Roberto Mariottini wrote: >Free sofware means everyone has the right to look the source and modify it >to suit his needs. PD software is less free than GPL software. Let me >exemplificate: > > - You can download my PD software, called XYZ. > - You can modify it to support a new and exciting feature, based on >proprietary and closed source information, and call it ABC. > - You can publish ABC in a binary-only form, selling it for much money. > - Users of ABC can't see your code nor modify it, but this is not a >problem. It's your code. I can object you are making money with also my >code, but again this is not the problem.
You could object, but it would be rather pointless after a PD release since presumably you as PD releaser knew what you were doing when you released the code to public domain. Public domain code rules couldn't be simpler: Free for anyone to redistribute, or not, in whatever manner anyone wants, including to make money, or not. Compare that to a few of those multi-page open/free source licenses and it's awfully refreshing. > - At a later taime you can cease support for ABC, and destroy its sources. > - The problem is that users of ABC can't apply patches to the original XYZ >code included in ABC, even if XYZ is PD. Even if I have added features and >bug fixes to XYZ, users of ABC will never notice. XYZ isn't the application. ABC+XYZ is the application. GPL forces ABC developer to do things he or she may not want to do. That, in a nutshell, is not giving your ABC developer full freedom. This isn't just another high-brow theoretical discussion. Besides the FreeDOS controversy under discussion, over the years I have seen a number of developers decline to use GPL'ed code because it forces them to act in a very specific manner that they do not wish to act. The people I see who want this, they aren't the big bad Microsofts of the world. They are usually a lone developer or a small business who wants a stronger measure of choice over what they themselves develop. Choice which GPL'ed code does not allow them because it is not as free from restriction as those businesses and developers need the code to be. GPL code has strings attached. No wait, it isn't strings; it is ropes, ropes that bind and restrict the third-party developer. Simply because many Open Source/FreeSoftware advocates believe that developers should act a certain way towards source code does not mean that it is what everyone else believes or should believe. They cannot be allowed to redefine "free" to favor their desires of what people should do with source code. I frequently see this semi-religious attitude in the more fanatical advocates of the Open Source movements and it drives me nuts. Open source is not more free than public domain. It is just more like the way those Open Source advocates want code to be. They exude their own FUD as surely as Microsoft ever did. Not all of them by any means, just way too damn many. Another important point: even were ABC+XYZ destroyed per your example, the original XYZ remains for DEF, and GHI, and any of whatever alphabet soup of developers want to use it. Without restrictions. >That's true. If you want to protect ideas, then use patents. >But if you have a good idea don't make a software of it: it can be easely >reverse-engineered. No, no, no. For most of my career, the majority of my good money-making ideas that I have had were implemented in software. Don't make software out of good ideas? The direct consequence is that software will only consist of mediocre and bad ideas. Where does that leave us? As for patents, they are in very bad odor with most of the Open Source development community along with a lot of those outside it For good reason: popular patents are often nothing more than litigation ploys to mint money from large corporations -- and indirectly pick the pocket of all the clients and users of those corporate products. That's you and me, right in there with the mob. Plus, patents are expensive to get, since they (the legitimate ones) are mostly created in the realm of Really Big Ideas that only larger concerns will research and fund. >Masking, tweaking and modifying is not an easy task. It can be a lot of work >(imagine tweaking the Linux kernel, or GCC), I don't know if it's worth. >Making an automate program to do the work can lead to a condemnation if this >is proved. It can be difficult, depending on the size and nature of the code. However, if lucrative, it is eminently possible. If not lucrative, then it isn't going to be attempted and will not force a copyright infringement showdown anyway. ------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net is sponsored by: Speed Start Your Linux Apps Now. Build and deploy apps & Web services for Linux with a free DVD software kit from IBM. Click Now! http://ads.osdn.com/?ad_id=1356&alloc_id=3438&op=click _______________________________________________ Freedos-devel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/freedos-devel
