Date: Tue, 20 May 2003 16:32:25 -0400 From: "Eric S. Raymond" <esr@thyrsus.com> To: freebsd-chat@freebsd.org Subject: Re: Fwd: ESR/OSI's Unix/Linux-history-laden treatise on SCO vs. IBM Message-ID: <20030520203225.GA30587@thyrsus.com> In-Reply-To: <p05200f42baf03c5204ce@[192.168.254.205]> References: <p05200f42baf03c5204ce@[192.168.254.205]>
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I've been forwarded some mail from the freebsd-chat list.
Since I am trying to act as an advocate for the whole open-source
community here, and not just Linux, a few comments and responses:
Gary Swearingen:
> It contains a few whoppers:
>
> "...the typical complexity of software [...] doubles every eighteen
> months..."
Alas, this is true. You only think it isn't because you live in Unixland,
where we make steady (if not always successful) attenpts to hold down bloat.
If you ever take a job coding C++ for a Windows shop you will learn --
painfully -- how bad it is out there.
> a complaint that SCO slighted by saying he "introduced" Linux to the
> world, presumably instead of ESR's absurd claim the Linus "invented"
> it ("in 1991"!).
Is there some other year you would propose?
> the open-source community is "today's principal source of innovation
> in software"
I stand by that statement.
> In his wrap-up, he gives us this copyleftic whopper: "We wrote our
> Unix and Linux code as a gift and an expression of art, to be
> enjoyed by our peers and used by others for all licit purposes both
> non-profit and for-profit." (I dispute the phrase "all licit
> purposes" as regards the Linux kernel and other "GNU is not Unix"
> parts of "the Unix tradition".)
This supposed "copyleftic whopper" is something I have observed in
most of my peers since 1982, long before copyleft was invented.
> A couple of minor problems:
> He says Unix was invented in 1969, Linux in 1991 (as if they
> were invented within one year.)
This is within the normal usage of "invention" for technologies with
a complex history.
> He inappropriately refers to "Ronald McDonald's restaurants".
That's been fixed. (Hey, *you* try writing under pressure!)
> He is biased toward Linux and away from BSDs, saying:
> "We in the open-source community (and our allies) are more than
> competent to carry forward the Unix tradition we founded so many
> years ago."
> soon after saying:
> "The technical leading edge of the Unix tradition had moved
> elsewhere, notably to Linux."
Had I meant "We in the *Linux* community", that's what I would have
written. It says "open-source community" specifically to include you guys.
Don't be paranoid; you make enemies that way.
Remember that I'm writing for *lawyers*, not geeks. Like it or not,
"Linux" is the open-source community's big visible brand name. In
this context, talking about BSD would be falling off message. It's
not that I'm biased against BSD, it's that I know when it's good
tactics to ring the "Linux" bell that J. Random Lawyer will recognize
and then shut the hell up about the other details.
> I wish that he'd added to his several off-topic pot-shots, the fact that
> none of the industry-making "Unix tradition" would have been happened
> had courts developed their concept of software patents before the birth
> of Unix.
I specifically *refuse* to do that. We do not want to open up the can
of worms that would be involved in proposing wholesale reform of IP law.
That would be a great way to get slapped down and lose.
--
<a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/">Eric S. Raymond</a>
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