leaving people alone.
Nothing I said advocated any socialist or leftist policy of any sort whatsoever. Putting words in my mouth to paint me as a leftist moonbeam is uncalled for and lame. See if you can do better next time.
Or, maybe he's just a guy spending some of his PR budget on maligning his competitors through hired cutouts. Clinton had James Carville and Sidney Blumenthal; Gates hires lobbying firms and freelance writers. Throw the mud and hope it sticks; it's a time-honored principle. It's not my preferred marketing technique, but it's his company and he can do what he wants.
Like they say in the military, don't bring me problems without solutions. That's kind of what the dems do, isn't it?Tinkering with the code is something that hardly anyone actually does, except for the core developers.
I guess I must be an exception to that.Saying that all software should be free ignores the hidden price - including your own ability to make a living from writing software.
I'm not big on absolutes, but if it isn't profitable, open source is a viable alternative to keep it alive.Closed source software can be just as good, sometimes even better, than Open Source.
They both have their pluses and minuses.Having a lot of programmers "scratching their personal itch" just ensures that a lot of programmer tools get written.
I think there is more truth in that statement than the author intended.Sometimes restricting the choices might not be a bad idea.
Maybe, but is that what is actually going on?My experience with open source is limited, but it did what I needed it to do for free. I found a couple bugs and came up with fixes fairly quick. I have an instant patch, and if anyone else wants to use it they are free to do so. It's all good from my perspective.
It depends on the situation. Have you written an awesome program entirely by yourself that's ready for the real world and functionally complete? Go ahead and sell it. Are you writing a program, but don't have the time, talent or inclination to make it functionally complete? Put it up on SourceForge as OSS and get some other people to help you. You are now compensated for your work through the programming man-hours of others rather than through retail cash.
Linux is only GPL because Linus Torvalds didn't want to bother with what he thought was the dirty work of writing an operating system.
Why would that be amusing? Microsoft has spent tens of millions of dollars in the past year sponsoring various sorts of mud-and-FUD attacks in the press and in the courts, in an ill-conceived campaign to bad-mouth individuals who are involved in producing open source software. It's as if Aerosmith took out ads in newspapers to tell everybody that guys who play in garage bands are communists and a threat to the music industry. It's quite bizarre; it borders on thuggery for a $30 billion corporation to turn its PR guns on hobbyists working at home at night.
It is true that Microsoft faces competition from some open source projects, notably linux, but that is because those projects are being promoted by commercial enterprises that have sales forces and marketing budgets. Red Hat, IBM, and now Novell certainly belong on Microsoft's radar as guys who would take sales away from them. OK, those are legitimate targets of Microsoft's wrath. But not the guy coding Mightnight Pizza software. Spending money to call that guy a communist? What the hell is that about? Somebody at Microsoft has a screw loose if he thinks articles like this are doing anything but needlessly making enemies out of people who may well be in the approval chain on software deals where they work. It's one of the dumber things I've ever seen a company do.
It's a little late for that, don't you think? For at least the last ten years, Windows has come free with any computer consumers can buy. And IE comes "free" with Windows. As does Media Player. Tens of millions of consumers now think that computers come with a free operating system, web browser, and media player. Considering the enormity of the success that Microsoft has had with its OEM selling motion, I think that any efforts by you to reverse that tide are futile.
What's the difference between that and Dell selling laptops that have Windows pre-loaded on them? They're giving away the software to sell you the laptop. Now comes Microsoft to tell us that people who want to give away software are communist looneytoons. Their chutzpah boggles the mind.
com·mu·nism ( P ) Pronunciation Key (kmy-nzm) n.
It is admirable the dude at Midnight Pizza software is giving of his time so generously. On the same token, it is not evil for a person to desire to charge for the work that he produces / owns and protect his intellectual capital from others using it without renumeration. Again TANSTAAFL - There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch. |
Now does that sound more like the OSS model or the proprietary model?
Let's see: OSS, run by the people and any person who isn't happy with those running a software project can take it in his desired direction (your branch will survive or die on its merits). Microsoft, you take what the authoritarian central power says you need or switch to a different authoritarian provider.
Free software helps my career. The vast majority of all code written today is never intended for resale. My company saves money by using Linux, Apache, Java, Perl, and other free software. (Although we do use proprietary software when it makes sense to). As a result, they have more money for hiring more developers and giving me raises.
I certainly don't believe that all software must be free; it should always be up to the creator. But there's little to support the argument that free software makes it harder for developers.
Finding a bug and reporting to the developers should be encouraged.
I noticed that my co-worker's left brake light was not working when we left work. The next day I made sure to tell him so he wouldn't get a ticket. You're saying I should have bought the replacement bulb, brought in my tools, and fixed it on my lunch break?
That is true. I am one who believes that it is possible to make a lot of money in business while conducting one's affairs in an honest, above-board, professional manner.
I think that hiring cut-outs to file media-stunt lawsuits against your competitors is sleazy, thuggish, and contemptible. I think that funding bogus "think tanks" to write hit pieces about individuals who head no company and sell no goods is creepy. I think that using a bogus news site run by a Washington lobbying firm to salt the public dialog with slams on home hobbyists is the act of a sociopath who hits people for fun.
I do not like those behaviors. I think they evince a corporate culture that is seriously twisted and vile. I think that in turn points to a corporate leadership that is fundamentally dishonest, ethically blind, and which has lost sight of what business indeed life is really about. My belief is that he who dies with most toys does not win if this is how he came about them.
Call that a religion if you like. I do not believe it is necessary in business to cheat or steal or lie to people. I have never hired thugs to beat up my competitors. I have never used corporate resources to smear private individuals who have no real ability to answer my smears.
They offend my sense of right and wrong. The corporation has the behavioral characteristics of a sociopathic thug. It is absolutely true that such characteristics are highly well-adapted to this world, and succeed in it. Bill Clinton got to be President of the United States. Bill Gates is the richest man in the world. It works. But I don't have to like such people, and I don't. Ronald Reagan got to be President of the United States too. You don't have to be a lying, scheming, sociopathic thug to get ahead in this world. I have seen with my own eyes that a Vietnamese "boat person" can start a donut shop in this country and be a millionaire in ten years. All he has to do is work his buns off, make good donuts, and sell them at a fair price. He doesn't need to hire sleazeballs to sue Winchell's, or hire bogus restaurant reviewers to say that Krispy Kreme's donuts are full of poison.
What kind of guy does stuff like that? You tell me. Gates does this stuff. He thinks it's part of business. I don't.
You're trying to have this both ways. When Dell or Microsoft do it, it's "bundling," but when Red Hat bundles the software with support, all of a sudden they are "giving away software" and that's somehow weird, unusual, and socialist. You're just throwing spears with unclean hands.
Now we need to decide whether you are ignorant of how open source software is owned and licensed, and made that statement because you don't know any better, or whether you are deliberately trying to mislead your fellow Freepers in the same way that the Microsoft Corporation deliberately tries to mislead people, i.e. by lying about it.
As you noted yourself, communism involves common ownership of property. There is nothing like that in open source software. The bits and pieces are owned and copyrighted by their respective authors, and licensed for use by those authors under some set of terms and conditions.
There is no difference between that arrangement and any other copyrighted and licensed software.
None of it involves common ownership of property.
It has nothing to do with a system of government.
The "communism" thing is basically a dishonest slur promoted by Microsoft and its shills to disparage something that they are afraid of, and insecure about.
dis·hon·es·ty [diss ónn?stee] (plural dis·hon·es·ties) noun
1.deceitful behavior: the use of lies or deceit, or the tendency to be deceitful
2.dishonest deed: a dishonest act or action
These are quite often the same guys, which is what makes this "let's spread slurs about guys who do open source software" so stupid. A few years ago I worked for a company where the CTO was a Microsoft Man. We had Exchange, and SQL Server, and all that stuff. But at night, this guy was a BeOS freak. He would go home and work on little toys that ran under BeOS. He thought this was fun.
What actual threat did BeOS ever pose to Microsoft? I can't imagine. It's like General Motors worrying that Carrol Shelby is going to make some more Cobras. So what? Nevertheless, Microsoft managed to turn this loyal customer into a blood-sworn enemy with some sort of thuggery that they performed on BeOS. I don't know what they did. But the last I heard, this guy was ripping out all the Microsoft stuff and replacing it with linux, Apache, and Postgres.
This idea that there are paid programmers over here, and some camp of commie moonbeams over there, is just stupid. It's the same guys. If you call them communists at night, when they are working on Python or Gnome, they are going to remember that the next day when they are at work, writing technical assessments for the pointy-hairs on the bids that came in for the new system.
Except for the collective ownership part. Each contributor retains his copyright and can license his code to others under a commercial license if he chooses to do so.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.