GPL 3.0: A bonfire of the vanities?

News.com ^ | March 9, 2006 | Jonathan Zuck

[antiRepublicrat]

I often find myself comparing the strife and pathos of the information technology industry to Greek and Shakespearean tragedies. Yet, the current debate on GPL 3.0 has me thinking back to my high school European history class.

In the late 15th century, the Renaissance was at its height and Florence was at its center. Under the patronage of the Medici family, "humanist" scholars were fueling an explosion in new works of art, science and philosophy. Though it was also a time of increased vice (drinking, gambling and lipstick), most of these humanists were dedicated Christians who were merely reconciling their faith with observed reality.

Enter Girolamo Savonarola, a Dominican priest, who came to power in Florence in 1494. He viewed all of this "humanism" as vanity, turning people's heads away from the word of God and true religion. He took a very severe stand against the new scholarship, culminating in a series of bonfires in the town square, where many great works of art and science were lost. These fires have come to be known as the "Bonfire of the Vanities."

Like Savonarola, Richard Stallman takes a similarly religious stance on software development, rather than a practical one. For Stallman, the concept that software be "free, as in freedom" is the only concern in the creation of software. In fact, he has declared that "it is far more important that software be free than that it be better." This has led him to view the open-source software community, a related but practically minded version of the free software community, with skepticism and frequently with disdain.

[antiRepublicrat]

Excellent article. It frames the GPL 3 debate, and with it the practical vs. the ideological, pretty well.

[N3WBI3]

OSS PING

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[Restorer]

Though it was also a time of increased vice (drinking, gambling and lipstick), most of these humanists were dedicated Christians who were merely reconciling their faith with observed reality.

An overly cheerful view of Renaissance life. As in the time of Socrates, philosophers really were destroying traditional religious constraints on behavior without replacing them with any other kind.

The Borgias and their ilk were not just Christians who liked to party. Their depravity and the reaction it created led directly to the Reformation.

[When_Penguins_Attack]

Richard Stallman, the enantiomeric image of Golden Eagle.

[antiRepublicrat]

Richard Stallman, the enantiomeric image of Golden Eagle.

I actually had to look that up.

[When_Penguins_Attack]

sorry. old chemistry term, referring to the "tetrahedral" shape of the "normal" bonds of a carbon atom. In the simplest organic molecule (methane -CH4) Carbon sits in the "center" of a pyramid, with 4 bonds at the three base "corners" of the pyramid and one at the apex. An enantiomer is a "mirror image" of the atom in question. Enantiomers are distinguishable in the way they rotate polarized light, with all "living" organic molecules rotating light to the left (or levo). Two enantiomers of, say, chloro hydro flouro methane would each have a chlorine, a flourine, an -OH group and a hydrogen attached at each "corner" but they are different atoms. There is no way they can be superimposed on each other, so although they are chemically identical, they are structurally different.
An enantiomerical image is basically the same...., except opposite, if you get the drift....

I can't believe I still remember that crap from 30 years ago. Haven't used it at all in over 15 years.

[antiRepublicrat]

I can't believe I still remember that crap from 30 years ago. Haven't used it at all in over 15 years.

You went way further in Chemistry than I did. My main memories are of my teacher letting me make thermite and nitrocellulose as extra credit projects. These days that would probably get you a visit from DHS.

[When_Penguins_Attack]

My worst project was extracting Lysergic Amides (same basic structure as LSD, without a couple of groups hanging off) from Morning Glory seeds........, which would have gotten me a visit from the law back then, as well. I went thru about 4 exctractions to see how "pure" I could get it, and then did a final extraction into ETOH (distilled straight grain alcohol). I didn't stop to think and realize this meant it got absorbed directly thru the mucous membranes in my mouth, thinking I had about 45 minutes like a "normal" hit of acid. I took almost 500 mics which is a WHOPPER of a dose, and I was tripping my eyes out almost immediately. By the time I walked out of the lab, I didn't know where I was. I wandered around campus for almost 4 hours smiling like an idiot, till my roomate happened by and saw me staring intently a the trees "weaving patterns." He took me home and kept me from anything more outrageous.

[rzeznikj at stout]

In high school chem (three or four years ago)--I remember making black powder, winterfresh flavoring, and coating glass with silver (Tollen Test)

This year in Gen. Chem--I've done titration of hard water, diluted NaOH, and synthesized alum.

These days that would probably get you a visit from DHS.

Definitely. Though the only complaints we got were from annoyed teachers that had to listen to the loud thuds from people lighting their black powder in the fume hood.

[Golden Eagle]

Did I just read what I thought you did? You made your own LSD, and took it?

No wonder we never agree on anything.

[impatient]

GPL 3.0 could be the end of the golden age of Linux.

If, in the likely event that Linus, the commercial distros, and the heavily-invested-into-Linux corporations stick with v2 while Debian and FSF go to 3, that, my friends, is the long-anticipated fork of Linux.

And if, in the likely event that development efforts cross the boundaries of the fork, then the inevitable accusations of one side will lead to challenges of the legal terms supporting the other, and the GPL will finally receive it's day in court. In this, it will likely faire better than expected, but not well enough to protect the current status-quo: where the license is respected for its intent out of a sense of community, and its legally-shakier provisions are ignored.

Stallman is proof that if you follow a liberal (who is right in spite of himself) even to the gates of paradise, he will complain about the humidity and torpedo the whole affair.

Oh well. Maybe it's time to start checking out NetBSD...

[antiRepublicrat]

If, in the likely event that Linus, the commercial distros, and the heavily-invested-into-Linux corporations stick with v2 while Debian and FSF go to 3

I don't know if they could do that. Linus controls the license for at least most of Linux, and Linux doesn't have the "or future version of the GPL" in it, so others can't exactly change the license without his permission.

[antiRepublicrat]

My worst project was extracting Lysergic Amides (same basic structure as LSD, without a couple of groups hanging off) from Morning Glory seeds

And I thought playing with the explosives was dangerous. :)

I had the recipe for LSD, but didn't want to make it -- now I'm glad I didn't. I also had the recipe for nitroglycerine, but after reading through it I figured you'd have to be either an idiot or suicidal to try to make it.

[antiRepublicrat]

You made your own LSD, and took it?

D-lysergic acid amide vs. D-lysergic acid diethylamide. Not quite the same thing, nowhere close to as potent as LSD.

[antiRepublicrat]

Back on subject, remember how you like to talk about all the Groklaw followers? There's a big rebellion against PJ at Groklaw over a posting she wrote about this article. Her community is in large part not agreeing with her.

She's showing her lib ideological colors, but that doesn't matter. The rest of us just use Groklaw as the latest place for SCO news, of course always with the original court documents for reference.

There's also another interview out with Linus Torvalds, and it meshes well with this article, and represents how sane tech people see open source, not the GE or Stallman extremes.

[N3WBI3]

Really good interview I have not seen that one yet... Thanks..