Discussion October 2008

discussion@lists.fsfe.org

32 participants
18 discussions

firefox, iceweasel, burningdog, icecat, ...
by PB 24 Oct '08

24 Oct '08

>> 8) Making market share the top priority: >> Might be true. I *do* have the feeling of a slight sellout happening >> (e.g. Firefox), which causes loss of the actual vision - and a drift >> away from the "good cause". >> > > Firefox is proprietary software. See: > http://directory.fsf.org/project/gnuzilla/ > *sigh* I know, I know... Mozilla's becoming similar to google: they're doing something good, but on the other hand they're pulling some strange stunts which makes me doubt to trust them (First it was the name, the logo and trademark problems, now it's non-free code in their binaries...) Unfortunately it became incredibly confusing to follow the different kinds of pure-GNU firefox browser forks. I've spent a whole evening doing some reading about their differences, motivations, etc... Seems like the info in my head is already outdated, because I've just encountered "IceCat", which I thought was supposed to be "IceWeasel". Now it's getting so damn confusing, that if you try to explain this to a regular user, they'll just roll their eyes, sigh, shake their head and walk away. Why is this necessary [1]: "The gNewSense BurningDog browser and the Debian IceWeasel browser are similarly derived from Firefox, also with the intent of being free software. Technically, however, these projects are maintained entirely independently of IceCat. (Previously, this GNU browser project was also named IceWeasel, but that proved confusing." What's really confusing is that I have 3 free browsers now! Why the fork? ...again? HOWEVER: What should one do now? Let's imagine a conversation where I encounter people, tell them about free software and it goes like this: (A... someone, B... me) A: "Sounds great! Where can I get started?" I should now answer: B: "Hm... use a free browser. Get IceCat!" A: "Cool. never heard of it. I'm using Firefox" B: "it's not free software... please use IceCat" A: "ok. where can I get it?" B: "apt-get install icecat" A: "How do I do that with Windows?" B: "Oh. sorry. you can't use any free software with windows. You will never be able to gradually migrate to freedom. good bye." I want things to be good. So I want things to be free (as in GPL). ...but I also don't want to end up grumpy and alone, completely incompatible with the rest of the world. This is why I want the rest of the world to understand why FS is the best. What are your opinions regarding the Firefox/icecat issue here, when it comes to "spreading the word"? Pb [1] http://www.gnu.org/software/gnuzilla/

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Re: Windows Refund (was: Re: Booth Digest, Vol 66, Issue 3 Refund windows errata correge)
by Robert M. Albrecht 24 Oct '08

24 Oct '08

Hi, ich wollte einen Asus EEE PC901 haben, leider gibt es in Deutschland nur die Windows-Version. Die Linux-Version wird bei uns nicht vertrieben. Hat schon mal jemand einen Refund von Asus bekommen ? cu romal -------- Original-Nachricht -------- > Datum: Fri, 24 Oct 2008 11:10:55 +0200 > Von: Matthias Kirschner <mk(a)fsfe.org> > An: paolo del bene <ninuxpdb(a)gmail.com> > CC: booth(a)fsfeurope.org > Betreff: Windows Refund (was: Re: Booth Digest, Vol 66, Issue 3 Refund windows errata correge) > Hi Paolo, > > Next time please send such information to discussion(a)fsfeurope.org. > booth(a)fsfeurope.org is for the coordination list for FSFE's precense at > booths. > > * paolo del bene <ninuxpdb(a)gmail.com> [2008-10-11 20:31:24 +0200]: > > > in Wed Aug 20 10:51:55 2008 i sent you an e-mail, where i communicated > who > > did the refunds, all is correct, but the URL does not fine, so please > change > > this old one > > "http://paolo-del-bene.pbwiki.com/licenses-refund" with the new one, > which > > you can see > > below. > > > > http://paolodelbene.blogspot.com/2008_08_01_archive.html > > I added the link to http://wiki.fsfe.org/Windows-Tax_Refund. This page > still needs a lot of work to make it useful for visitors, but it is a > start. > > Best wishes, > Matthias > > -- > Deputy German Coordinator, Fellowship Coordinator > Free Software Foundation Europe (FSFE) [] (http://fsfeurope.org) > Join the Fellowship of FSFE! [][][] (http://fsfe.org/join) > Your donation powers our work! || (http://fsfeurope.org/donate) > _______________________________________________ > Booth mailing list > Booth(a)fsfeurope.org > https://mail.fsfeurope.org/mailman/listinfo/booth

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Explaining FSFE's antitrust work
by Ciaran O'Riordan 24 Oct '08

24 Oct '08

I've often thought that FSFE's involvement in the MS antitrust case was unclear. The mainstream media generally focussed on the fines, so when FSFE was associated with the case, it might have looked like a simple exercise in MS-bashing. It was actually about helping Samba and free software developers in general, so here's my attempt to explain it: (pasted below) http://fsfe.org/en/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/fsfe_s_antit… I wrote it now because we've just put online our new PDF on this: http://www.fsfeurope.org/projects/ms-vs-eu/leaflet-ms-vs-eu.en.G.pdf And then I saw that the Samba developers are very happy with what they're getting due to Microsoft's compliance: http://people.samba.org/people/abartlet/a-year-since-microsofts-appeal-fail… ================== FSFE's antitrust victory with Samba FSFE's role in the antitrust case was to ensure that free software developers would be able to use any interoperability information that Microsoft would be forced to publish. After 5 years of work, the last court case was won last year. There were always doubts about whether Microsoft could really be pinned down, but from Samba developer Andrew Bartlet's blog, it seems the Samba team are now loving the interoperability information. I didn't do much on this case. For FSFE, it was mostly Georg Greve and Carlo Piana. From Samba, they worked with Andrew Tridgell, Jeremy Allison, and Volker Lendecke. There were other organisations involved, but FSFE played two key roles. First, we represented the interests of free software developers. Others had interests such as the ability of their private company to compete with MS, or lowering the price of X or Y, or fining MS, etc. These organisations were on our side, but they could have accepted a solution that excluded free software. FSFE was there to constantly argue that free software must benefit from the outcome, and to explain what this required. The second key role was persistency. The case began with many companies bringing evidence against Microsoft, but one-by-one they made business deals with Microsoft and withdrew from the case. This could never happen to FSFE, so FSFE was a reminder that the European Commission would never be left alone on this case. There are two other organisations worth mentioning. SSII is the only other organisation that, like FSFE, stayed in the case from start to finish. And ECIS is worth a mention because although they joined late, they added a lot of strength to what we were supporting. The antitrust case was sometimes misunderstood. The mainstream media - with its love of simplifying topics down to numbers - constantly reported about how much Microsoft were going to get fined. That's a pity. The fines were never important for us. Helping Samba and other free software projects was the important part. Done. Some interesting links * Our leaflet: FSFE and the antitrust case against Microsoft * Our project page: Microsoft against free competition * Seán Daly interviews Georg, Carlo, Volkere, and Jeremy, September 17th 2007 * Seán interviews Georg, April 27th 2006 * Seán interviews Carlo, March 31st 2005 ================== -- Ciarán O'Riordan, +32 477 36 44 19, http://ciaran.compsoc.com/ Support free software, join FSFE's Fellowship: http://fsfe.org Recent blog entries: http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/fsfe_s_antitrus… http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/openstreetmap_c… http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/why_european_so… http://fsfe.org/fellows/ciaran/ciaran_s_free_software_notes/eu_states_to_di…

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RE: Comment on "Nine Attitude Problems in Free and Open Source Software"
by Sam Liddicott 24 Oct '08

24 Oct '08

To add some context. I use nvidious drivers but have been an FSF member for years. If I cut off non-free drivers and non-free blobs then I reduce my influence over those I'm bringing to free software and their progress may cease until another compromiser comes along. Me and they will necessarily have a slow journey. Stallman could have written gcc in assembler but he felt it worth using another non-free compiler as a compromise. (At work we are now buying machines with ATI video cards, to support AMD's open source move even though these specific cards have closed source drvers) I don't mind if who considers me an enemy who cares about popularity and not freedom, I know I'm bringing people in as fast as they can come. Sam -----Original Message----- From: Noah Slater <nslater(a)gnu.org> Sent: 24 October 2008 04:19 To: Yavor Doganov <yavor(a)gnu.org> Cc: discussion(a)fsfeurope.org Subject: Re: Comment on "Nine Attitude Problems in Free and Open Source Software" On Fri, Oct 24, 2008 at 02:50:19AM +0300, Yavor Doganov wrote: > > An organisation can "care for freedom" or popularity in shades of > > grey, > > Yes, I agree. The second name for this is "double standards". The standards are only double if you lump yours in with theirs. Don't you see? There is only contradiction from your point of view. >From Debian's point of view there is none. You cannot assign your value system onto someone else and then judge the rationality of their behaviour based on that. This clearly makes no sense. > > Note that I quoted "care for freedom" as this implicitly judges > > Debian and Ubuntu from YOUR ethical position, > > Of course! During my all conscious life, I have always evaluated > things from MY ethical position. I am not expecting you to evaluate things under any other premise. You have your value system and I expect you to judge things by that. Similarly I have my value system, and perhaps my email address might indicate to you that it is not too dissimilar to yours. My real problem here, and this is not levelled at you directly, I respect the work you do for the Free Software movement and for The GNU Project. My real problem is with intolerance towards other people's perspectives. It is one thing to say: "Distributing non-free device drivers is bad, please don't do that." And it is another thing to say: "Because you distribute non-free device drivers, you are the enemy." Is it not best to tolerate differences in opinions? To work towards furthering your goals? Not to alienating the very people who may share, and may be working towards those very goals? > If it doesn't, you feel unconformatble so you can either (1) don't do it; (2) > tweak your ethical principles. The latter is what's happening with Debian, > and to the community at large. Fortunately, or unfortunately as the case may be, things change. Organisations have a tendency to change in response. This is entirely natural. Is it not Richard Stallman who blindly criticises networked service, and by definition, the Web at large, primarily because he does not understand it? Was this an explicit part of the original Free Software movement, or is he responding to the changing climate? Admittedly, this is an unfair example. I appreciate that Richard does not represent the entire Free Software movement. In fact, Mako Hill and others are making an extremely valiant effort to address these very issues. For more information, see: http://autonomo.us/ > > I consider it reasonable to shorten this to the assertion that > > Ubuntu cares about popularity more than Debian does. > > I agree, mostly. I also think that Ubuntu cares more about popularity > and less about freedom, although the result is really the same. Both > distros do not teach users to value their freedom. Again, you are making a false dilemma. The informal fallacy of false dilemma (also called false dichotomy, the either-or fallacy, or bifurcation) involves a situation in which only two alternatives are considered, when in fact there are other options. Closely related are failing to consider a range of options and the tendency to think in extremes, called black-and-white thinking. -- Wikipedia, False dilemma Cannot Debian teach users about freedom, simply because they also provide means for installing non-free software? Must things be so black and white? > > You are not considering that Debian may share a different value > > system from you, > > I am considering this very deeply, in fact. For years. That's my > personal ethical dillema with Debian. You are free to have an ethical problem with Debian, I would not deny you that. To turn around and l [The entire original message is not included]

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Petition to stop software patents in Europe
by Giacomo Poderi 22 Oct '08

22 Oct '08

Hi all, This is the link to a new campaign/petition against Swpat in Europe. http://stopsoftwarepatents.eu/711000042650/ Please read it and, if you deem it proper, sign it and circulate the link wherever possible/appropriate. Regards, Giacomo =========== Introduction Our petition aims to unify the voices of concerned Europeans, associations and companies, and calls on our politicians in Europe to stop patents on software with legislative clarifications. The patent system is misused to restrain competition for the economical benefit of a few but fails to promote innovation. A software market environment is better off with no patents on software at all. Healthy competition forces market players to innovate. European court decisions still accept in many cases the validity of the software patents granted by national patent offices and the European Patent Office (EPO) that is beyond democratic control. They not only continue to grant them, but also to lobby in favor of them. Despite the current deep crisis of the patent system, they are unable to reform and put at risk too many European businesses with their soft granting policy. On 2005 the Commission appeared to be more supportive to the interests of major international conglomerates than of small and medium sized enterprises from Europe - who are a major driving force behind European innovation. The European Parliament rejected at the end the software patent directive, but has no rights for legislative initiatives. Considerations Studies A large number of serious scientific and economic studies justify ruling out patents on software. Copyright for software, but no patents Software authors are already protected by copyright law, allowing others to innovate in the same space generating healthy competition, but this protection is undermined by patents on software. It is far too easy to violate patents on software whilst being completely unaware of any transgression. Software companies do not use and do not need the patent system to innovate. They must be protected from owners of dubious granted patents. Litigation instead of innovation Software patents miss their legitimate purpose. Patents on software favour litigation in detriment of innovation, defeating their democratic justification. They force software producers to spend on bureaucracy, lawsuits, and circumventing dubious granted claims on software what would otherwise be spent on Research and Development. Owners of patents on software, who sometimes doesn't produce software themselves, obtain a means to exert unfair control over the market. American mistakes In the USA there are billions of dollars in litigation over software patents each year, and not only between software companies, but also other companies just because they have a web site (this starts to happen in Europe also). This mistake needs to be avoided in Europe. We urge our legislators * to pass national legal clarifications to substantive patent law to rule out any software patent; * to invalidate all granted claims on patents that can be infringed by software run on programmable apparatus; * to also strive to propagate these rules to the European level, including the European Patent Convention.

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Stallman: cloud computing is a trap
by Thomas Pfeffer 06 Oct '08

06 Oct '08

Hi everybody, Matthias Kirschner was so kind to invite me to this list and share my comments on Stallman: "Cloud computing is a trap". In his posting (http://fsfe.org/en/fellows/mk/i_love_it_here/stallman_cloud_computing_is_a_…) Matthias Kirschner asked, why so many people give away the control over their data, since USB storage is so cheap. He refered to Stallman's critisism of the use of web-based programs like Gmail as a loss of control over data and a trap of proprietary systems (http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2008/sep/29/cloud.computing.richard.st…) To be fully clear, I deeply respect Stallman, and advocate for the openness of scholarly publications, learning materials and software myself. http://www.ecompetence.info/uploads/media/ch1.pdf Due to my respect for Stallmann, I am very concerned about his warnings. There are certain benefits in web-based applications (~cloud computing, ~Web 2.0?), which Stallman does not seem to consider. Maybe there are conflicting freedoms, which have to be balanced. 1) there are applications (e.g. email-accounts, webspace, collaboration tools), which by definition can not rely on the individual, local desktop. I agree, there may be the question of how to balance between desktop and web-application, but I do not think that we can do without web-applications. (e.g. storage on USB, as Matthias suggested, is no substitute for storage on a webspace, since the latter can be remotely accessed and used for collaboration.) In other words: desktop computing vs. web-based computing is not an either-or alternative. 2) the main reason for the shift from desktop-computing to web-applications is the increasing need for communication and remote collaboration, allowing for new social arrangements. 3) who provides and controls web-applications? There are at least three different types of providers, that offer applications to individual users: the individual nerd, who is able to maintain a webserver for his own use, a traditional institution (e.g. university or employer), who provides the application to its members, or specialised web-hosts, who provides the application to any customer. 4) Not being able to maintain my own web-applications (lack of technical competence), I only have the choice between the traditional institution I am member of (my employer) or different web-hosts. Whom do I have to be more afraid of? My employer, who e.g. might want to check my private emails without my knowledge, or my web-host, who e.g. might start to charge me in some years? 5) I admit, I am worried myself about the intransparency and the lack of control over hosted web-services. But on the other hand, I also feel strongly tempted about the opportunities, conveniences (and freedoms) they offer to me, or to communities of people. They allow me to do things I could not do otherwise. 6) Basically, I think Stallman argues from the perspective of a computer specialist, who is able to control and maintain any web-application himself. This is not the situation, I am in as an individual and a teacher. As an individual, I need web-services, which are independent from my employer. As a teacher, I want to to teach my students, how survive in the internet, how to claim their own space, how to organise collaborations, how to publish in the internet, without depending on an institution they are member of. 7) Basically, I think Stallman argues from the perspective of a computer specialist, who is able to control and maintain any web-application himself. I wonder if it would be possible for the FSFE to define criteria for identifying web-applications (and providers) that are no trap, that allow even average users to keep control. How could trustworthy web-applications and web-services look like? What is good practice for a web host? Is there room for public, non-proprietary systems of web-services and how should they look like? 8) I did not talk about money yet, but I think it's also possible to make a case for hosted web-services as a way to outsource some IT-tasks. Especially for smaller institutions (e.g. small companies or schools), hosted web-services might be cheeper and more reliable to outsource at least some functions, instead of maintaining every IT functionality themselves. many thanks tom http://thomas-pfeffer.wikispaces.com

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Re: Understanding MPL
by gk＠fsfe.org 06 Oct '08

06 Oct '08

> [ ... ] Thank you very much, that was really helpful. > > (4) What about deriving a - for example Java - class from a class under > > (a) MPL > > (b) LGPL > > Would the derived class be allowed to have a proprietary license? > > I don't know the Java language, so I don't know what "derive" means in > that context. So I'll go for: Maybe :-) > > There might be some helpful info here: > http://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl-java.html Now, from what you said, also this issue seems pretty clear. A derived class, that is inheriting attributes and behaviour from another class is a derivative work. However, I think, since the derived class normally is in a separate file only the LGPL requires it to stay LGPL. The MPL should allow another license for that file/class, even though it is strongly connected to - and definitely does not make sense in any way without - its super/father/base class. Regards, gk

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Understanding MPL
by gk＠fsfe.org 02 Oct '08

02 Oct '08

Hi! I am currently reading the MPL 1.1, and have some basic problems understanding it. --8<--------------------------------------- 3.7. Larger Works. You may create a Larger Work by combining Covered Code with other code not governed by the terms of this License and distribute the Larger Work as a single product. In such a case, You must make sure the requirements of this License are fulfilled for the Covered Code. --8<--------------------------------------- What does "combine" mean? Especially when modifications are defined as --8<--------------------------------------- 1.9. "Modifications" means any addition to or deletion from the substance or structure of either the Original Code or any previous Modifications. --8<--------------------------------------- (1) Does that mean, that as long as somebody does not use lines from a file of the Covered Code, he may distribute his proprietary code, which calls functions of the Covered Code, in a single executable? (2) Only when he alters the Covered Code, or uses portions of it in some other file, that code would be under the Terms of the MPL? (3) That would be similar to the LGPL, right? (4) What about deriving a - for example Java - class from a class under (a) MPL (b) LGPL Would the derived class be allowed to have a proprietary license? Thank you very much in advance. Regards, gk

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Discussion October 2008