The Penguin Ping.
Want on or off? Just holla!
Posted on 08/23/2002 7:53:26 AM PDT by ShadowAce
On the Internet, software wants to be free. But as the Free Software Foundation and many others point out, the word "free" here is not about price; it is about liberty.
"Free" is used as in the phrase "free speech" (a right we covet), rather than the phrase "free beer" (always too good to be true) or "free kitten" (which sounds good, but has a high overhead).
Confusion arises because free software mostly has a zero price tag as a natural consequence of the original license, the GPL, that enforces the liberty of developers to use code created by their peers. The innovation of the Open Source Initiative was to provide new, more business-friendly licenses. By suggesting alternatives to GPL licensing, it enabled hybrid open-source/closed-source works.
The early years of open source have thus focused on free (as in beer) software, so it is still possible to misunderstand. But we have seen a definite shift in thinking. The open-source community has welcomed companies that build commercial enterprises, as long as they act symbiotically rather than parasitically. Today it is clear that open source has matured.
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What distinguishes projects like Apache, NetBeans and Linux is less the price tag but rather the eclectic inclusiveness. |
The key values of the Internet flow from the mesh of participants, which Metcalfe's Law observes as leading to an exponentially growing pool of potential relationships. Complementing that are loosely coupled, open, royalty-free standards, allowing all to participate at the linear-growing cost of connection to the standards rather than the exponentially growing cost of negotiating each relationship.
This exponential-relationship, linear-cost world is termed the "Net Effect" and has been the primary energy source of the Internet revolution from its inception.
The Web resulted from the Net Effect, and today we need a development and deployment methodology that harnesses it. Open source provides the ideal, loosely coupled yet rigorous environment for the massively connected community.
What distinguishes projects like Apache, NetBeans and Linux is less the price tag but rather the eclectic inclusiveness. If a standard is a technology where the community affected by changes controls the changes, then open source will underpin standards in this century.
Open source is not without cost. Someone has to underwrite the community. Developers have to donate their time and expertise. Sun's experience of underwriting NetBeans.org and OpenOffice.org (and others) has involved commercial and individual end users and developers cooperating with generosity to build the platform on which their solutions can be delivered.
The evolution of these projects has revealed the existence of a commercially valid business model based on open source. It has become the development methodology of the Net Effect.
| It's not about free stuff.
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In the evolved open-source development model, a "community of code" maintains an open-source code base, preferably itself evolved "in the open." It uses behaviors and principles well documented elsewhere, which inherently lead to better code faster, not least because of the scrutiny of the community. These benefits are obtained as long as there is a viable community of interested parties to create, maintain and improve the code.
From the "community of code," a gatekeeper function emerges, operating with implicit community consent. The gatekeeper embodies the will of the community to set bounds for the project and creates the "reference implementation." Changes are made infrequently enough to ensure stability for solutions above, while paying regard to work in the community below. This gatekeeper is the key to success for the evolved open-source model, bridging community informality with the stability needed by commercial enterprise.
Above the reference implementation is the crucial dividing line between the code foundation and solution offerings that depend on it. The licenses used below the line foster and protect the community; those above the line facilitate commercial success. Drawing the line is the great art; the balance between community and commerce differs for every project.
Open or closed?
The experience of Sun and others is that open source provides ideal development and business models for today's Net Effect economy. It's not about free stuff; it's about enfranchising every user and development community member. Today's software innovations need this model more than ever before. With an open foundation, companies can gain their just compensation for their innovations "above the line," but the subtle lock-in offered by our traditional understanding of "standards" is largely avoided.
Most importantly, open source is not just about code; it is about community. You don't make a project open source just with a license. It takes the costly and time-consuming birthing of a community of code, a trusted gatekeeper function and a series of symbiotic commercial enterprises to make true open source. 21st century open source is not free.
But it is liberating.
This bears repeating. There is no such thing as a free lunch, or free software either, if by "free" one means without cost. Ultimately, someone has to pay.
Want on or off? Just holla!
You just can't attach your own strings, which seems fair. Why should you be able to take what someone else has decided to freely release, and proprietarize it against his wishes?
The GPL also protects companies that release source code, so that competitors cannot pull a closed-source "embrace-and-extend" on them.
Why? You obviously have no problem with proprietary software which is far more restrictive of users' rights than the GPL. The GPL is actually less restrictive than just sticking "Copyright Foobar Inc." on your software; standard copyright prohibits any redistribution, while the GPL allows it as long as you fulfill certain conditions.
My personal software uses the BSD license, but I understand and respect the decisions of others to use the GPL.
HA HA HA HA
You're just upset about the GPL because your master runs terrible risks if it steals GPL code and includes it in the next version of Windows.
If they get caught, they'd have to GPL the Windows source code.
Microsoft loves free code, it means that they can sell more software with out paying for it themselves. See the TCP/IP stack, the FTP and TELNET client, their DNS and DHCP servers and the core of Active Directory, Kerberos.
Go away, wannbe thief. The GPL is there precisely to keep the Microsofts of the world from getting a free ride off of someone else's work.
Instead of whining about not being able to steal code due to the GPL, they should just write their own quality software.
But then, they've shown how good they are at that, right?
One more time for those people that have only heard the Microsoft lie and haven't actually read the text of the GNU Public license.
The GPL states that if you use GPL code in your product you have to release your code under the GPL. If you don't like that, don't use the GPL code. You are free to write your own under any license you want.
Figures you would take such a stance. You see no evil in Microsoft's EULA, but see plenty in the GPL. Such hypocrisy. If Microsoft can conduct it's little "shared source" program with all of the restrictions that go with it, why can't developers choose to restrict your right to make a profit off of their labor? No one is stopping them from dual licensing. Mozilla is dual licensed under the MPL and GPL. QT is under the QPL and GPL.
You just want a free lunch. The GPL doesn't stop the copyright holder from dual licensing. The only reason why large projects like the Linux kernel cannot be dual licensed is because there are thousands of copyright holders. But again, there is nothing stopping dual licensing. Oracle could release its products under the GPL on a "use at your own risk" basis and sell licenses under their existing EULAs that give bonuses like free support, training, manuals and priority access to updates (ie something more robust than existing support ideas).
You're making no sense. GPL makes sure you can't just take someone else's intellectual property and make money from it. You're so concerned about the piracy of commercialized code but you can't see that misappropriating GPL code is also piracy? As has been pointed out, you don't have to use GPL'd code -- write your own.
As I see it, there are several issues.
I'm pointing out the hypocrisy in some developers saying that they want software to be free -- and yet oppose commercial use of that same software.
"Commercial Use" has several connotations... some devs do have a problem with their code being used in a commercial setting -- where money is made through the use of the code. Charging for the code itself is another issue that virtually the entire Open Source community is united on -- code that WAS free should REMAIN free.
There's nothing stopping anybody from releasing software for public use and improving it regardless of whether it is eventually commercialized.
That goes to the concept of improving the code base. If someone wants to charge money for improving a program, they'll want to maximize their return by taking the program out of the free code base. Part of the joy of Open Source is that any average joe who wants to put up a web server can do it without severely crimping his wallet. It's the old Power To The People concept without the socialism.
The selfish corporate-types who want to take free code and then stir in some secret ingredients and NOT give it all back are the socialists.
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