I am not a lawyer, but I fear the situation descrbed is not against the GPL. But I'll let you discuss on that, I really don't know.
As far as I remember, a library should be put under the LGPL and not the GPL. Because putting the lib under the GPL would restrict the freedom to use it, as you point out. Thus the LGPL was designed to allow such a use. Anyone knows more details?
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-not-lgpl.html
That proves you wrong.
Well, I would say, that it is already against the spirit of free software to publish a library under the GPL and not the LGPL.
Actually,
<quote from web page> Which license is best for a given library is a matter of strategy, and it depends on the details of the situation. At present, most GNU libraries are covered by the Library GPL, and that means we are using only one of these two strategies, neglecting the other. So we are now seeking more libraries to release under the ordinary GPL.
Proprietary software developers have the advantage of money; free software developers need to make advantages for each other. Using the ordinary GPL for a library gives free software developers an advantage over proprietary developers: a library that they can use, while proprietary developers cannot use it.
Using the ordinary GPL is not advantageous for every library. There are reasons that can make it better to use the Library GPL in certain cases. The most common case is when a free library's features are readily available for proprietary software through other alternative libraries. In that case, the library cannot give free software any particular advantage, so it is better to use the Library GPL for that library.
This is why we used the Library GPL for the GNU C library. After all, there are plenty of other C libraries; using the GPL for ours would have driven proprietary software developers to use another--no problem for them, only for us.
However, when a library provides a significant unique capability, like GNU Readline, that's a horse of a different color. The Readline library implements input editing and history for interactive programs, and that's a facility not generally available elsewhere. Releasing it under the GPL and limiting its use to free programs gives our community a real boost. At least one application program is free software today specifically because that was necessary for using Readline.
[...] </quote from web page>
Hi Alessandro!
On Wed, Jun 20, 2001 at 03:04:47PM +0200, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/why-not-lgpl.html That proves you wrong.
Indeed. From the end of that web page:
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.
I fully surrender. :-)
Seems that tactics and politics are more important then the original idea of freedom for software... I trust RMS having thought about this for quite a while, before suggesting to go along this way.
Thanks for the link Alessandro!
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Seems that tactics and politics are more important then the original idea of freedom for software...
Well, I don't see it as negatively. This kind of reasoning (at least as you express it above) reminds me of the "BSD is better because you are free not to release source of your derivative work: you have more freedom than with a GPL package".
The idea has always been more in the lines of "do ut des": I give my software if you give me back yours (that uses mine, otherwise I have no say in your licensing policies). And it seems a fair game to me.
I trust RMS having thought about this for quite a while, before suggesting to go along this way.
Yes, I think so. And it works for me. My experience with libbarcode (my only GNU package, very small as well) is that a customer asked me if he could include the libraray in his proprietary program. While he can do that for internal use (and this links with the original question), if he publishes the result he can't, and a (GPL) wrapper is needed. The wrapper, in this case, is not a huge technical problem, but it gives advantage to free software programs over a proprietary ones. Proprietary programs must be kept separate from the library, and this is something that hopefully will reach a few of the end users. Some libraries are less wrappable, some are more. All in all, i think it's a fair game.
And this stuff leads directly to the issue of ASP (application service providers). I see this kind of "service" a threat to both free software (which can get proprietarized) and to people freedom.
Company P can use my free library inside their web server to deliver .png barcode images to the end user. The end user will never know that it's produced by a modified free package. Still worse, a company can filter user data very transparenltly (the user runs a client that sends data to be filtered to the company), and ask payment each time the service is used. Think for example of a "compiling service" for cpu-driven devices. What if the compiler is a modified GCC?
I think *this* is an issue. Hope the GPLv3 will address it, but I really can't think how it can (very-restrictive licenses are not unilateral: the user must agree to the license. Do you remember about http://www.freeworldlicence.org/ , (passed here in December).
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
/alessandro
Hi Alessandro!
On Wed, Jun 20, 2001 at 04:04:04PM +0200, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
The idea has always been more in the lines of "do ut des": I give my software if you give me back yours (that uses mine, otherwise I have no say in your licensing policies). And it seems a fair game to me.
I think, that's also the idea behind BSD. The difference is, if you want to enforce this or not. Does anybody have any statistics or experiences which approach was more effective in the long run? I could imagine, that it is more tempting for a company to use a library, if it is BSD-free. And that they might consider sending their modifications to the original developers, for whatever reason. While on the other hand, they might be scared off by the (L)GPL and thus not touch the library at all. Which results in no return at all. What will be of more benefit on a large time scale? Even if only one company in one thousand sends patches, this is still more then none at all.
Company P can use my free library inside their web server to deliver .png barcode images to the end user. The end user will never know that it's produced by a modified free package. Still worse, a company can
I wonder, why a company would want to hide the origin of a lib, if it would have been perfectly legal to do so. In case of the GPL it is clear. If they would reveal, that they use your lib, you could sue them. Thus they can only use your lib, if they hide, who has written it. On the other hand, if linking your lib into their program would be legal, why would they want to hide this fact from the end user? It could be even a plus for them to tell their users, that they use a known good lib for their program. So maybe one should only enforce to _acknowledge_ the usage of a free lib by closed source software companies, instead of restricting the usage itself. Just putting some text on the box like: "This software uses the excellent free lib xyz".
The issue, that someone can use your source code to make money has been discussed here widely and I think, we agreed, that we are aware of this and that we accept this. So if you write a web server and someone uses it to earn a living through web hosting, that's considered as being OK. Same for compilers or bar codes from web pages.
I think *this* is an issue. Hope the GPLv3 will address it, but I really can't think how it can (very-restrictive licenses are not unilateral: the user must agree to the license. Do you remember about http://www.freeworldlicence.org/ , (passed here in December).
No, but it doesn't make to much sense to me either. You don't want separate worlds. You want free software to penetrate the closed source software field too and replace some of these existing solutions with free software. But you can only achieve this, if you allow both worlds to mix.
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it? There are quite a few examples of companies, that started with closed source "contributions" to free programs, but later decided to release the source code, often under the GPL. Give them the chance to get step by step closer to free software. That's definitely making it easier for them.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
On Thu, 21 Jun 2001, you wrote:
Hi Alessandro!
On Wed, Jun 20, 2001 at 04:04:04PM +0200, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
The idea has always been more in the lines of "do ut des": I give my software if you give me back yours (that uses mine, otherwise I have no say in your licensing policies). And it seems a fair game to me.
I think, that's also the idea behind BSD. The difference is, if you want to enforce this or not. Does anybody have any statistics or experiences which approach was more effective in the long run? I could imagine, that it is more tempting for a company to use a library, if it is BSD-free. And that they might consider sending their modifications to the original developers, for whatever reason. While on the other hand, they might be scared off by the (L)GPL and thus not touch the library at all. Which results in no return at all. What will be of more benefit on a large time scale? Even if only one company in one thousand sends patches, this is still more then none at all.
in reply to this, and comments below..
You raise very valid points.. however... ;) [Starts flaming cas its morning and i'm at work and bored and...]
This is FSF - founded by RMS. Its not about market penetration - thats what 'Open Source' is. FSF was/is supposed to be about doing the .. most 'pure' form of freedom. excuse the quotes ;)
Lets suppose BSD license is better all round as in larger market pentration, causes users to feedback more, etc etc.
No matter how much 'better' it is, FSF is about supporting GPL and not BSD, since FSF is about the freedom of the actual software. Its those rough 'opensource' ppl that argue the commercial benefits for commerical sake.
[feels a bit better now after some good roasting]
Company P can use my free library inside their web server to deliver .png barcode images to the end user. The end user will never know that it's produced by a modified free package. Still worse, a company can
I wonder, why a company would want to hide the origin of a lib, if it would have been perfectly legal to do so. In case of the GPL it is clear. If they would reveal, that they use your lib, you could sue them. Thus they can only use your lib, if they hide, who has written it. On the other hand, if linking your lib into their program would be legal, why would they want to hide this fact from the end user? It could be even a plus for them to tell their users, that they use a known good lib for their program. So maybe one should only enforce to _acknowledge_ the usage of a free lib by closed source software companies, instead of restricting the usage itself. Just putting some text on the box like: "This software uses the excellent free lib xyz".
The issue, that someone can use your source code to make money has been discussed here widely and I think, we agreed, that we are aware of this and that we accept this. So if you write a web server and someone uses it to earn a living through web hosting, that's considered as being OK. Same for compilers or bar codes from web pages.
I think *this* is an issue. Hope the GPLv3 will address it, but I really can't think how it can (very-restrictive licenses are not unilateral: the user must agree to the license. Do you remember about http://www.freeworldlicence.org/ , (passed here in December).
No, but it doesn't make to much sense to me either. You don't want separate worlds. You want free software to penetrate the closed source software field too and replace some of these existing solutions with free software. But you can only achieve this, if you allow both worlds to mix.
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it? There are quite a few examples of companies, that started with closed source "contributions" to free programs, but later decided to release the source code, often under the GPL. Give them the chance to get step by step closer to free software. That's definitely making it easier for them.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/ _______________________________________________ Discussion mailing list Discussion@fsfeurope.org http://mailman.fsfeurope.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/discussion
Hi John!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 10:10:34AM +0100, John Tapsell wrote:
This is FSF - founded by RMS. Its not about market penetration - thats what 'Open Source' is. FSF was/is supposed to be about doing the .. most 'pure' form of freedom. excuse the quotes ;)
Exactly, that's why it seems unlogic to restrict libraries from being linked against commercial programs.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Marc Eberhard writes:
Exactly, that's why it seems unlogic to restrict libraries from being linked against commercial programs.
There's no such thing as libraries being restricted from being linked against commercial programs.
Klaus Schilling
Klaus Schilling writes:
Marc Eberhard writes:
Exactly, that's why it seems unlogic to restrict libraries from being linked against commercial programs.
There's no such thing as libraries being restricted from being linked against commercial programs.
In the free software world, that is. Such a restriction would make the library at most semi-free, as in the case of the original berkeley library.
Klaus Schilling
|| On Thu, 21 Jun 2001 18:27:09 +0200 || Klaus Schilling pessy@chez.com wrote:
ks> There's no such thing as libraries being restricted from being linked against ks> commercial programs.
You mean proprietary, I guess.
Of course there are restrictions. That is the whole point of having the GNU Lesser General Public License. However I won't use the LPGL for any new projects. I have been asked several times to change GnuPG to the LGPL so that it will be possible to build "more customer friendly GNU/Linux distribution". Guess what they mean by this.
Werner
Marc Eberhard wrote:
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 10:10:34AM +0100, John Tapsell wrote:
This is FSF - founded by RMS. Its not about market penetration - thats what 'Open Source' is. FSF was/is supposed to be about doing the .. most 'pure' form of freedom. excuse the quotes ;)
Exactly, that's why it seems unlogic to restrict libraries from being linked against commercial programs.
It is not restricted. Even assuming you wrote "commercial" when you meant "proprietary" (again), the GPL allows you to link with proprietary code, so you have all the freedoms.
What it does not allow is to *distribute* the resulting binary because that would deprive the recpient from the freedoms.
So it makes perfect sense.
Frank
Hi Frank!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 07:43:27PM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
Marc Eberhard wrote:
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 10:10:34AM +0100, John Tapsell wrote:
This is FSF - founded by RMS. Its not about market penetration - thats what 'Open Source' is. FSF was/is supposed to be about doing the .. most 'pure' form of freedom. excuse the quotes ;)
Exactly, that's why it seems unlogic to restrict libraries from being linked against commercial programs.
It is not restricted. Even assuming you wrote "commercial" when you meant "proprietary" (again),
Yes, sorry... I'll have to try harder to erase this synonym from my brain. :-)
the GPL allows you to link with proprietary code, so you have all the freedoms.
Well, yes, but only if you use the final product in house. I agree, that this gives all the companies, that develop their own software, the possibility to use free libraries with their own closed source code. As Alessandro pointed out, this also includes the danger of remote service providers, that try to circumvent the GPL by running the service in house for customers outside.
What it does not allow is to *distribute* the resulting binary because that would deprive the recpient from the freedoms.
And this applies to all software companies, right? They live on selling software. They spread new ideas into the market. They produce the products, most users see and use. Having no free libraries in these products, makes it impossible to reach people through this main path of software delivery to end users. As you pointed out, they can only include a LGPL'd library, if they acknowledge its usage in a proper way.
I see here again your more pessimistic view. Companies will take, but never give back. I can argue against it, that putting up this barrier, does cause some kind of confrontation. So it is just logic to me, that the companies in question, will not be very willing to cooperate with free software authors. On the other hand, if you choose to be more open and allow them to use your free library, its more of a collaboration and this can open a lot of doors for your free library too. I think, that diplomacy is a better approach here instead of a restrictive licence.
But this is of course based on my opinion, that the "classic" software house has no chance to survive the next 20 years anyway. I see a movement towards service providers, that earn their money with specific customisation of products for individual companies.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Hello.
Sorry for the delay, I'm expected to do real work sometimes, though rarely :( It looks like this might turn in the usual BSD/GPL flame war, but unless it gets hot it might be constructive as well.
Alessandro:
The idea has always been more in the lines of "do ut des": I give my software if you give me back yours (that uses mine, otherwise I have no say in your licensing policies). And it seems a fair game to me.
Marc:
I think, that's also the idea behind BSD. The difference is, if you want to enforce this or not.
Not a minor difference, though.
Does anybody have any statistics or experiences which approach was more effective in the long run? I could imagine, that it is more tempting for a company to use a library, if it is BSD-free. And that they might consider sending their modifications to the original developers, for whatever reason.
They "might consider". But they have no reason to, actually. And there are a lot of case where they don't.
While on the other hand, they might be scared off by the (L)GPL and thus not touch the library at all. Which results in no return at all. What will be of more benefit on a large time scale? Even if only one company in one thousand sends patches, this is still more then none at all.
It is more than none, but is it better or worse? You must remember that in your case you have helped further several proprietary programs. In the (L)GPL case you only helped free software. (Sure, in the LGPL case they could do, but your condition included the "being scared off").
Alessandro:
Company P can use my free library inside their web server to deliver .png barcode images to the end user. The end user will never know that it's produced by a modified free package. Still worse, a company can
Marc:
I wonder, why a company would want to hide the origin of a lib, if it would have been perfectly legal to do so. In case of the GPL it is clear. If they would reveal, that they use your lib, you could sue them.
No, they are allowed to use it, and to not give source to the user because the user doesn't run the program. And, in any case, nobody is interested in telling how did they accomplish the result. The result must look "new millennium technology", this is how the world goes.
On the other hand, if linking your lib into their program would be legal, why would they want to hide this fact from the end user?
Because if all users know, some of them will get the free library and not pay for the service any more.
It could be even a plus for them to tell their users, that they use a known good lib for their program.
This only works in a few cases. Apache is a good example. When I was questioning with an Apache developer that lives in my town, he showed me how nobody has interest in forking a proprietary versio of Apache, and most companies contributed back. But Apache has a huge developer community; any fork would suffer from continuous resyncing with the original product. But for almost every project, a company would take huge advantage in forking the product and become the leader, putting the original out of market. This applies to *everything* that I am doing. I *must* use the GPL to protect myleft from what I would call "theft".
So maybe one should only enforce to _acknowledge_ the usage of a free lib by closed source software companies, instead of restricting the usage itself.
I know there are problems with this, but I don't remember the details (at least it's not GPL-compatible, but it may be non-enforceable too, I don't remember).
The issue, that someone can use your source code to make money has been discussed here widely and I think, we agreed, that we are aware of this and that we accept this. So if you write a web server and someone uses it to earn a living through web hosting, that's considered as being OK. Same for compilers or bar codes from web pages.
Yes. My problem is with "proprietarisation by remotisation" (not English, but I can't find a better way to state it). If someone extends GCC and sells a "compile on demand" service, this *is* against user's freedom. You may have a CPU whose compiler is not free yet it is GCC. It would be legal, because who has the compiler doesn't distribute it but only uses it internally.
I think *this* is an issue.
Exactly. I agree with myself here :)
Do you remember about http://www.freeworldlicence.org/ , (passed here in December).
No, but it doesn't make to much sense to me either. You don't want separate worlds.
It doesn't make sense to me, either. The point I was making is that for some kind of resctrictions you *must* have the user sign the agreement. You can't control everything via implied agreement. You can't restrict use of the software without having the users know about it, or they will behave illegally without even having a chance to know it.
You want free software to penetrate the closed source software field too and replace some of these existing solutions with free software. But you can only achieve this, if you allow both worlds to mix.
Yes. I can run GCC on Windows (if I had one), and this is good. But proprietarization, as allowed by BSD/MIT licenses, cannot help spreading of free software as much as it helps spreading proprietary software. I'm told that Microsoft uses a BSD-derived TCP/IP stack. I'm told (maybe on this list, I don't remember) that most IP utilities they ship are berkeley derived (run "strings" on them and check).
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it?
They are circumventing the GPL. It reminds me of the "Ethics of Circumventing OS" thread (march and april, here).
There are quite a few examples of companies, that started with closed source "contributions" to free programs, but later decided to release the source code, often under the GPL.
Often, stuff is GPL'd to avoid it to die. And that code is not usually high quality code. Sometimes it even had backdoors (http://www.securityfocus.com/templates/article.html?id=136).
I think there are more examples of companies that proprietarized without giving back. Let me restate I don't think the BSD-type licenses are bad, they are just not enough to protect authors. I personally wouldn't feel safe using them (yet, for an X module I wrote I used the MIT license, for compatibility).
Oh, BTW, did you all read the new Microsot EULA at http://msdn.microsoft.com/msdn-files/027/001/516/eula_mit.htm ?
(c) Open Source. Recipients license rights to the Software are conditioned upon Recipient [...] (ii) not using Potentially Viral Software (e.g. tools) to develop Recipient software which includes the Software, in whole or in part. For purposes of the foregoing,
So, they forbid you to use a free ("potentially viral") compiler to compile your own stuff, if it has to be linked with theirs. Oh, and the (i) point removed above states you can't "distribute such Software, in whole or in part, in conjunction with Potentially Viral Software". Interestingly, you can't distribute the software at all, so this is just a mean to restate the "viral" accusation.
Sorry for the length, thanks for getting that far :)
/alessandro
Hi Alessandro!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 03:54:01PM +0200, Alessandro Rubini wrote:
Sorry for the delay, I'm expected to do real work sometimes, though rarely
Me too.
:( It looks like this might turn in the usual BSD/GPL flame war, but unless it gets hot it might be constructive as well.
Let's keep it constructive. :-)
Does anybody have any statistics or experiences which approach was more effective in the long run? I could imagine, that it is more tempting for a company to use a library, if it is BSD-free. And that they might consider sending their modifications to the original developers, for whatever reason.
They "might consider". But they have no reason to, actually. And there are a lot of case where they don't.
True, but even a single company can make a real difference.
It is more than none, but is it better or worse? You must remember that in your case you have helped further several proprietary programs. In the (L)GPL case you only helped free software. (Sure, in the LGPL case they could do, but your condition included the "being scared off").
Well, it's in some way a question, if we believe, that free software will win anyway in the long run or not. If we are convinced, that it will win, we can opt for the most possible freedom. Yes, we might help some closed source programs at the moment, but they will disappear anyway on a long time scale.
If we think, that this is not going to happen, then of course we need to go along a different path. And that might be to forbid closed source programs to use free software. I just wonder, if this isn't somehow in contradiction to the aim of keeping free software as free as possible? I too like the "take and give" approach very much, but the goal is free software, isn't it? So the big question is: How can we achieve that in the most effective way?
No, they are allowed to use it, and to not give source to the user because the user doesn't run the program. And, in any case, nobody is interested in telling how did they accomplish the result. The result must look "new millennium technology", this is how the world goes.
I'm not too sure about this. I do like to know, how a result was achieved. But I might not be that representative for the average internet user.
On the other hand, if linking your lib into their program would be legal, why would they want to hide this fact from the end user?
Because if all users know, some of them will get the free library and not pay for the service any more.
This depends upon which part of the problem is solved by the free library. If it is only some part of the problem, it would still be too much work for most users. If the library provides almost all functions and it is easy to replace the proprietary part, because it adds just some trivial extensions, then I would expect to see a free implementation of the whole thing very soon. And then there is no market anymore for the company anyway. So they need to supply a solution, that is much more then just using a library. And in that case, they don't loose anything by acknowleding the free library they use.
It could be even a plus for them to tell their users, that they use a known good lib for their program.
This only works in a few cases. Apache is a good example. When I was questioning with an Apache developer that lives in my town, he showed me how nobody has interest in forking a proprietary versio of Apache, and most companies contributed back. But Apache has a huge developer community; any fork would suffer from continuous resyncing with the
That's exactly the situation, that I anticipated, and why I didn't see a reason for restricting the free library to free software programs.
original product. But for almost every project, a company would take huge advantage in forking the product and become the leader, putting the original out of market. This applies to *everything* that I am doing. I *must* use the GPL to protect myleft from what I would call "theft".
OK, so we have to distinguish between projects. What are the criteria, why it works for Apache and not for your projects? Is it just the huge developer/user base? Or is it something else? Is it possible to copy the Apache approach for other projects? What are the main ingredients to achieve this?
Yes. My problem is with "proprietarisation by remotisation" (not English, but I can't find a better way to state it). If someone extends GCC and sells a "compile on demand" service, this *is* against user's freedom. You may have a CPU whose compiler is not free yet it is GCC. It would be legal, because who has the compiler doesn't distribute it but only uses it internally.
OK, I see that point now. This problem has emerged, because the internet is becoming more and more easy to access for more and more people. So companies can use it as a medium to provide services. Of course the consumers still have a word to say. If they don't want to depend on such a remote service, they will not buy the product. It's probably a very good item for the FSFE watch list: Which companies do try this strategy to get around the GPL? Informing users and other companies of this strategy of a company will probably ruin their business quite quickly. Just tell them, that there is a company, that wants to make them dependant, so that it can later ask for any price for their service. That's probably pretty scaring to most users.
It doesn't make sense to me, either. The point I was making is that for some kind of resctrictions you *must* have the user sign the agreement. You can't control everything via implied agreement. You can't restrict use of the software without having the users know about it, or they will behave illegally without even having a chance to know it.
I'm not sure, if this is really necessary. You can't claim, that you didn't know, that it is forbidden to kill someone else and get away with it. I think, the same principle applies to software. If you use it, you have to make a reasonable effort to find out about the conditions and terms under which you are allowed to use it. I don't think, that you need to insist on signing an agreement for this.
Yes. I can run GCC on Windows (if I had one), and this is good. But proprietarization, as allowed by BSD/MIT licenses, cannot help spreading of free software as much as it helps spreading proprietary software. I'm told that Microsoft uses a BSD-derived TCP/IP stack. I'm told (maybe on this list, I don't remember) that most IP utilities they ship are berkeley derived (run "strings" on them and check).
Well, even if they don't tell you, it is well known nowerdays, isn't it? People know, that the good stuff is not coming from them. They just did everything that broke parts of it. :-)
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it?
They are circumventing the GPL. It reminds me of the "Ethics of Circumventing OS" thread (march and april, here).
Yes, true. If an author explicitly wants to enforce this restriction, the company trying to use it, would violate/circumvent the GPL.
Sorry for the length, thanks for getting that far :)
No problem, I like the discussion very much too.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Marc Eberhard wrote:
OK, I see that point now. This problem has emerged, because the internet is becoming more and more easy to access for more and more people. So companies can use it as a medium to provide services. Of course the consumers still have a word to say. If they don't want to depend on such a remote service, they will not buy the product. It's probably a very good item for the FSFE watch list: Which companies do try this strategy to get around the GPL? Informing users and other companies of this strategy of a company will probably ruin their business quite quickly. Just tell them, that there is a company, that wants to make them dependant, so that it can later ask for any price for their service. That's probably pretty scaring to most users.
If it's that easy, why don't you just tell them about M$'s practices (attempts to lock them in, i.e. make them dependent, using interfaces, file formats, net protocols, patents, etc.), and windoze will be gone in no time ... :-(
Frank
Hi Frank!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 07:47:19PM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
If it's that easy, why don't you just tell them about M$'s practices (attempts to lock them in, i.e. make them dependent, using interfaces, file formats, net protocols, patents, etc.), and windoze will be gone in no time ... :-(
I do! And I'm doing quite well at the moment in raising people's concerns about sending around winword or powerpoint files (I'm still new to my current work place). Most have stopped to send these formats and started to think about alternatives. The same is true for some special software used here. Making it known, does help a lot. It seems to me, that most people were just simply unaware of this and if you mention it to them, they are very interested in getting this sorted. And it appears to me, that they are also very willing to try new ideas out. Of course not on an over night base, but ask me again in one year and I'm sure to be able to report more success(es).
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
El Fri, Jun 22, 2001 at 09:59:45AM +0100, Marc Eberhard deia:
Hi Frank!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 07:47:19PM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
If it's that easy, why don't you just tell them about M$'s practices (attempts to lock them in, i.e. make them dependent, using interfaces, file formats, net protocols, patents, etc.), and windoze will be gone in no time ... :-(
I do! And I'm doing quite well at the moment in raising people's concerns about sending around winword or powerpoint files (I'm still new to my current work place). Most have stopped to send these formats and started to think about alternatives. The same is true for some special software used here. Making it known, does help a lot. It seems to me, that most people were just simply unaware of this and if you mention it to them, they are very interested in getting this sorted. And it appears to me, that they are also very willing to try new ideas out. Of course not on an over night base, but ask me again in one year and I'm sure to be able to report more success(es).
Hey!. I want you in my company (or should I look for a job in yours?). Pity it must be too far away to commute. When I try to convince people in my workplace to send stuff in free formats or at least PDF I am not too successful. And when I joined I thought they knew their stuff...
If you have a web page somewhere with your usual arguments, it might help... In any case I think it is not my arguments, it must be my lack of tact or something...
Back to the original thread. I think in many cases we don't want too much freedom, just the optimum. One's freedom ends where their neighbour's begins. I defend freedom of speach, but not shouting out loud at 3 am when I want to sleep (well, it is justified sometimes, but not just for a party). Or I don't want people to be free to carry and use guns. I don't want people to be free to take another person's property. I don't like free thieves.
So I don't want people to make a piece of free software non-free. The free version could be easily lost once a heavily embraced and extended non free version exists.
I think one of the benefits of the GPL is that (except for weird circumventions that I wouldn't think are so serious as Alessandro fears, but I haven't thought about it at all) the set of GPL software can only grow, never diminish. BSD software can either grow or shrink because the license may be changed and the original BSD licensed version become obsolete. GPL does not allow for this, and when it comes to defending freedoms, monotonicity is a very wellcome property, because you can be sure that somebody will try to steal your freedom some time or other if they can. Every program that adopts the GPL will be GPLed forever, any BSD licensed program may disappear behind closed doors.
So I don't care if a company is scared off by the GPL and does not contribute free software. With the GPL we can wait an infinite time until one does. With BSD we have to make sure that total net contributions outweight the loses in every period.
You can't defend unlimited freedom because it is unsustainable, but you can defend a fair balance of freedoms that sustains itself and tends to bigger freedom.
Hi !
On Tue, Jun 26, 2001 at 12:32:16AM +0200, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
Hey!. I want you in my company (or should I look for a job in yours?).
Go to http://jobs.ac.uk and enter the keywords "Aston University". Had a quick look at your companies web page... is it Spanish or Portuguese? Couldn't really understand anything. :-))))
Pity it must be too far away to commute. When I try to convince people
Yes, I'm afraid it is.
in my workplace to send stuff in free formats or at least PDF I am not too successful. And when I joined I thought they knew their stuff...
If you have a web page somewhere with your usual arguments, it might help... In any case I think it is not my arguments, it must be my lack of tact or something...
I don't really argue that often. I usually just send them an answer, that I could not read their attachment, because it uses a proprietary file format. Since they want me to read their stuff, they have to think about it. And if they ask me to send them something, I send them a TeX file. That usually makes them very happy. :-)
Back to the original thread. I think in many cases we don't want too much freedom, just the optimum. One's freedom ends where their neighbour's begins.
Who said that? Wasn't it Matthias Claudius?
I defend freedom of speach, but not shouting out loud at 3 am when I want to sleep (well, it is justified sometimes, but not just for a party). Or I don't want people to be free to carry and use guns. I don't want people to be free to take another person's property. I don't like free thieves.
I fully agree with you.
So I don't want people to make a piece of free software non-free. The free version could be easily lost once a heavily embraced and extended non free version exists.
I think one of the benefits of the GPL is that (except for weird circumventions that I wouldn't think are so serious as Alessandro fears, but I haven't thought about it at all) the set of GPL software can only grow, never diminish. BSD software can either grow or shrink because the license may be changed and the original BSD licensed version become obsolete. GPL does not allow for this, and when it comes to defending freedoms, monotonicity is a very wellcome property, because you can be sure that somebody will try to steal your freedom some time or other if they can. Every program that adopts the GPL will be GPLed forever, any BSD licensed program may disappear behind closed doors.
Well, I do see a problem here with your argumentation. Source code is not useful forever. The problems we want to solve and the algorithms to so, do change over the time. So some source code becomes obsolete with the years passing by. Although the number of lines of free software only increases, it doesn't say, if the number of "still useful" lines of code does the same. It could well go down to zero again. So if we want to have a decent set of free software tools, we do need to produce a certain amount of new code every year and we do need to keep up with the state of the art. Just imagine a new CPU and a manufacturer not releasing the instruction set without a NDA. All your free software could become pretty useless pretty fast.
So I don't care if a company is scared off by the GPL and does not contribute free software. With the GPL we can wait an infinite time until one does. With BSD we have to make sure that total net contributions outweight the loses in every period.
I strongly doubt, that we can wait an infinite time for the above given reasons. I don't think, that we can win against companies that way, we have to convince them. And we can't do that by completely ignoring their needs.
You can't defend unlimited freedom because it is unsustainable, but you can defend a fair balance of freedoms that sustains itself and tends to bigger freedom.
Yes, and the question is: Is the GPL or the LGPL the better "balance of freedoms" for free libraries? None of them offers unlimited freedom. Both still have restrictions and these are a very important part of them.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
El Tue, Jun 26, 2001 at 09:25:18AM +0100, Marc Eberhard deia:
Hi !
On Tue, Jun 26, 2001 at 12:32:16AM +0200, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
Hey!. I want you in my company (or should I look for a job in yours?).
Go to http://jobs.ac.uk and enter the keywords "Aston University". Had a quick look at your companies web page... is it Spanish or Portuguese? Couldn't really understand anything. :-))))
Thanks, but I wasn't serious. If what you looked at was tinet.org that's not my company, that's my isp. A very competent, trustworthy and useful free net. And the language is Catalan.
Pity it must be too far away to commute. When I try to convince people
Yes, I'm afraid it is.
in my workplace to send stuff in free formats or at least PDF I am not too successful. And when I joined I thought they knew their stuff...
You see?. I loose my nerves too quick. They know their stuff. And many of them even know what to attach to a message, but some do not. It is just that I get easily angry when I get an MS Office format attachment
If you have a web page somewhere with your usual arguments, it might help... In any case I think it is not my arguments, it must be my lack of tact or something...
I don't really argue that often. I usually just send them an answer, that I could not read their attachment, because it uses a proprietary file format. Since they want me to read their stuff, they have to think about it. And if they ask me to send them something, I send them a TeX file. That usually makes them very happy. :-)
That's what I do at home, but I don't think I can do it at my job. Well in fact I don't send them TeX files at home, I try to give example and use formats that are both open and widespread enough for the recipient to be likely to have a viewer, instead of taking vengeance. But maybe your strategy is better.
Back to the original thread. I think in many cases we don't want too much freedom, just the optimum. One's freedom ends where their neighbour's begins.
Who said that? Wasn't it Matthias Claudius?
I don't know. I heard it somewhere, but I don't remember.
Well, I do see a problem here with your argumentation. Source code is not useful forever. The problems we want to solve and the algorithms to so, do change over the time. So some source code becomes obsolete with the years passing by. Although the number of lines of free software only increases, it doesn't say, if the number of "still useful" lines of code does the same. It could well go down to zero again. So if we want to have a decent set of free software tools, we do need to produce a certain amount of new code every year and we do need to keep up with the state of the art. Just imagine a new CPU and a manufacturer not releasing the instruction set without a NDA. All your free software could become pretty useless pretty fast.
Mmmm... You may be right in part, and I may be wrong in another part. I think that frozen code becomes obsolete over time, but the code is not usually frozen. It evolves gradually. And the GPL guarantees that this evolution does not result in the code being propietary. The BSD style license (if I'm not mistaken) does not guarantee that a company (or an individual) won't take over and evolve the code fast enough that the original freely available version becomes obsolete and nobody updates it because they can still use the binary only proprietary version. This way what was originally free is at least partially lost.
You can argue that the original code is still there and anybody can bring it up to date if he or she wants to. But I think that is less likely to happen in BSD than in GPL, because in GPL that is the only way to evolve the software (other than keeping the updated version private). The benefits of having an up to date version usually outweight the benefits (if any) of the rest of the world not having it, so there is an incentive to take what is free and give back the update.
So I don't care if a company is scared off by the GPL and does not contribute free software. With the GPL we can wait an infinite time until one does. With BSD we have to make sure that total net contributions outweight the loses in every period.
I strongly doubt, that we can wait an infinite time for the above given reasons. I don't think, that we can win against companies that way, we have to convince them. And we can't do that by completely ignoring their needs.
I'm probably generalising too much, and I'm basing my arguments mostly on intuitions, so you don't have to believe me, but I think that it is not that hard to take an old free package and patch it a little or port it to a different platform if the only alternative is to start from scratch. If there is the alternative of using an up to date but closed, previously BSD licensed software, then that may never happen.
I don't want to win "against" companies. I want to win "with" them, or without them, or not to win. I don't even know what to "win" means. Does it mean to do what one thinks is right?. Does it mean to see what one uses or makes used by most people?. Does it mean to "destroy the enemy"?. I don't see that the fact that companies can use BSD software in more ways than GPL software really helps to win anything, if winning means getting more freedom for all.
I don't know. I have nothing against people (or companies) contributing free software under BSD licenses. They can do what they please. But I don't think I'll use a BSD license if I ever make something worth sharing.
You can't defend unlimited freedom because it is unsustainable, but you can defend a fair balance of freedoms that sustains itself and tends to bigger freedom.
Yes, and the question is: Is the GPL or the LGPL the better "balance of freedoms" for free libraries? None of them offers unlimited freedom. Both still have restrictions and these are a very important part of them.
Yes. But the question is also what of the two licenses' balance of freedoms sustains itself better? It's not easy, but I think the FSF position is reasonable, it is a matter of strategy.
Hi!
On Thu, Jun 28, 2001 at 12:45:50AM +0200, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
You see?. I loose my nerves too quick. They know their stuff. And many of them even know what to attach to a message, but some do not. It is just that I get easily angry when I get an MS Office format attachment
Patience is indeed very important.
That's what I do at home, but I don't think I can do it at my job.
Why not? If they don't care about the format of documents sent to you, why should you care for them to be able to read it? By the way: One secretary told me, that mime type text/tex is not readable, because Eudora doesn't recognize this format and refuses to display it, so it can't be plain text. It was really a big surprise for her, when I asked her to save the file to the disk and just open it with any editor... it was simple ASCII text... at least she believes me more now then Eudora. :-)
Well in fact I don't send them TeX files at home, I try to give example and use formats that are both open and widespread enough for the recipient to be likely to have a viewer, instead of taking vengeance. But maybe your strategy is better.
If you try to find a suitable format for them, they will never start to think about the whole problem. Only when they receive a format, they can't cope with, they will start to think. So it's not a matter of vengeance, it's just a measure to make them start thinking about the whole issue.
Mmmm... You may be right in part, and I may be wrong in another part. I think that frozen code becomes obsolete over time, but the code is not usually frozen. It evolves gradually. And the GPL guarantees that this evolution does not result in the code being propietary. The BSD style license (if I'm not mistaken) does not guarantee that a company (or an individual) won't take over and evolve the code fast enough that the original freely available version becomes obsolete and nobody updates it because they can still use the binary only proprietary version. This way what was originally free is at least partially lost.
Do you have something like the Mosaic -> Netscape (before the release of the source code) thing in mind? Yes, this is a real danger. How often has this happened in the past? Anyone knows more examples?
You can argue that the original code is still there and anybody can bring it up to date if he or she wants to. But I think that is less likely to happen in BSD than in GPL, because in GPL that is the only way to evolve the software (other than keeping the updated version private). The benefits of having an up to date version usually outweight the benefits (if any) of the rest of the world not having it, so there is an incentive to take what is free and give back the update.
Or keep the code completely free of GPL'ed stuff, because the GPL is seen as a danger. This is a bit of a worry for me, it might keep companies from using free software entirely. But maybe it can be overcome by appropriate informations from the free software world.
I don't want to win "against" companies. I want to win "with" them, or without them, or not to win. I don't even know what to "win" means.
I didn't mean to win against companies in a sense of some kind of a struggle, but to win companies to use and produce free software. Or in other words to encourage them and convince them, that free software is a good thing for them too.
Does it mean to do what one thinks is right?. Does it mean to see what
Well, yes, I do think, that it is right, what I do.
one uses or makes used by most people?. Does it mean to "destroy the enemy"?.
No, there is no enemy. We are talking about religions here. About ideas of a better world. There is no enemy. There are only people, who have not yet seen the light. :-)
I don't see that the fact that companies can use BSD software in more ways than GPL software really helps to win anything, if winning means getting more freedom for all.
I was more thinking of the difference between the GPL and the LGPL. I do think too, that the BSD licence might be to free.
I don't know. I have nothing against people (or companies) contributing free software under BSD licenses. They can do what they please. But I don't think I'll use a BSD license if I ever make something worth sharing.
Same for me. But I'm still not sure, if I would use the LGPL or the GPL. I did use the GPL, but that piece of software wasn't a library, so the choice was clear. Maybe it's a good idea to use the GPL and to add a remark, that other licences can be discussed, if someone sees a need for it. Then you can always try to convince the company asking, to publish their sources too. :-) I'm of course only referring to libraries here, because the LGPL doesn't apply to programs, so only the GPL is really useful.
Yes. But the question is also what of the two licenses' balance of freedoms sustains itself better?
I fully agree and that's what a huge part of this thread was about.
It's not easy, but I think the FSF position is reasonable, it is a matter of strategy.
I don't know. I would really like to hear more arguments from the FSF(E) about their reasoning for this recommendation.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
El Thu, Jun 28, 2001 at 10:06:29AM +0100, Marc Eberhard deia:
That's what I do at home, but I don't think I can do it at my job.
Why not? If they don't care about the format of documents sent to you, why should you care for them to be able to read it? By the way: One secretary told me, that mime type text/tex is not readable, because Eudora doesn't recognize this format and refuses to display it, so it can't be plain text. It was really a big surprise for her, when I asked her to save the file to the disk and just open it with any editor... it was simple ASCII text... at least she believes me more now then Eudora. :-)
Basically because there is no policy enforcing proper formats for attachments, and I'm nobody's boss to tell them what to do (quite the reverse). So if the company pays for my time, my computer and miscrosoft's crap and wants me to use it, I can't hardly refuse without either convincing them or looking for another job (and my previous jobs weren't better in this issue). At least I can use debian most of the time where I work now.
Well in fact I don't send them TeX files at home, I try to give example and use formats that are both open and widespread enough for the recipient to be likely to have a viewer, instead of taking vengeance. But maybe your strategy is better.
If you try to find a suitable format for them, they will never start to think about the whole problem. Only when they receive a format, they can't cope with, they will start to think. So it's not a matter of vengeance, it's just a measure to make them start thinking about the whole issue.
A little anecdote. Once in a small mailing list someone sent an MS word 2000 attachment. A reply came up complaining about using incompatible formats for documents and asking everybody to have some consideration towards people who didn't have the same software and this kind of things. All very well, until I read the part that said that everybody should send attachments in word 98 format, which was the "normal" thing to have (i.e. what the person writing the complaint had). So, some people won't start thinking about these issues so easily.
But I take note of your strategy. I think I'll start using it when somebody sends me garbage a second time...
I was more thinking of the difference between the GPL and the LGPL. I do think too, that the BSD licence might be to free.
Yes, I think I deviated the discussion more toward a GPL-BSD one which wasn't the original idea. Sorry.
Hi !
On Fri, Jun 29, 2001 at 08:39:57AM +0200, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
Basically because there is no policy enforcing proper formats for attachments, and I'm nobody's boss to tell them what to do (quite the
Same here, I'm just a simple research fellow. And still I do that. And yes, some of the mails in question came directly from my boss. What's wrong with that? Why shouldn't I tell him the truth? He wants me to work efficiently and I can't do that, if I waste my time converting some stupid formats.
reverse). So if the company pays for my time, my computer and miscrosoft's crap and wants me to use it, I can't hardly refuse without either
Why not? I too got a computer with preinstalled Windows when I started here. Well, was a matter of half a day to wipe the hard disc and install Debian on it. Where is the problem? They were a bit surprised at the beginning, but not more.
convincing them or looking for another job (and my previous jobs weren't
I don't think so. You create your working environment to some degree yourself. And most bosses rather have a motivated employee then a bored one.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
El Fri, Jun 29, 2001 at 10:20:05AM +0100, Marc Eberhard deia:
Hi !
On Fri, Jun 29, 2001 at 08:39:57AM +0200, Xavi Drudis Ferran wrote:
Basically because there is no policy enforcing proper formats for attachments, and I'm nobody's boss to tell them what to do (quite the
Same here, I'm just a simple research fellow. And still I do that. And yes, some of the mails in question came directly from my boss. What's wrong with that? Why shouldn't I tell him the truth? He wants me to work efficiently and I can't do that, if I waste my time converting some stupid formats.
I've been insisting on it for more than one year and all I got was the opinion than having non computer professionals in the company learn about proper attachment formats was too difficult / expensive. I think that is nonsense and the benefits far outweight the "expenses", but I'm getting tired of insisting. The only thing to do is to tell people one by one until they're all convinced, but it's difficult when they don't listen. I guess some more patience/diplomacy on my part would come handy.
Anyway. Let's leave it here. I never doubted you're right.
Marc Eberhard wrote:
I wonder, why a company would want to hide the origin of a lib, if it would have been perfectly legal to do so. In case of the GPL it is clear. If they would reveal, that they use your lib, you could sue them. Thus they can only use your lib, if they hide, who has written it. On the other hand, if linking your lib into their program would be legal, why would they want to hide this fact from the end user?
Company policy? Or did, e.g., M$ ever official announce that some or their networking code is based on BSD code? (AFAIK, this was discovered by grepping for some strings in the binaries.)
It could be even a plus for them to tell their users, that they use a known good lib for their program. So maybe one should only enforce to _acknowledge_ the usage of a free lib by closed source software companies, instead of restricting the usage itself. Just putting some text on the box like: "This software uses the excellent free lib xyz".
Like this?
: You must give prominent notice with each copy of the work that the : Library is used in it and that the Library and its use are covered by : this License. You must supply a copy of this License. If the work : during execution displays copyright notices, you must include the : copyright notice for the Library among them, as well as a reference : directing the user to the copy of this License.
(LGPL, §6 which is about using LGPL libraries in non-free programs)
The issue, that someone can use your source code to make money has been discussed here widely and I think, we agreed, that we are aware of this and that we accept this.
Again, it's not about making money, it's about non-free programs. Authors who use the LGPL for their libraries have decided to allow this, those who use GPL have decided not to.
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it?
If this became the rule for hardware makers to do, it would soon be impossible to run a completely free Linux kernel on modern hardware.
Frank
Hi Frank!
On Thu, Jun 21, 2001 at 04:35:57PM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
Marc Eberhard wrote:
their users, that they use a known good lib for their program. So maybe one should only enforce to _acknowledge_ the usage of a free lib by closed
Like this?
[...]
(LGPL, §6 which is about using LGPL libraries in non-free programs)
Yes, exactly. :-)
And yes, the more I think about the original question, the more I'm convinced it can be done. Well, companies are already distributing binary stuff that the user must link with the Linux kernel (like the disk-on-chip driver: I used it, no thanks).
And it brings me back to my original comment: Why should we want to do anything against it?
If this became the rule for hardware makers to do, it would soon be impossible to run a completely free Linux kernel on modern hardware.
Well, it seems, that most people here are quite pessimistic about the will of the hardware manufacturers to cooperate. So one must come to the conclusion, that they will be releasing more and more binaries instead of less, if they're allowed to do so. Is that, because more and more parts of the product are moved from hardware implementations to software, so that the driver for that piece of hardware forms an essential part of the product and thus the manufacturers want to hide it from their competitors?
As being optimistic by default, I see this as only one possibility. It could also be, that they take the chance to concentrate on their core business, being the production of hardware, and leave the driver part to others, which most likely results in free drivers. Why do you think, that this scenario is not realistic? Remember, that IBM didn't succeed with its MicroChannel architecture. So I'm not yet convinced, that the hardware manufacturers really like closed source drivers.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Marc Eberhard wrote:
Well, it seems, that most people here are quite pessimistic about the will of the hardware manufacturers to cooperate. So one must come to the conclusion, that they will be releasing more and more binaries instead of less, if they're allowed to do so. Is that, because more and more parts of the product are moved from hardware implementations to software, so that the driver for that piece of hardware forms an essential part of the product and thus the manufacturers want to hide it from their competitors?
Yes, it might be a little pessimistic. Sure, there are positive examples of hardware makers supporting the development free drivers, but many do not. And I'm not sure if more would do that if it would be made easier for them to release non-free drivers.
As being optimistic by default, I see this as only one possibility. It could also be, that they take the chance to concentrate on their core business, being the production of hardware, and leave the driver part to others, which most likely results in free drivers. Why do you think, that this scenario is not realistic?
Actually I'm wondering myself. If I was a hardware maker and wanted to sell hardware, not drivers, I'd be happy if other people were writing the drivers for free. But many hardware makers don't seem to work this way (yet?). Perhaps they're just irrationally afraid of releasing interface specifications because they're entangled in the old "intellectual property" world-view. If you're more paranoid -- perhaps they have some agreements with big software makers ...
[...]
What it does not allow is to *distribute* the resulting binary because that would deprive the recpient from the freedoms.
And this applies to all software companies, right? They live on selling software. They spread new ideas into the market. They produce the products, most users see and use. Having no free libraries in these products, makes it impossible to reach people through this main path of software delivery to end users.
As others have pointed out, the goal of the FSF(E) is not to spread GNU software as far as possible, but to make sure it remains free. So a distribution of a GNU library in millions of copies of proprietary programs would not be productive, in fact counter-productive because it doesn't give the end-users the freedoms. It might give them a technically better, but proprietary program and therefore less reason to switch to a really free alternative.
I see here again your more pessimistic view. Companies will take, but never give back. I can argue against it, that putting up this barrier, does cause some kind of confrontation. So it is just logic to me, that the companies in question, will not be very willing to cooperate with free software authors. On the other hand, if you choose to be more open and allow them to use your free library, its more of a collaboration and this can open a lot of doors for your free library too. I think, that diplomacy is a better approach here instead of a restrictive licence.
Well, it's each author's choice to use the GPL, LGPL or another license, but some authors would rather have no cooperation with companies than such that makes the software non-free.
[...]
If it's that easy, why don't you just tell them about M$'s practices (attempts to lock them in, i.e. make them dependent, using interfaces, file formats, net protocols, patents, etc.), and windoze will be gone in no time ... :-(
I do! And I'm doing quite well at the moment in raising people's concerns about sending around winword or powerpoint files (I'm still new to my current work place). Most have stopped to send these formats and started to think about alternatives. The same is true for some special software used here. Making it known, does help a lot. It seems to me, that most people were just simply unaware of this and if you mention it to them, they are very interested in getting this sorted. And it appears to me, that they are also very willing to try new ideas out. Of course not on an over night base, but ask me again in one year and I'm sure to be able to report more success(es).
That's good. However, my experience is that most people will stop sending me such formats if I ask them to, but more "out of compassion for this poor Linux user who can't use our standard formats" (vomit) than because of fear of lock-in or something. I.e., they still write their texts with winword, but export them to plain text, HTML, PDF or something when they send them to me.
When I talk about things like freedom or that companies want to make them dependent, most of the time I have the impression they don't even listen. They seem to have gotten used to being out of control of their computer, and they don't seem to care much if they can use their documents a few years from now, or if they'll have to start from scratch when they get a new machine. Maybe it's because they don't have much valuable stuff on their machines, and most of their text-processing is like "type it, print it, forget it/delete it", I don't know.
So if it's really easy to convice typical "winusers" with arguments based on freedom, please tell me how.
Frank
Hi Frank!
On Fri, Jun 22, 2001 at 04:51:02PM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
As others have pointed out, the goal of the FSF(E) is not to spread GNU software as far as possible, but to make sure it remains free.
I totally agree. But of which use is free software, if it is not of benefit to a broader community? Freedom only for freedom's sake?
So a distribution of a GNU library in millions of copies of proprietary programs would not be productive, in fact counter-productive because it doesn't give the end-users the freedoms. It might give them a technically better, but proprietary program and therefore less reason to switch to a really free alternative.
I do see this scenario only as a transient state. It will start with one free library in the closed source program. Later there will be two, three and eventually the closed part of the code will become so minimal, that it will be easy to replace it entirely. Thus a program can become free by more and more free parts in it. It's a matter of time. Each piece of free software in a closed source program is one secret less, they have in their safes. And it provides a rather smooth transition from closed source to free software, something very important to users.
That's good. However, my experience is that most people will stop sending me such formats if I ask them to, but more "out of compassion for this poor Linux user who can't use our standard formats" (vomit) than because of fear of lock-in or something. I.e., they still write their texts with winword, but export them to plain text, HTML, PDF or something when they send them to me.
Well, still it is a step forward. They are concerned about being able to save their documents in a portable free format. This forces even aggressive software house to provide this facility. Keep in mind, that their strategy is exactly the opposite, namely inventing incompatible formats, that can only be processed with their own software. Even if it looks like a small step, it is already a very effective counter reaction. I was by the way not referring to personal mails sent to me, but to mails send to a lot of people here through internal mailing lists. I start to see comments like: I append the following document in format xyz, because this can be processed/viewed on all used platforms here to the best of my knowledge. Hey, they started to think!
When I talk about things like freedom or that companies want to make them dependent, most of the time I have the impression they don't even listen. They seem to have gotten used to being out of control
Don't give up. If you tell them often enough and clearly point out the dangers ahead, they will listen to you one day. It might be that the idea of freedom is valued more at universities and thus they are more sensitive to such problems.
of their computer, and they don't seem to care much if they can use their documents a few years from now, or if they'll have to start from scratch when they get a new machine. Maybe it's because they don't have much valuable stuff on their machines, and most of their text-processing is like "type it, print it, forget it/delete it", I don't know.
But then, they shouldn't care at all, which system they use. Thus it shouldn't be too hard to make them switch over. Anyway this is different here too and as far as I know, some manufacturers (e.g. Boeing) insist on documentation in SGML, because they must still be able to read it in 20 years from now.
So if it's really easy to convice typical "winusers" with arguments based on freedom, please tell me how.
Patience, diplomacy, a guy in an office, that did reboot his computer 155 days and 8:34 hours ago, while they have to do so three times a day. Believe me, this is very convincing... so my suggestion is: Simply be a positive example. Not more and not less. And if they ask you, yes, your system is so stable, because it uses free software, which has the advantage, that... you know the rest!
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Marc Eberhard wrote:
So a distribution of a GNU library in millions of copies of proprietary programs would not be productive, in fact counter-productive because it doesn't give the end-users the freedoms. It might give them a technically better, but proprietary program and therefore less reason to switch to a really free alternative.
I do see this scenario only as a transient state. It will start with one free library in the closed source program. Later there will be two, three and eventually the closed part of the code will become so minimal, that it will be easy to replace it entirely.
If they want to ...
Thus a program can become free by more and more free parts in it. It's a matter of time. Each piece of free software in a closed source program is one secret less, they have in their safes.
As long as they can't make secret changes in those pieces (LGPL prevent this, as any changes to the library itself must be distributed with source when distributing a binary based on the library).
Frank
Hi Frank!
On Sat, Jun 23, 2001 at 12:38:21AM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
Thus a program can become free by more and more free parts in it. It's a matter of time. Each piece of free software in a closed source program is one secret less, they have in their safes.
As long as they can't make secret changes in those pieces (LGPL prevent this, as any changes to the library itself must be distributed with source when distributing a binary based on the library).
Dynamic libraries should also be quite efficient from a practical point of view. If the program uses a "standard" shared lib on the system, it is impossible to modify the free library, at least impossible for the evil closed source software company.
Bye, Marc _______________________________________________________________________________
email: marc@greenie.net email: m.a.eberhard@aston.ac.uk, web: http://www.aston.ac.uk/~eberhama/
Marc Eberhard wrote:
On Sat, Jun 23, 2001 at 12:38:21AM +0200, Frank Heckenbach wrote:
Thus a program can become free by more and more free parts in it. It's a matter of time. Each piece of free software in a closed source program is one secret less, they have in their safes.
As long as they can't make secret changes in those pieces (LGPL prevent this, as any changes to the library itself must be distributed with source when distributing a binary based on the library).
Dynamic libraries should also be quite efficient from a practical point of view. If the program uses a "standard" shared lib on the system, it is impossible to modify the free library, at least impossible for the evil closed source software company.
Yep -- and if they link statically, they have to provide object files and the source of any changes they make to the library (LGPL).
Frank