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[News] OSI Discusses Fakers, Free Software

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How Open Source Is Your Open Source?

,----[ Quote ]
| Michael DeHaan has an excellent post entitled "How Open Source Is Your Open 
| Source?". I dare say it is his best post despite getting in a few (Linux) 
| distro biased comments. He proposes a set of community standards that 
| determine the real health and openness of Open Source. In my opinion, a major 
| problem with OSI at the moment is that it perpetuates (mainly indeliberately) 
| that a mere license makes something Open Source. In my view, an Open Source 
| license is really the first step in making software Open Source.      
`----

http://www.opensource.org/node/357

Open Source is not about freedom, nor is it about licenses.

,----[ Quote ]
| Yes, freedom is necessary, but it's not sufficient. There's plenty of free 
| software out there that has no value because there is no community 
| surrounding the software. The pyramid of editors, developers, contributors, 
| and users is absent. You can maximize your freedom by living as a hermit. 
| Such a person is free to do anything they can do within their personal 
| resources -- which isn't much. Freedom is maximized in a society, which means 
| giving up some freedoms in exchange for the resources to make use of other 
| freedoms. "Your freedom to swing your fist ends when it hits my nose."       
`----

http://www.opensource.org/node/358


Related:

Microsoft not so 'open' after all?

,----[ Quote ]
| Head of open-source group says more than half of licenses don't pass muster
| 
| [...]
| 
| Michael Tiemann, president of the non-profit Open Source Initiative, said 
| that provisions in three out of five of Microsoft's shared-source licenses  
| that restrict source code to running only on the Windows operating system 
| would contravene a fundamental tenet of open-source licenses as laid out by 
| the OSI. By those rules, code must be free for anyone to view, use, modify as 
| they see fit.    
| 
| [...]
| 
| By his count, the OSI has rejected "two dozen" or so license applications for 
| language that restricted the use or redistribution of software and its source 
| code, even when the restrictions were written with what Tiemann 
| called "moral" intent. For instance, the OSI has rejected license 
| applications from Quakers and other pacifists who sought to prevent the use 
| of software for weapons such as landmines.     
| 
| "I am highly sympathetic to that point of view," he said. "But the OSI is not 
| in the business of legislating moral use. We allow all use, commercial or 
| non-commercial, mortal or medical."   
`----

http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9028318&intsrc=news_ts_head


OSI email group gets catty over Microsoft's Permissive License request

,----[ Quote ]
| Things got really interesting when Chris DiBona, longtime OSI member, open 
| source advocate, and open source programs manager for Google, Inc. chimed in: 
| 
|     I would like to ask what might be perceived as a diversion and maybe even 
|     a mean spirited one. Does this submission to the OSI mean that Microsoft 
|     will:  
| 
|     a) Stop using the market confusing term Shared Source
|     b) Not place these licenses and the other, clearly non-free , non-osd
|     licenses in the same place thus muddying the market further.
|     c) Continue its path of spreading misinformation about the nature of
|     open source software, especially that licensed under the GPL?
|     d) Stop threatening with patents and oem pricing manipulation schemes
|     to deter the use of open source software?
| 
|     If not, why should the OSI approve of your efforts? That of a company who 
|     has called those who use the licenses that OSI purports to defend a 
|     communist or a cancer? Why should we see this seeking of approval as 
|     anything but yet another attack in the guise of friendliness?    
`----

http://www.linux.com/feature/118677


Reverse-Halloween: The Marketing Checkbox Strategy

,----[ Quote ]
| Getting Microsoft software licenses OSI-approved and similarly getting 
| Microsoft's proprietary document formats approved at ISO are like painting an 
| old Chevrolet.  
| 
| [...]
| 
| This may be enough to satisfy the enterprise customer that he is achieving 
| something different. Clearly, the substance is no different: it's a lock-in 
| in sheep's clothing.  
`----

http://fussnotes.typepad.com/plexnex/2007/08/the-marketing-c.html


Merging "Open Source" and "Free Software"

,----[ Quote ]
| Of course, they are not. Other Shared Source licenses may very well be too 
| restrictive to be considered Open Source. But, Microsoft may conveniently 
| divert the attention from this little detail to the fact that some of 
| Shared Source licenses are Open Source.   
`----

http://www.libervis.com/article/merging_open_source_and_free_software
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