Date: Sat, 13 Mar 1999 08:05:37 -0800 From: Josef Grosch <jgrosch@ontario.mooseriver.com> To: "John S. Dyson" <dyson@iquest.net> Cc: Brett Glass <brett@lariat.org>, tlambert@primenet.com, jkh@zippy.cdrom.com, freebsd-advocacy@FreeBSD.ORG Subject: Re: O'Reilly article: Whence the Source: Untangling the Open Source/Free Software Debate Message-ID: <19990313080537.B44604@ontario.mooseriver.com> In-Reply-To: <199903130912.EAA01252@y.dyson.net>; from John S. Dyson on Sat, Mar 13, 1999 at 04:12:38AM -0500 References: <4.1.19990312162726.03ff1c40@localhost> <199903130912.EAA01252@y.dyson.net>
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On Sat, Mar 13, 1999 at 04:12:38AM -0500, John S. Dyson wrote: > Brett Glass said: > > > > >John Dyson is moving into the area of good non-GPL advocacy; I wish > > >he'd pull the rug out from under them while pointing at the flying > > >saucers a little more often, though. > > > > Perhaps John Dyson could be appointed the spokesperson on licensing > > matters, if he's willing. (He's doing it already.) > > > No way. > > What we really need is a carefully constructed research paper on > the various licensing terms, and the ramifications of each. I am > not the right person to do that. > [ DELETED ] John makes a very good point here. I am frequently amazed that people thrash back and forth over GPL vs. BSD licensing without having a clear understanding of what these licenses really mean. John Dyson and Brett Glass are both intelligent and clever people but that are not lawyers and specifically not intellectual property lawyers. One thing that we need to keep in mind is the law has its' own logic which often has no relationship with day to day reality. Another point to keep in mind is that the entire GPL and BSD license issues can be rendered moot by a large corporation willing to spend the money on lawyers. If, to randomly pull a large corporate name out of the air, General Electric was using GPL tools to manufacture product and was not living up to the specifics of GPL, according to Stallman, by not shipping source code with the product, there is little Stallman, the FSF, and Linux fanatics, etc. could do about it. GE could just bury Stallman and the FSF in legal expenses. GE probably has legal department of over 1000 people including several hundred lawyers and para-legals. Getting back to Johns point. A research paper is a very good idea but in writing this paper the author needs to consultant with competent legal authority for a clear understanding of subtleties and nuances of these 2 licenses. This kind of advice will not come cheap. A cousin of mine is an intellectual property lawyers in San Francisco. He gets $250.00 per hour and his billing rate in the middle of the scale. Josef -- Josef Grosch | Another day closer to a | FreeBSD 3.1 jgrosch@MooseRiver.com | Micro$oft free world | UNIX for the masses To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-advocacy" in the body of the message
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