ESR: "We Don't Need the GPL Anymore"
by Federico Biancuzzi06/30/2005
Recently, during FISL (Fórum Internacional de Software Livre) in Brazil, Eric Raymond gave a keynote speech about the open source model of development in which he said, "We don't need the GPL anymore. It's based on the belief that open source software is weak and needs to be protected. Open source would be succeeding faster if the GPL didn't make lots of people nervous about adopting it." Federico Biancuzzi decided to interview Eric Raymond to learn more about that.
Why did you say we don't need the GPL anymore?
It's 2005, not 1985. We've learned a lot in the last 20 years. The fears that originally led to the reciprocity stuff in GPL are nowadays, at least in my opinion, baseless. People who do what the GPL tries to prevent (e.g., closed source forks of open source projects) wind up injuring only themselves. They trap themselves unto competing with a small in-house development group against the much larger one in the parent open source project, and failing.
I read that you studied marketing to promote OSI. I'm wondering whether maybe the fact that Linux is more famous than BSD could be related to the "virality" of the GPL. If every time you build a product based on Linux you must release the source code, it's clear that everyone will know that it's based on Linux. And so the buzz keeps growing: another product based on Linux! This doesn't happen with BSD licensed code. For example, I read that the new portable console Sony PSP includes some code from NetBSD. How do we know it? Just for the advertising clause written in a simple text file that someone discovered on their web site. But that is different from the way Sony announced that Playstation 3 will natively run Linux. They proudly wrote a press release and started a big buzz. What is your opinion?
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Related Reading 
Understanding Open Source and Free Software Licensing |
I believe you overestimate the marketing benefits of saying "Linux Inside!"; most technology consumers don't care, and Sony knows that. I think Sony is announcing Linux support because they know it's the most likely option to attract developers. NetBSD is a worthy project, but, let's face it, the fan base for it simply is not large enough to justify spending marketing effort to recruit them.
More generally, I don't think the GPL is the principal reason for Linux's success. Rather, I believe it's because in 1991 Linus was the first person to find the right social architecture for distributed software development. It wasn't possible much before then because it required cheap internet; and after Linux, most people who might otherwise have founded OS projects found that the minimum-energy route to what they wanted was to improve Linux. The GPL helped, but I think mainly as a sort of social signal rather than as a legal document with teeth.
Some time ago there was a monetary offer to get a Linux snapshot under BSD license. Would you have accepted?
I wouldn't have had the right to accept Jeff Merkey's offer; I'm not Linus. But supposing I were ... hmmm ... it's interesting that you asked me this, because I've exchanged email with Linus about a not entirely dissimilar set of questions having to do with how we cope if a court breaks the GPL.
I think the answer to your question is no. I wouldn't worry about a closed fork harming the community; I think that's a self-punishing form of idiocy. Linus probably still disagrees with me on this; he's always been more of a GPL fan than I am. What I would feel is something I know for certain Linus does--an obligation not to violate the expectations of the kernel contributors without better reason than a few dollars in my pocket.
Linus has told me he will relicense the kernel only in the case of an emergency that makes it necessary. I think in his shoes I would have the same policy.
Linux (the kernel) comes under GPL version 2. Quoting Linus's note:
Also note that the only valid version of the GPL as far as the kernel is concerned is _this_ particular version of the license (ie v2, not v2.2 or v3.x or whatever), unless explicitly otherwise stated.
Is it certain that Linus will adopt GPL v3?
It depends. I know for a fact that he is concerned that GPL 3.0 will overreach.
Is there any risk of a fork over this? One Linux kernel led by Linus under GPL v2 and another led by someone else under GPL v3?
I think not. The technical culture of the Linux kernel group doesn't seem to me to be composed of licensing fanatics.
The GPL includes a clause that automatically shifts the license terms to any new version of the license itself. Isn't this a Trojan horse?
No, because the clause says "at your option." That is, the person receiving GPL v2 software gets to choose whether v2 or the later version applies.
But this means:
- The user will choose which particular version of GPL he prefers, not the original software author.
- This mobile target (GPL 2.0, 2.1, 2.x, 3.x) could be chosen appropriately in case of a lawsuit.
How can this undefined condition be a good thing?
The user chooses only for copies of the software still under GPL 2. The author is free to change his license to 3.0.
The condition you call "undefined" means users cannot have rights they might have been counting on summarily yanked out from under them. Which is a good thing: the GPL was supposed to be about guaranteeing the users' rights, after all.
You take code under GPL and then you are free to choose every single day of the week a different version of that license because you don't have to write that number anywhere. Shouldn't the people working on the GPL v3 remove this clause or require licensors to write somewhere the exact version number of the GPL "receiving" developers have chosen?
Why? What problem would this solve?
It certainly wouldn't do anything for the users, who would be losing options rather than gaining them.
Quoting from Insider Hints at GPL Changes:
The current version of the GPL, which was last updated in 1991, fails to trigger the open source license if a company alters the code, but does not distribute its software through a CD or floppy disk.... But the rule does not apply to companies that distribute software as a service, such as Google and eBay, or even dual-license companies like Sleepycat.... "That means a bunch of innovation is being taken out. This is an important problem for us working on the new GPL to get right."
Wouldn't expanding its virality to software distributed as a service be a dangerous path?
I never really thought virality was a good idea in the first place, so I have to see this as a step in the wrong direction. I've used GPL on many of my own projects, but more as a gesture of solidarity with the majority in the community than because of any attachment to the GPL itself.
The pros and cons of "viral licensing" is something I've been thinking about a lot recently. As far back as 1998, I suspected that allegiance to the GPL is actually evidence that open source developers don't really believe their own story. That is, if we really believe that open source is a superior system of production, and therefore that it will drive out closed source in a free market, then why do we think we need infectious licensing? What do we think we gain by punishing defectors?
Stronger virality punishes defectors more effectively, but also has more tendency to scare people away from joining the open source community in the first place. Where the optimum point is all depends on how important punishing defectors really is relative to the economic pressures in favor of open source. My current belief is that the free market will do quite a good job of punishing defectors on its own; thus, increasing virality is a bad move.
Mind you, in saying this I'm not defending or excusing anybody who is cheating on the GPL's terms now. Whether our not viral licensing is a good idea for the community may be debatable, but software authors who choose it have a right to expect that those terms will be obeyed.
On gpl-violations.org there are some examples of companies that used GPLed code for their products, but "did not make any source code offering or include the GPL license terms with their products."
Most of them signed a "Declaration to Cease and Desist from further distributing their product without adhering to the license terms," while one of them refused to sign the declaration and so "the netfilter/iptables project was compelled to ask the court for a preliminary injunction," banning the distribution of that product unless the company "complies with all obligations imposed by the GNU GPL."
Why does this happen? Don't business companies understand GPL terms? Or maybe they try to cheat, hoping that nobody will discover them?
It's probably both. That is, some companies cheat and others blunder. There are probably some that have both cheated and blundered.
But if they prefer to keep the source code undisclosed, why don't they choose BSD-licensed code?
The blunderers don't know what they're doing. The cheaters may not know of BSD equivalents of what they want.
Maybe because they chose to put Linux in their embedded products just because it's one of the current buzzwords in IT and not because it is technically better than BSD systems?
I can't read the minds of blunderers and cheaters, and would not want to immerse myself in their thinking if I could.
Is managing a successful software company really possible, providing all your code under GPL?
Cygnus ran that way at a profit for years. I think Red Hat does today, though I'm not certain about the status of Cygwin.
But Red Hat doesn't release all of its software as open source.
I believe they make their real money on a product (Red Hat Enterprise Linux) that is completely GPLed. If you know differently, can you tell me what other licenses they are using?
It seems that Red Hat is selling its GNU/Linux distribution under a sort of user license that limits the freedom No. 2 provided by the GPL. The short version of the story, as I was told, is that if I buy a CD/DVD with the last Red Hat version and I make an ISO from that and put that online, I'll get sued.
The same thing happens with computer magazines. They cannot include any Red Hat CD because the term Red Hat is a trademark or something like that, and they don't let the magazine use it without permission. And obviously they don't give you that permission. Magazines must use Fedora and never say Red Hat.
Excuse me while I fire up a browser and research this a bit... Ahhh... right, if you republish a RHEL CD in either form, you could get sued for illegal use of the embedded trademarks. I think I just found the user license in question.
So the answer to your question is yes... Red Hat is a demonstration that you can have a profitable business based on entirely GPL code. You may have to play some interesting tricks with trademark law to do it, though. As I understand it now, what Red Hat has done is legally blocked republication of its entire RHEL distribution even though any component part is still GPLed and therefore freely redistributable.
Damn, that's clever and sneaky. I like it. It serves everybody: Red Hat gets a fence around its product, but all the community objectives of open source licensing are still met.
Do you consider this behavior coherent?
Yes. It makes logical and even ethical sense.
Isn't one of the community objectives of open source licensing the possibility to share the code? So how can the fact that every single piece is still under GPL and thus redistributable, but if I take the whole CD/ISO it will be covered by the US trademark laws, be acceptable?
That's the beauty of it. The possibility of sharing the code is unaffected--what you can't "share" is Red Hat's integration work and branding.
Some time ago, Linux abandoned BitKeeper because the company behind it didn't like the reverse-engineering effort done by Andrew Tridgell. Larry McVoy, BitKeeper's primary author, said, "You can compete with me, but you can't do so by riding on my coattails. Solve the problems on your own, and compete honestly. Don't compete by looking at my solution."
This is not the first reverse-engineering effort to write an open source tool that uses a proprietary protocol; just think of Samba or Gaim.
Is freedom more important than innovation?
The question is falsely posed. Freedom and innovation are not opposites; they are intimately connected. Proprietary protocols and the monopolies they spawn prevent innovation. Open standards encourage it.
McVoy is engaging in a rhetorical deception, one he copied from Microsoft. He wants you to believe that innovation will stop if software vendors can't collect secrecy rents. But this is pure, unadulterated bullshit. Is innovation in automobile designs stopped because auto designers can look at each other's engines?
Open source designers think up and deploy more new ways to do things every week than the proprietary industry can manage in six months. The reason is lower process friction--when you want to experiment, you don't have to argue with a boss or risk being shot down because your company thinks it might be too disruptive of their existing product line. You just do it.
Freedom is the oxygen of innovation, not its enemy.
So why didn't Andrew develop a new protocol and made it an open standard? I mean, he chose to write a free tool to handle a proprietary protocol. He chose freedom, not innovation. Only after the company stopped the support of the free client did they start a new project (Git).
Tridge did this because what he needed was a tool to extract BitKeeper metadata from the kernel archive--data which had been put in BitKeeper but which McVoy did not own. Writing a new protocol would have been beside the point--what he wanted was to get the metadata out of jail.
Everyone is free to choose where to put his own data. Linus chose BitKeeper years ago. So the root of the problem is that someone chose a proprietary application from the very beginning.
That's right. But Linus's choice should not constrain either Linus or other developers from getting at their own data.
If I don't want to have my data trapped in a proprietary format, I will avoid those proprietary applications. What is the sense of using the proprietary application and then asking for an open source tool to access the data?
You own your data, even when it's trapped in a proprietary application. There is a term in American law, conversion, for the act of refusing to give back property of others that has been entrusted to you for safekeeping. This is probably illegal wherever you live, too, and when proprietary vendors trap your data and refuse to let you get at it except through their application, they may be committing a crime.
In the open source world, we think this gives you a right to do whatever is necessary to retrieve it. The wrong, if there is one, isn't in creating open source rescue tools as Tridge did; it is on the part of proprietary vendors who refuse to provide facilities for export to an open, fully documented dump format.
In fact, in this case McVoy did provide such an export format. All Tridge did was figure out the magic words that tell the BitKeeper server to dump that information to the client. His rescue tool--I've seen it--is a trivial script. So there was no wrongdoing on either side here, just McVoy shooting his mouth off because Tridge figured out how to use a poorly documented feature.
If open standards are the final goal, why should people write open source software to support proprietary protocols?
To support users who don't want their data to be trapped in proprietary applications under vendor control.
So why did those users choose proprietary applications at first?
Sometimes they might have no choice. Sometimes they might believe that choosing a proprietary application is the best choice. It doesn't really matter which of these is the case. Either way, they have a right to get their data out of jail once they've realized their mistake.
But if we keep writing open source software for people "trapped" in proprietary formats or applications, people will keep choosing them just because there is an "emergency exit door"!
Shouldn't we use this "trap" to attract people to open source software directly? If we keep accepting and helping people with proprietary formats, why should they change software and formats?
Because the software they're using is, in general, badly engineered, inflexible, and full of security holes. By supporting proprietary formats, we reduce the friction costs of migrating out of that world.
What type of relation do you see between the open source world and standards such as IEEE standards and de facto standards?
A very intimate and symbiotic one: each requires the other. Most people already understand one direction of the dependence--for open source to flourish, strong open standards for communications protocols and data formats are essential.
What a lot of people have not figured out yet--though the W3C and IETF are moving in this direction--is that open standards depend on open source reference implementations. It is extremely difficult to specify everything that needs to be specified in a technical standard; in some notorious cases, such as the way Microsoft perverted Kerberos, vendors have used that underspecification as a loophole to create implementations that locked in their customers. Open source reference implementations are the only known way to prevent such abuse.
Do you think that organizations such as W3C and IETF should actively verify and enforce that protocols and formats proposed by companies not be patented? I'm thinking of Cisco and the VRRP story....
Yes. A "standard" with blocking patents is a dangerous trap.
The upcoming GPL version should cover some new aspects such as patents. Do you think that this could worry businesses more than its virality and make lots of people even more nervous about adopting it?
It depends on how sweeping the new clauses are. Without seeing them, I can't really evaluate the possibility.
Some big companies announced that they will share their patents to cover Linux and some other open source projects. I don't understand how this can be a good thing. If every open source developer is against software patents, shouldn't we try to boycott the system? What is the sense if we say, "We are against software patents, but if any big companies patents things for us, it's better"?
I don't hear anybody saying this. The open source community is not asking companies to patent anything, merely accepting those grants when they happen. It's not like we could stop them, really.
I don't understand your last sentence. If someone gives you a present, you will probably accept. But if you are against something and the present is related to that "something," shouldn't you refuse the present?
I didn't hear anyone saying, "Thanks, IBM, we don't want your patents because we are against this system and we don't want to support it or being part of it." Don't you think they should have?
Why do that, rather than encouraging IBM in an action that subverts the system?
I don't think IBM behavior subverts the system. I think they did that move to get the press talking about them and Linux, and to tell clients that they will be covered by IBM lawyers if needed. However, the point is that since Linux people didn't refuse this move, now they have an entanglement with IBM patents. Doing so, they sent a message to the people that is clearly not "we are against patents."
I don't agree with that interpretation. Think back to the days of the Cold War. If the Soviets let some dissidents out of jail, would you have told them "No, put those people back in jail" because you thought accepting that action meant supporting the Gulag?
It's a strange example.
Just follow the logic.
Let's get back to the GPL. Aren't you concerned that you'll stir up a political mess by saying we don't need it? Some people might think you're trying to wreck GPL 3.0 before it launches.
No. I've actually been making the argument that the GPL is rationally justified only if open source is an inferior system of production since 1998. But back then, the evidence that open source is a superior system was much less clear. I believed it, having written the first analytical argument for that proposition in The Cathedral and the Bazaar in late 1996. I already knew what that implied about the superfluousness of the GPL when I wrote the paper--but until there was a lot more real-world evidence, I knew the argument would be difficult for GPL fans to hear.
In fact, it's political considerations that kept me quiet for a while. For a long time, I judged that any harm the GPL might be doing was outweighed by the good. For some time after I stopped believing that, I didn't see quite enough reason to fight with the GPL zealots. I'm speaking up now because a couple of curves have intersected. It has become more apparent how much of an economic advantage open source development has, and my judgment of the utility of the GPL has fallen.
Yes, many people will view this as heresy. Fine--it's part of my job to speak heresy in ways other people might feel afraid to do. If there is any better use for being famous and respected than using that status to question orthodoxy, I haven't found it yet.
Federico Biancuzzi manages the BSD section of the Italian magazine Linux&C. As a freelancer, he writes for ONLamp, LinuxDevCenter, and SecurityFocus.
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Showing messages 1 through 24 of 24.
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not all code can be open source
2006-02-06 18:13:31 agentskip007 [Reply | View]
One thing that all supporters of the open source movement fail to realize is that software is built to automate\imporve\enhance business processes.
Superior business processes are often a key part of competitive advantage in the free market place. If this kind of software is open source, then companies can reverse engineer their competitors business processes (or critical segments) out of that software. Companies will never risk exposing their core processes to competitors in this manner.
This does not mean that open source software does not have its place. Rather, it plase rests in the common tools upon which software that improves\automates these business processes are built. These applications includes operating systems and databases, where FOSS already has strong showings.
FOSS also is moving into some of the more common business activities\services that have become commodities and are a part of all businesses. These include Consumer Relationship Management (SugarCRM). In this case, FOSS will serve as the least common denominator that all businesses need. Then, the business will take the code private and enahnce it with their own processes and knowledge.
Under this model, companies that provide computer solutions will need to use the BSD and others like it so that they can leagally sell a enhanced solution to their client company (an open source base enhanced with that companies busienss processes and expertise that is). It must be done this way because the cilent company needs to have non-disclosure agreements with consulting firms, something they cannot do with GPL, which requires disclosure to all who enhance it.
GPL only fits into this model in cases where the company has the expertise in-house to customize the open source software or only needs the out-of-the-box functionality provided by the FOSS.
As a person responsible for business decisions around IT, I can tell you that this is how it works in my company and in all others I know of. The benifits of FOSS are clear. However, the disclosure of business processes\expertise and corresponding risk of losing ones competitive advantage far outweigh the benefits of FOSS develppment for such applications that require that kind of disclosure.
For those who consider me a point-haired manager, consider that I have an undergraduate in CS and a manage a small project team where I architect\code\unit test Java applications. So I share your technical passion and use\customize open source software everyday. I look forward to joining an open source project once I finish my masters degree.
I would also like to thank all open source developers for their contributions thus far.
Kind Regards,
Mike
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How will you pay me?
2005-09-24 11:45:07 ashewmaker [Reply | View]
Consider, for a moment, licensing in terms of the question, "How will you pay me?" The GPL is a license that explains to other people that I want to be paid with information, and it doesn't prevent me from also asking to be paid with money. The BSD is a license that enables me to ask a person to pay me with information or money, but it generously does not require either. A proprietary license enables me to just ask for the money.
Regardless of whether or not a person thinks that OSS will naturally prove its superiority to closed, proprietary software, that person must ask themself, "How do I want to be paid?"
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ESR ignores smaller projects and the individual situation
2005-09-23 18:51:43 Emile_van_Bergen [Reply | View]
ESR has a point in that the GPL is less needed to prevent forks than it may have been because forking hardly pays anymore or only pays in the short term, because you simply can't keep up in the long term.
However, that only applies in the situation where your contribution is small, and the work you're adding to is relatively large, such as Brand X GCC or Brand X Linux. And even there, considering how many people in kernel development track a moving baseline while maintaining their own patch sets intended for eventual inclusion in the baseline, the strategy of maintaining a proprietary addition does not seem as infeasible as ESR makes it sound.
You don't have to duplicate all future work by the internet to stay current. You only have to keep merging your own stuff. In short: the penalty for leaving the main branch, the Open one, isn't nearly as high as he implies.
A situation where it does not apply at all is where a large proprietary work successively absorbs small but innovative open source works.
ESR completely ignores this scenario. The small work does need to be tracked by the proprietary company, but such tracking is already a fact of life in large development projects composed of many smaller subprojects. An open source project would just be an unofficial subproject or vendor component that would have to be tracked and re-merged whenever new features are released that are attractive.
Without the GPL to protect the smaller works, they'll simply help the big proprietary projects to stay up to date.
Even if, /if/ our production model is so superior that we can win even while contributing to the other model for free, I personally feel that companies that don't pay me, have no right to impose any more licensing restrictions on /users of my software/ than I would impose.
Hence my choice for the GPL for everything I release publically. If a company wants to restrict indirect users of my work, they'll have to pay me for a different license.
That provides a source of income that I would lack if I would only make money on services. If /everyone/ was in that boat, I would not care because I get other people's software in return for my software, allowing me to provide the same services as everyone else, and compete. But as long as proprietary software companies want access to my work, without giving me access to theirs, I need to be compensated in a different way.
ESR ignores that mechanism too. I don't know how important it is to the overall picture, but it /is/ important to me.
When two methods of production provide the same total output or arrive at the same balance overall, one may have much larger variation or a much larger internal tensions in the balance than the other.
Same total output is not the only metric to judge a system.
If you can produce as much with slaves as with people with rights, then that only says that the systems are equal in terms of output, not that the systems are equal.
Cheers,
Emile.
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Where is the proof?
2005-07-04 11:52:47 Corbeau [Reply | View]
I can understand that ESR find the GPL useless and even embarrassing: to stand behind his position of opensource superioty as a development process, it has to answer such questions as "If FOSS process is so great, why you need the viral clause in the GPL?" To stay coherent, he has no choice has stating such thing taht the GPL is not need in his agenda. I can easily imagine the doubt toward such an answer from his listeners which, for me, explain why he considers the GPL as being an obstacle to FOSS adoption. Seen as such, yes it is, but in my opinion, this is more a educational concern and stating that the GPL is no more need and harm opensource just give credits to people that consider the GPL as a cancer or a treat to innovation.
Whatever the point of view on the question, I find that the argument that the GPL is useless and have no teeth still need to be proved. There was a lot of project that have passed under the GPL without even a lawsuit, and I'm pretty sure that a lot of software and patches will not have been released without it. Personnaly, my clients will most of the time doesn't allow me to release source code of their products or even the tools they used if it wasn't necessary by the license. That's included some patch from web site engine, browser and compilers. The concern of GPLv3 authors regarding this is not fake paranoia: lot of codes aren't redistributed back to the community inside our more and more services-oriented market.
And for examples of where the opensource approach as failed, there can hardly be any example available for free, by definition. We simply know that a lot of improvement in the bsd flavours never get release, and we had to wait very long for an ssl plugin under apache, since most people where using the fortify fork before an apache-ssl patch was released. Being apache available under the GPL and may be will you have get far sooner. But this can be regarded just as hypothetic as ESR statements; you have to make your own opinion on this issue. Personnaly, I prefer a pragmatic defense which doesn't release any value to my stuff, instead of a naively idealistic approach that's just try to prove the superiority of one process method over another. I need more and more free softwares because I believe in the basic freedoms they give me. I will not bid my rights under them just to prove to unbeliever that opensource process is superior to their way of doing it.
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Only for large projects
2005-07-02 05:21:42 cjcoats [Reply | View]
People who do what the GPL tries to prevent (e.g., closed source forks of open source projects) wind up injuring only themselves. They trap themselves unto competing with a small in-house development group against the much larger one in the parent open source project, and failing.
This is wrong for smaller, more narrowly focused projects.
I am lead maintainer on such a project, with quite
small resources at my command (mostly me...): see
Real benefit of the GPL.
2005-07-02 02:26:08 Franki [Reply | View]
I see the real benefit of the GPL being that companies like Microsoft can't incorporate OSS code into their operating system and then sell it on to clients all the while trumpeting their wonderful innovations and not disclosing that their wonderful innovation rides on the back of lots of OSS code.
If they want to tout that their proprietry model of software developement is the better one, let them do it without using OSS code. Since we don't have Windows code to compare it to, we can't know for sure if there isn't already any OSS code in there, but at least the law would be on our side should the situation ever arise where we do find OSS code in Windows.
GPL means that companies have to either support Open Source, or not. It ensures they can't pay it lip service and take what they need from it without actually offering anything in return.
What Sun is doing with Solaris and Java is an indication of the OSS world without the GPL. Sun gets to go on about how they support Open Source while controlling their contribution with an Iron first under a non GPL compatible license. There is not allot of freedom in their interpretation of OSS. The GPL wouldn't have allowed them to do that.
rgds
Franki
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Existing projects vs. donated code
2005-07-01 11:28:43 ksfiles [Reply | View]
I think that a small number of companies may be dissuaded from tightly linking their code to GPL code due to concerns of distribution constrained by the GPL.
But it's clear that a number of companies *like* the reciprocal nature of the GPL, as demonstrated by their releasing large bodies of their own code under the license. See, e.g., SugarCRM, CUPS, and MySQL.
The GPL allows them to release code they have created for their own products, without worrying that a competitor can instantly leapfrog their product by making a proprietary fork of it, as would be possible under the BSD, Apache or similar licenses.
Some companies, like Sun, may choose licenses with even more control, like CDDL/MPL, and some may donate orphaned code like IBM with Derby. However, I think that for many, the GPL strikes a nice balance between retaining some control/rights, and giving users and developers as many rights as possible.
--kirby
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lots of positive examples
2005-07-01 11:14:00 gregg_tavares [Reply | View]
One of the things I've seen frustrating in all the responses to this topic is that everyone appears to be concentrating on Linux as the only example of a GPLed project and that it would have failed if it wasn't GPLed. I'd just like to point out that
Apache
Python
PHP
Subversion
Lua
Boost
and thousands of other high profile projects have done just fine under a more BSD style license. I'm not trying to solve the arguement of which is better, just pointing out that there is ample evidence that the GPL is not required for successful open source projects.
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They overlook a worse aspect of the GPL.
2005-07-01 11:03:57 grint [Reply | View]
They're discussing the effects of "copyleft" on closed-source developers, but like every other discussion of this I've seen, they fail to mention that the GPL unnecessarily applies also to other open-source developers.
There is no good reason I've heard why the GPL (version 3, at least) shouldn't make an exception for other open source to at least allow a GPL'd property like the "readline" library, to be linked into programs with non-GPL open source software like something BSD-licensed, without requiring "the whole" to be licensed under terms like the GPL's.
Now, I know that some (maybe RMS) say there's no problem putting the whole under GPL, even if parts are BSDL'd, but others, like me, disagree, and that inhibits the progress of open source development. -
They overlook a worse aspect of the GPL.
2005-07-02 18:50:35 cubrewer [Reply | View]
This limitation on the freedom of developers is the explicit intention of RMS. It is discussed in relation to the LGPL .. the gist is "Please do not use the LGPL. We (RMS and the FSF) prefer you the GPL like our readline library in order to force the GPL on projects" (go google "Why you shouldn't use the LGPL").
I guess if you're a fan of the GPL "virality" then this is a great idea... and if not, then not.
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Oh really?
2005-07-01 07:04:40 paul@paul-robinson.us [Reply | View]
The fact being that if the GPL were not really important to the goals of open-source software, then why does Microsoft find it such a horrible thing that its executives decry it as "a cancer" and other perjorative terms? I never hear this about the BSD license or other open source licenses, so there must be some reason Microsoft finds this license so distasteful.
The simple fact of the matter is the GPL prohibits a third party from making any product using that license into a proprietary one. None of the other licenses out there give the kind of protections against misuse of the ideals of open source, that if the author of the work chooses to share it with others, other people do not obtain any privelege to then take that same material and make it proprietary simply by adding something to it.
The GPL doesn't place any obligations upon a user of a product, or on a private modification, nor does it do anything to restrict others in the development of a competing product. It only imposes a restriction upon those who want to make modifications and release the product to the public. They cannot make those modifications proprietary and not allow everyone else to see them.
If we did not have the GPL or some equivalent license requiring that modifications of publicly released changes also be public, many of the advantages in functionality would have been "stolen" by proprietary software applications that no one else would have access to except the developers of the changes, and they could use those changes to lock people in. The inability to force proprietary lock-in is one of the strengths of the GPL and the reason that a company like Microsoft is deathly afraid of it.
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Oh really?
2005-07-01 07:37:59 rben13 [Reply | View]
I think the point that ESR is trying to make is that it doesn't matter if some company steals open source software and uses it to create a proprietary product. ESR believes that the advantages that FOSS have over proprietary software are so great that companies that engage in that kind of activity still won't be able to compete against FOSS solutions.
I'm not sure I'm ready to agree with ESR, but he's probably spent a lot more time thinking about it than I have.
Microsoft hates the GPL because it prevents them from using their favorite tactic, Embrace and Extend, to try to crush FOSS. What MS doesn't realize is that it's too late for even those kinds of moves. As ESR points out, the standards bodies have caught on to the kinds of things that MS does and are not relying more on reference implementations of standards which will block MS from taking over critical protocols.
More and more businesses and governments are realizing that FOSS just makes sense. It's not the GPL which is selling them, it's the total cost of ownership numbers. I think many of them also value the ability to customize the software as needed. Imagine what it is like if you are a small country that uses a language not supported by MS or other proprietary vendors. Your best chance for having office software that you can use in your native language is FOSS.
The bottom line, if I understand ESR correctly, is that the lowered process friction of FOSS means that the open source community will always be able to out innovate any proprietary company through sheer force of numbers. While this idea works well for popular FOSS projects like Open Office, Linux, and Apache, I'm not so sure it's true for every FOSS project. I think I would agree that the GPL might not be required on those projects, but it might still be important for smaller projects that don't generate so much interest that their developer base dwarfs that of any proprietary company. -
Oh really?
2005-07-06 10:11:48 john_betelgeuse [Reply | View]
One small problem with ESR's theory:
Closed (proprietary) hardware.
The NVidia graphics driver is the perfect example. The NVidia driver flat out sucks. NVidia has been totally unable to write, test and release a version of this driver that is even remotely as stable as the rest of the kernel.
The built-in advantages of the FOSS cannot, however, fix this problem, because the hardware is proprietary. -
Won't be able to compete?
2005-07-01 08:20:29 paul@paul-robinson.us [Reply | View]
I think the point that ESR is trying to make is that it doesn't matter if some company steals open source software and uses it to create a proprietary product. ESR believes that the advantages that FOSS have over proprietary software are so great that companies that engage in that kind of activity still won't be able to compete against FOSS solutions.
And this is why Microsoft's proprietary Windows operating system has 85% of the desktop market and Linux has about 8%? -
Won't be able to compete?
2005-07-01 09:22:26 rben13 [Reply | View]
Window's won't always have such a large market share. In fact, very few products have ever held such a large market share w/o government enforced monopolies. In a truely free market, such a monopoply is impossible.
MS is beginning to lose ground to Linux in the area of network servers and to Apple in desktops. Note that Mac OS/X is built on a FOSS operating system.
The vast majority of computers in the rapidly developing countries of China, India, Mexico and the entire continent of Africa, will wind up running FOSS simply because of the costs associated with proprietary software. China, India, Taiwan and Japan have already started talking about working on a Linux version specifically for their governmental needs.
The next generation of programmers from those countries are going to be trained first on Linux and other FOSS software.
So no, I don't think MS will be able to compete, not for the OS market. -
luckily for MS there are no "truly free markets"
2005-07-01 11:30:20 techHead [Reply | View]
Window's won't always have such a large market share. In fact, very few products have ever held such a large market share w/o government enforced monopolies. In a truely free market, such a monopoply is impossible.
Luckily for Microsoft such a "truly free market" doesn't obtain anywhere in the world and probably never will.
Microsoft's proprietary model doesn't have to be better than open source as a way of making software. All they have to do is make it too painful to create software around an open source model. You can bet that they're spending a lot of time and money figuring out how to do that. ESR is declaring victory way too early. -
Not so lucky for M$ there are no "truly free markets"
2005-07-02 07:42:52 evanh [Reply | View]
Without any regulations/enforcement, monopoly is the one sure outcome. M$ would stay completely uncontested in such an environment.
Evan
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Not so lucky for M$ there are no "truly free markets"
2005-07-12 23:14:50 bill@immosys.com [Reply | View]
Without any regulations/enforcement, monopoly is the one sure outcome
Incorrect. The only sure outcome is that the outcome is a transitory effect. Market share is not a horserace which has a defined beginning and end. It is an ongoing state of flux.
Microsoft is as big and dominant as it is becuase of certain regulations that free them of certain risks. The corporation is a fiction of government that eliminates what are otherwise limiting risks.
You really should do some real research on the history of monopolies. You'll find that a) they nearly always get that way through government assistance and b) by the time the government gets around to "doing something" it is usually too late - the fall has begun. Thus, the government was party to the problem, and claims to be a party to the solution when in fact it was irrelevant and at the party next door.
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Won't be able to compete?
2005-07-01 08:29:23 notchewie [Reply | View]
paul@paul-robinson.us writes, "And this is why Microsoft's proprietary Windows operating system has 85% of the desktop market and Linux has about 8%?"
Nice troll; well not really. You're completely ignoring historical facts with this statement. You should be looking at the increasing numbers of non-MS desktop on the market that are based on FOSS technology. -
Won't be able to compete?
2005-09-24 17:46:12 paul@paul-robinson.us [Reply | View]
paul@paul-robinson.us writes, "And this is why Microsoft's proprietary Windows operating system has 85% of the desktop market and Linux has about 8%?"
Nice troll; well not really. You're completely ignoring historical facts with this statement. You should be looking at the increasing numbers of non-MS desktop on the market that are based on FOSS technology.
Oh, so it's trolling to point out that the current, entire world-wide penetration of FOSS desktops is less than 15%. Looks like it's someone who, in the words of Jack Nickolson, "you can't handle the truth!" The stark reality is that FOSS has only been able to prevent vendor lock in because of licenses like GPL/LCPL, which prevent distributed software from being made closed. Apple's (current) OS is not an FOSS; it is a closed-source OS even though most of it comes from BSD, which isn't under a license which prevents closure.
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Existing projects vs. donated code
Resource Management: A Critical Look at RAII Michael Feathers
The Logs That Bind.. Michael Feathers
Outside the Design Boundary Michael Feathers
Can a program lie to you the way a story or essay can? Andy Oram
On the Blogs
- If I BSD/MIT it, a competitor could easily "borrow" my code, plunk it under a properitary licence, and they'd get profit off my work
-If I GPL it, my competitior can still "borrow", but if he wants to sell it, he has to share his source code et all.
Personally, for everything but trival code (which becomes beerware ;)), I GPL it. I might have to reconsider when v3 comes (I support Linus' view on the GPLv3 issue), but at the moment GPL works for me for the following reasons:
-Easy to understand (well known)
-Protects the code and the users