Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Dean McEwan]

 After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB*
at www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry
on June 28th 2003, I am disturbed, I would like to
work on helping you people move to a OSL licence,
work out copyright owners and add the OSL option to each 
individual file one by one.

 I am willing to pay to track down unfindable people.

 This license does not lose you any additional freedoms,
in fact it is more legally secure so it gains you
legal security, as well as the traditional GNU freedoms
which RMS is jeopordising with a disgusting set of
*IDEALS*. 

In cases where members have died I will pay to track down their copyright "bequethers".

I will build up a copyright list for each file using BK 
and the CHANGELIST/SET files, as well as listed file
copyright holders in that file.

---
Cheers, Dean McEwan.
One of 4 members of the board of DM. TECH.



Need a new email address that people can remember
Check out the new EudoraMail at
http://www.eudoramail.com

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Miles Bader]

"Dean McEwan" <dean.mcewan@eudoramail.com> writes:
>  After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB*
> at www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry
> on June 28th 2003, I am disturbed, I would like to
> work on helping you people move to a OSL licence,

Hmmm, if I read that page, I see nothing dated `June 28th' that's
related to linux, or indeed to software at all.

-Miles
-- 
Is it true that nothing can be known?  If so how do we know this?  -Woody Allen

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Andre Hedrick]

Yeah the bit about "Nasal Sex with Dead Plants" just makes one wonder, is
a rose just a rose?  (note to self, don't read RMS's diary again)

Has anyone ever asked why it is okay for RMS to suggest it is okay to
invalidate another person/company license (BitKeeper is the example) yet
become offended when their own license is to desired to be invalidated?

Why is it that nothing but gpl can exist with gpl?

Why is that a superior option to license under which follows the
original spirit of GPL but goes further to promote the ideas of open
source is frowned upon?

Maybe it has something to do with self pollenation.

Cheers,

Andre Hedrick
LAD Storage Consulting Group

On 24 Jul 2003, Miles Bader wrote:

> "Dean McEwan" <dean.mcewan@eudoramail.com> writes:
> >  After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB*
> > at www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry
> > on June 28th 2003, I am disturbed, I would like to
> > work on helping you people move to a OSL licence,
> 
> Hmmm, if I read that page, I see nothing dated `June 28th' that's
> related to linux, or indeed to software at all.
> 
> -Miles
> -- 
> Is it true that nothing can be known?  If so how do we know this?  -Woody Allen
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
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> 

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 02:46:39 -0700, Andre Hedrick wrote:

> Has anyone ever asked why it is okay for RMS to suggest it is okay to
> invalidate another person/company license (BitKeeper is the example) yet
> become offended when their own license is to desired to be invalidated?

	Hmm... are you trolling?

	I case you are not, AFAIK RMS accepts any free software
license but prefers, in that order, the GNU GPL, the GNU LGPL, any GNU
GPL-compatible copyleft, any GNU GPL compatile license, any copyleft,
any free software.  I don't quite understand what do you mean by
invalidate, but BitKeeper is not even free software, and no one is
arguing it is.

	BTW, RMS never gave that list of preferred licenses' ordering,
I am just extrapolating from his writings.  Anyone who knows better,
please tell so.


> Why is it that nothing but gpl can exist with gpl?

	Not true.  Anything that doesn't *add* restrictions to those
of the GNU GPL can coexist.


> Why is that a superior option to license under which follows the
> original spirit of GPL but goes further to promote the ideas of open
> source is frowned upon?

	Does it go further?  Exactly how?

	BTW, I for myself frown upon the license proliferation.
Hopefully the OSL will serve to reduce the number of different
licenses by consolidating all the GNU-hating camp.


-- 
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Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Andre Hedrick]

http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=linux-kernel&m=105855801706434&w=2

[prev in list] [next in list] [prev in thread] [next in thread]

List:     linux-kernel
Subject:  Bitkeeper
From:     Richard Stallman <rms () gnu ! org>
Date:     2003-07-18 19:51:36
[Download message RAW]

    > If you are trying to copy BK, give it up.  We'll simply follow in the
    > footsteps of every other company faced with this sort of thing and change
    > the protocol every 6 months.  Since you would be chasing us you can never
    > catch up.  If you managed to stay close then we'd put digital signatures
    > into the protocol to prevent your clone from interoperating with BK.

I think it would be appropriate at this point to write a free client
that talks with Bitkeeper, and for Linux developers to start switching
to that from Bitkeeper.  At that point, McVoy will face a hard choice:
if he carries out these threats, he risks alienating the community
that he hopes will market Bitkeeper for him.
-

For those who can not (will not) read, clearly the suggestion for somebody
to take up the cause to develop a "Bitkeeper" clone.  Know the details of
the license it was issued to the community to use.

All know the response and the history of not threats but action by the FSF
to defend their license and works.

I am tired of this game.

Later

Andre Hedrick
The Linux X-IDE guy, second.

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003, Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra wrote:

> On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 02:46:39 -0700, Andre Hedrick wrote:
> 
> > Has anyone ever asked why it is okay for RMS to suggest it is okay to
> > invalidate another person/company license (BitKeeper is the example) yet
> > become offended when their own license is to desired to be invalidated?
> 
> 	Hmm... are you trolling?
> 
> 	I case you are not, AFAIK RMS accepts any free software
> license but prefers, in that order, the GNU GPL, the GNU LGPL, any GNU
> GPL-compatible copyleft, any GNU GPL compatile license, any copyleft,
> any free software.  I don't quite understand what do you mean by
> invalidate, but BitKeeper is not even free software, and no one is
> arguing it is.
> 
> 	BTW, RMS never gave that list of preferred licenses' ordering,
> I am just extrapolating from his writings.  Anyone who knows better,
> please tell so.
> 
> 
> > Why is it that nothing but gpl can exist with gpl?
> 
> 	Not true.  Anything that doesn't *add* restrictions to those
> of the GNU GPL can coexist.
> 
> 
> > Why is that a superior option to license under which follows the
> > original spirit of GPL but goes further to promote the ideas of open
> > source is frowned upon?
> 
> 	Does it go further?  Exactly how?
> 
> 	BTW, I for myself frown upon the license proliferation.
> Hopefully the OSL will serve to reduce the number of different
> licenses by consolidating all the GNU-hating camp.
> 
> 
> -- 
>  _   Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra     +41 (21) 648 11 34
> / \  http://br.geocities.com./lgcdutra/         +41 (78) 778 11 34
> \ /  Answer to the list, not to me directly!    +55 (11) 5686 2219
> / \  Rate this if helpful: http://svcs.affero.net/rm.php?r=leandro
> 
> 
> -
> To unsubscribe from this list: send the line "unsubscribe linux-kernel" in
> the body of a message to majordomo@vger.kernel.org
> More majordomo info at  http://vger.kernel.org/majordomo-info.html
> Please read the FAQ at  http://www.tux.org/lkml/
> 

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 13:02:48 -0700, Andre Hedrick wrote:

> List:     linux-kernel
> Subject:  Bitkeeper
> From:     Richard Stallman <rms () gnu ! org>
> Date:     2003-07-18 19:51:36

	You didn't need to copy all that, this is well known.  But you
were talking a quite different story, about invalidating licenses and
such.  I fail to see the relation, as the original message from
Stallman was about a proprietary lock-in game threat.


> For those who can not (will not) read, clearly the suggestion for somebody
> to take up the cause to develop a "Bitkeeper" clone.  Know the details of
> the license it was issued to the community to use.

	I can't quite see your point... what's the problem with a
clone?  It certainly isn't immoral or illegal.  An EULA tastes no
better comming from McVoy than coming from Gates.  Cloning of Unix,
BTW, was performed by a young Finnish student some years ago, and now
there's a nasty US company going after people who helped
him... certainly this is proof cloning is bad?


> All know the response and the history of not threats but action by the FSF
> to defend their license and works.

	So what's the problem exactly?


> I am tired of this game.

	Which game?

	BTW, can you answer what's so fantastic about the OSL apart
from allying with ESR instead of RMS?  Are you trying to take sides in
an ego clash, or do you have arguments supporting one or another in a
rational conversation?


-- 
 _   Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra     +41 (21) 648 11 34
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\ /  Answer to the list, not to me directly!    +55 (11) 5686 2219
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Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 11:05:40PM +0200, Leandro Guimar?es Faria Corsetti Dutra wrote:
> > For those who can not (will not) read, clearly the suggestion for somebody
> > to take up the cause to develop a "Bitkeeper" clone.  Know the details of
> > the license it was issued to the community to use.
> 
> 	I can't quite see your point... what's the problem with a
> clone?  It certainly isn't immoral or illegal.  

A clone is illegal because you'd have to reverse engineer to do the clone
and reverse engineering is allowed for the purpose of interoperability,
not for the purpose of making a clone.  I suspect that the reverse
engineering exceptions were put in place to make sure that vendors
couldn't lockin their customers with no recourse for the customers.
In other words, your data is your data no matter where you store it.
Perfectly reasonable sentiment.

BK already provides more than enough in the way of interoperability,
both on the way in and on the way out.  It's trivial to get your 
data out of BK as well as your metadata.  It's a small perl script
to get all the info out and plop it into some other system, we're
much better about that than any free or commercial system.

In other words, reverse engineering is ok if the product doesn't
provide access to your data, we do that already, poof, no reverse
engineering allowed.  So it's illegal to reverse engineer BK.  

Given that, you can see why some people are disgusted that RMS would
suggest it is OK to clone BK.  At that point, it becomes a statement of
"it's OK to do illegal stuff if you are making GPLed software".  

Hardly the sort of thing you want on record in a public forum from a
free software leader when people are starting to question whether or
not the free software they have is actually legal.  
-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 14:57:44 -0700, Larry McVoy wrote:

> A clone is illegal because you'd have to reverse engineer to do the clone
> and reverse engineering is allowed for the purpose of interoperability,
> not for the purpose of making a clone.

	First, you are too US-centric.

	Second, if this is only what is allowed, then we are living in
a kind of a surreptitious world police state.  Not a free world by any
means.  In this circumstances, I will consider any clone attempt a
honourable act of civil disobedience necessary for the long-term
survival of humankind, barring the Second Coming.

	Now, your interpretations of others' words are certainly
self-serving.  If I define a clone as a workalike, one has to do no
reverse engineering.  It would suffice to do the same tasks, and use
your own interoperability stuff to get data back and forth.


> Given that, you can see why some people are disgusted that RMS would
> suggest it is OK to clone BK.  At that point, it becomes a statement of
> "it's OK to do illegal stuff if you are making GPLed software".  

	Not only self-serving, but libellous.  With each word you
expose even more the evil.


> Hardly the sort of thing you want on record in a public forum from a
> free software leader when people are starting to question whether or
> not the free software they have is actually legal.

	Even if I can't agree him on political or moral subjects, in
this instance RMS acted exactly as I expected, and I praise him for
it.  I hope he's proud for it, but not proud enough as to damage his
philosophy even more.


-- 
 _   Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra     +41 (21) 648 11 34
/ \  http://br.geocities.com./lgcdutra/         +41 (78) 778 11 34
\ /  Answer to the list, not to me directly!    +55 (11) 5686 2219
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Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Gaël Le Mignot]

 >   BK  already   provides   more   than  enough   in   the  way   of
 > interoperability,  both on  the way  in and on  the way  out.  It's
 > trivial to get your data out  of BK as well as your metadata.  It's
 > a small perl  script to get all the info out  and plop it into some
 >  other  system, we're  much  better about  that  than  any free  or
 > commercial system.

And MS  Word allows to  export data in  plain text or html.   But it's
still allowed to  reverse MS Word to make  a .doc import/export plugin
for OpenOffice or Abiword.

This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
protocols. 

All data formats and protocol  should be publically available. This is
absolute required for  a full inter-operability, and to  give to users
the freedom of  choice. If they are not,  then European laws guarantee
us that we are free to try to find out by ourselves. And I'm glad this
law exists.

-- 
Gael Le Mignot "Kilobug" - kilobug@nerim.net - http://kilobug.free.fr
GSM         : 06.71.47.18.22 (in France)   ICQ UIN   : 7299959
Fingerprint : 1F2C 9804 7505 79DF 95E6 7323 B66B F67B 7103 C5DA

Member of HurdFr: http://hurdfr.org - The GNU Hurd: http://hurd.gnu.org

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

On Fri, Jul 25, 2003 at 11:56:34AM +0200, Ga?l Le Mignot wrote:
> 
>  >   BK  already   provides   more   than  enough   in   the  way   of
>  > interoperability,  both on  the way  in and on  the way  out.  It's
>  > trivial to get your data out  of BK as well as your metadata.  It's
>  > a small perl  script to get all the info out  and plop it into some
>  >  other  system, we're  much  better about  that  than  any free  or
>  > commercial system.
> 
> And MS  Word allows to  export data in  plain text or html.

Which is a lossy export.  Of course reverse engineering of Word is allowed,
you didn't get all your data.  You can get *all* of your data out of BK,
by definition.  BK can start with the data it exports and rebuild the 
revision history.  So can you.  So you are needlessly arguing.

> This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
> protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
> to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
> protocols. 

Really?  Show me that law please.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Matthias Andree]

On Fri, 25 Jul 2003, Larry McVoy wrote:

> > This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
> > protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
> > to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
> > protocols. 
> 
> Really?  Show me that law please.

IANAL, but check the "German Gesetz über Urheberrecht und verwandte
Schutzrechte" (Urheberrechtsgesetz/UrhG for short), §§ 69c, 69d, 69e.
http://bundesrecht.juris.de/bundesrecht/urhg/index.html

It concerns itself with "interoperability" of independently developed
programs with an existing one that you may use, (not with clones though,
the law formulates this differently); decompilation is allowed, unless
information needed to obtain interoperability is available, and there
are other restrictions.  License or contract clauses that attempt to run
counter to §69d 2,3 (backup copies to ensure future use) or §69e
(decompilation) are void.

Anyone interested should check out the exact words of the law though,
and in particular he should not rely on my translation.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

I've looked into this and I think if you dig into you'll find that this
stuff is all claused in "if they don't provide the API's to interoperate".

It's a moot point anyway because by the time anyone has come anywhere near
to reverse engineering what we do today we'll be years beyond that.  In 
some ways, that's fine, either we keep moving or die.  I can live with that.
On the other hand, I'm not about to hand our IP out on a silver platter.
Be legal or be in court...

On Sat, Jul 26, 2003 at 04:52:46AM +0200, Matthias Andree wrote:
> On Fri, 25 Jul 2003, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> > > This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
> > > protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
> > > to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
> > > protocols. 
> > 
> > Really?  Show me that law please.
> 
> IANAL, but check the "German Gesetz ?ber Urheberrecht und verwandte
> Schutzrechte" (Urheberrechtsgesetz/UrhG for short), ?? 69c, 69d, 69e.
> http://bundesrecht.juris.de/bundesrecht/urhg/index.html
> 
> It concerns itself with "interoperability" of independently developed
> programs with an existing one that you may use, (not with clones though,
> the law formulates this differently); decompilation is allowed, unless
> information needed to obtain interoperability is available, and there
> are other restrictions.  License or contract clauses that attempt to run
> counter to ?69d 2,3 (backup copies to ensure future use) or ?69e
> (decompilation) are void.
> 
> Anyone interested should check out the exact words of the law though,
> and in particular he should not rely on my translation.

-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Jesse Pollard]

On Thursday 24 July 2003 16:57, Larry McVoy wrote:
[snip
>
> In other words, reverse engineering is ok if the product doesn't
> provide access to your data, we do that already, poof, no reverse
> engineering allowed.  So it's illegal to reverse engineer BK.

Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...

Even though the data is still ASCII, the interrelationships between the
parts of the data is still "data". And extracting/viewing that would
require the reverse enginnering.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

On Fri, Jul 25, 2003 at 08:17:33AM -0500, Jesse Pollard wrote:
> On Thursday 24 July 2003 16:57, Larry McVoy wrote:
> [snip
> >
> > In other words, reverse engineering is ok if the product doesn't
> > provide access to your data, we do that already, poof, no reverse
> > engineering allowed.  So it's illegal to reverse engineer BK.
> 
> Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
> whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
> get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...

Oh, I see, you violate our license, your license is revoked, and
now you have the write to reverse engineer BK?  Show me the law which 
says that is true.

BK has a command that will take a BK tree and produce pure SCCS files,
there is even a GNU SCCS clone so tell me again you need to go poking
around in BK?

This whole thread is nuts.  First of all, there is no need to do so other
than to try and piss us off.  Second of all, it's completely unrealistic
to think you can reverse engineer it and keep up with our advancements.

> Even though the data is still ASCII, the interrelationships between the
> parts of the data is still "data". And extracting/viewing that would
> require the reverse enginnering.

And those relationships are available from the command line, using BK 
commands.  In other words, you're just trying to yank my chain.  Give
it a rest or join the rest of the wankers in my procmailrc.  Think about
that, one day you may need something from me and I'll never see your 
request, it will be languishing in /dev/null with the rest of wankers.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Gaël Le Mignot]

 >> Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
 >> whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
 >> get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...

 > Oh, I see, you violate our license, your license is revoked, and
 > now you have the write to reverse engineer BK?  Show me the law which 
 > says that is true.

I was working  on a project during  my free time using BK,  and then I
get employed  by a company  contributing to Subversion. My  license is
then void, but I want to be  able to still use the files and servers I
used before. Reverse is allowed, and moral, in this case.

 > BK has a command that will take a BK tree and produce pure SCCS files,
 > there is even a GNU SCCS clone so tell me again you need to go poking
 > around in BK?

Without any lose of data and meta-data ?
And still, my license being void, how could I do that ?

(of course, I am not in this  case - I'll never be crazy enough to use
a non-free software to store my data).

-- 
Gael Le Mignot "Kilobug" - kilobug@nerim.net - http://kilobug.free.fr
GSM         : 06.71.47.18.22 (in France)   ICQ UIN   : 7299959
Fingerprint : 1F2C 9804 7505 79DF 95E6 7323 B66B F67B 7103 C5DA

Member of HurdFr: http://hurdfr.org - The GNU Hurd: http://hurd.gnu.org

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Richard B. Johnson]

[-- Warning: decoded text below may be mangled, UTF-8 assumed --]
[-- Attachment #1: Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=X-UNKNOWN, Size: 2458 bytes --]

On Fri, 25 Jul 2003, [iso-8859-1] Gaël Le Mignot wrote:

>  >> Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
>  >> whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
>  >> get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...
>
>  > Oh, I see, you violate our license, your license is revoked, and
>  > now you have the write to reverse engineer BK?  Show me the law which
>  > says that is true.
>
> I was working  on a project during  my free time using BK,  and then I
> get employed  by a company  contributing to Subversion. My  license is
> then void, but I want to be  able to still use the files and servers I
> used before. Reverse is allowed, and moral, in this case.
>
>  > BK has a command that will take a BK tree and produce pure SCCS files,
>  > there is even a GNU SCCS clone so tell me again you need to go poking
>  > around in BK?
>
> Without any lose of data and meta-data ?
> And still, my license being void, how could I do that ?
>
> (of course, I am not in this  case - I'll never be crazy enough to use
> a non-free software to store my data).
>

Ever heard of "Peoplesoft"? Some IT types converted a
business database(s) to Peoplesoft. The license expired.
The company was out of business until it was reinstated.
The fee to reinstate the expired license was like extortion.
Never again. You don't want to __ever__ convert your company
databases to some proprietary format that must be unlocked
with a license key that can expire. If you run a business,
you need to have access to your database even if the company
that produced the software goes out of business so you can't
renew your license. If a software company won't provide such
a license, then you set yourself up for a stockholders revolt
and suit. You need to get a perpetual license. If the software
company doesn't provide one, go to the competition.

There are software databases and development environments
that need to be reviewed to make sure they don't expire.
Rational Software is an example. We use Rational for some
of our stuff. Can I extract my source-code from their
proprietary VOBs if they go out of business? Actually, yes.
So, even if we have expiring licenses, we can still get
access to our intellectual property. These things are
important, but alas... off-topic..

Cheers,
Dick Johnson
Penguin : Linux version 2.4.20 on an i686 machine (797.90 BogoMips).
            Note 96.31% of all statistics are fiction.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Rik van Riel]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003, Larry McVoy wrote:

> A clone is illegal because you'd have to reverse engineer to do the
> clone and reverse engineering is allowed for the purpose of
> interoperability, not for the purpose of making a clone.

This is a good point to remember, especially since you
contradict it later on in your own mail.

Making a program to extract data from a bitkeeper
repository is fine. It is covered by this interoperability
clause.

What is arguably (not) fine is making a program that does
everything bitkeeper does and does it in the same way, ie.
creating a bitkeeper clone.

However, that has nothing to do with a program that can
extract data from a bitkeeper repository but quite clearly
isn't a bitkeeper clone...

-- 
Great minds drink alike.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

On Sat, Jul 26, 2003 at 03:10:28PM -0400, Rik van Riel wrote:
> On Thu, 24 Jul 2003, Larry McVoy wrote:
> 
> > A clone is illegal because you'd have to reverse engineer to do the
> > clone and reverse engineering is allowed for the purpose of
> > interoperability, not for the purpose of making a clone.
> 
> This is a good point to remember, especially since you
> contradict it later on in your own mail.
> 
> Making a program to extract data from a bitkeeper
> repository is fine. It is covered by this interoperability
> clause.
> 
> What is arguably (not) fine is making a program that does
> everything bitkeeper does and does it in the same way, ie.
> creating a bitkeeper clone.
> 
> However, that has nothing to do with a program that can
> extract data from a bitkeeper repository but quite clearly
> isn't a bitkeeper clone...

I can't tell if we are in agreement or not.  As far as I've been
able to tell disallowing reverse engineering is not allowed in some
countries if and only if the application does not provide documented
ways to interoperate with the application.  People have tried to claim
otherwise but every time we've dug into we've found the laws to be pretty
reasonable and balanced.  They tend to have the view "if you are being
a jerk and locking people into your application with no way to get at
their data, then of course reverse engineering is allowed, how else are
people to get at their data?  On the other hand, if you are being nice
and you provide documented ways for people to get at their data then
reverse engineering is not allowed".  Which seems to make sense, right?
If corporations aren't trying to lock you into their products then they
ought to be able to enjoy some fruits from their labors without people
coping their work.  On the other hand, if corporations are abusing their
position then that protection goes away.

So far, nobody has come forward with a substantable claim that in their
country you can reverse engineer anything you want for any reason you
want with impunity.  

Maybe there is one but I haven't seen it yet.

Furthermore, this is all a moot point.  We're constantly evolving the
product -- for technical reasons -- and any clone is just going to be
stuck in a catchup game, much like clones of Word are stuck.  If a 
bunch of people think they can do better than us, more power to them,
as long as they do it legally.  I know that if I were on the other side
of the fence, I'd look at the problems BK was solving and try very hard
to not look at how BK is solving them - in fact, this is exactly what we
do with our competitors.  We compete primarily with ClearCase and I have
never run ClearCase, not even once.  There is too much of a chance that
they have a patent on something, or a patent coming, and we don't want
to take the same path they did so we are more likely to avoid the patent
problems.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra]

On Sat, 26 Jul 2003 12:23:22 -0700, Larry McVoy wrote:

> I can't tell if we are in agreement or not.  As far as I've been
> able to tell disallowing reverse engineering is not allowed in some
> countries if and only if the application does not provide documented
> ways to interoperate with the application.  People have tried to claim
> otherwise but every time we've dug into we've found the laws to be pretty
> reasonable and balanced.

	I find quite amusing your notion of reason and balance.  Or
rather sad...


> They tend to have the view "if you are being
> a jerk and locking people into your application with no way to get at
> their data, then of course reverse engineering is allowed, how else are
> people to get at their data?  On the other hand, if you are being nice
> and you provide documented ways for people to get at their data then
> reverse engineering is not allowed".  Which seems to make sense, right?

	No.  Reverse engineering is first a way of learning, then a
safeguard... if you need to learn (for there are no docs) and if you
need a safeguard (for you can't trust the vendor), then you need the
possibility of cloning.  Both of these conditions are much more likely
present in non-free software.  If both of them are fulfilled, it is
also very likely one will need to create a clone, but not necessarily
so.

	That you get so jumpy at the mere mention of reverse
engineering should have rang bells everywhere long time ago, not only
at the FSF proverbial HQ.


> If corporations aren't trying to lock you into their products then they
> ought to be able to enjoy some fruits from their labors without people
> coping their work.

	I assume you meant copying.

	No one is threatening to copy your source code.  People only want to
create a clone, not a copy: something that interoperates with the same
data structures, perhaps with the same user interfaces.

	Perhaps you are claiming the definition of protocols and data
structures as protected by copyright.  Perhaps, but it doesn't make
cloning less moral.  Laws and morals unfortunately are splitting
farther and farther.


-- 
 _   Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra     +41 (21) 648 11 34
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\ /  Answer to the list, not to me directly!    +55 (11) 5686 2219
/ \  Rate this if helpful: http://svcs.affero.net/rm.php?r=leandro

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Larry McVoy]

On Sat, Jul 26, 2003 at 09:46:28PM +0200, Leandro Guimar?es Faria Corsetti Dutra wrote:
> On Sat, 26 Jul 2003 12:23:22 -0700, Larry McVoy wrote:
> > They tend to have the view "if you are being
> > a jerk and locking people into your application with no way to get at
> > their data, then of course reverse engineering is allowed, how else are
> > people to get at their data?  On the other hand, if you are being nice
> > and you provide documented ways for people to get at their data then
> > reverse engineering is not allowed".  Which seems to make sense, right?
> 
> 	No.  Reverse engineering is first a way of learning, then a
> safeguard... 

It's not clear to me that you have the right to learn how something
works if the producer of that something doesn't want you to learn it.
You seem to think differently, the laws don't seem to agree with you.

> 	Perhaps you are claiming the definition of protocols and data
> structures as protected by copyright.  Perhaps, but it doesn't make
> cloning less moral.  Laws and morals unfortunately are splitting
> farther and farther.

Perhaps that is because people who share your opinions can't seem to
understand that reverse engineering / copying is much easier than creating
in the first place and the people who spent the money on the creation need
to recoup that investment and make some profit so they can create again.

Maybe the warning bells should be ringing because your statements
are all about your "right" copying other people's work (I think it is
called plagerizing in some fields) rather than about creating new work.
If you spent less time copying and more time creating then we would be
following you rather then you attempting to (illegally) follow us.
Food for thought, dinner is served, eat up.
-- 
---
Larry McVoy              lm at bitmover.com          http://www.bitmover.com/lm

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Mr. James W. Laferriere]

	Hell Larry ,

On Sat, 26 Jul 2003, Larry McVoy wrote:
> On Sat, Jul 26, 2003 at 09:46:28PM +0200, Leandro Guimar?es Faria Corsetti Dutra wrote:
> > 	No.  Reverse engineering is first a way of learning, then a
> > safeguard...
> It's not clear to me that you have the right to learn how something
> works if the producer of that something doesn't want you to learn it.
> You seem to think differently, the laws don't seem to agree with you.
	Hmmmpphh ,  Try & stop me from reverse engineering your new
	invention ,  The lever !
	I or Anyone may recreate something as long as I do not sell it OR
	re-/distibute to others .  at least in the US I sure can .
		JimL
-- 
       +------------------------------------------------------------------+
       | James   W.   Laferriere | System    Techniques | Give me VMS     |
       | Network        Engineer |     P.O. Box 854     |  Give me Linux  |
       | babydr@baby-dragons.com | Coudersport PA 16915 |   only  on  AXP |
       +------------------------------------------------------------------+

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Bernd Eckenfels]

In article <20030726192322.GA24865@work.bitmover.com> you wrote:
> So far, nobody has come forward with a substantable claim that in their
> country you can reverse engineer anything you want for any reason you
> want with impunity.  

I am not aware that reverse engeneering is forbidden in germany. 

Hell, I can go to a restaurant, eat there and cook the same at home.

Greetings
Bernd
-- 
eckes privat - http://www.eckes.org/
Project Freefire - http://www.freefire.org/

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra]

On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 08:42:30 +0000, Dean McEwan wrote:

>  After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB* at
> www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry on June 28th 2003, I
> am disturbed

	Yes, that entry is disgusting.  Furthermore, I think one can
has good philosophical reasons to totally reject these views.  But I
have to praise RMS for keeping them fairly separate of his FSF & GNU
work, to the point of using a separate domain.  Many other activists
don't do the same, mixing free software with antiglobalisation and
other divisive opinions.


> I would like to work on helping you people move to a OSL licence,
> work out copyright owners and add the OSL option to each individual
> file one by one.

	I fail to see the connection between licensing and RMS'
personal political opinions.  Or do you suggest a Thought Police
should be nominated to investigate ESR opinions before accepting the
OSL?  I fear it won't be much better... perhaps they might not offend
you but sure will offend other people.


> I am willing to pay to track down unfindable people.

	This is a worthy goal.


> This license does not lose you any additional freedoms, in fact it
> is more legally secure so it gains you legal security

	What do you mean?  As I understand it OPL has no specific
advantages over the GNU GPL apart from dissociation from the GNU
Project.  All I heard up to now were subjective stuff like "it's
simpler", "I can understand it" or "more strict lawyerspeak", all of
which seems contracditory to me.  I am still awaiting a good
comparision and a case for it.  Google helped me nothing here.

	On the other hand the real soft belly of the kernel as I
understand it is the lack of copyright assignments.  Assuming you can
track all copyright owners, which I doubt one possibly can now,
getting the agreement from all of them would be roughly the same as
having their assignments, without the same juridical safety effect.
And you may open a Pandora box, as I haven't seen any thourough study
on the possible effects of adding or substituting OSL for the GNU GPL.


> as well as the traditional GNU freedoms which RMS is jeopordising
> with a disgusting set of *IDEALS*.

	Can you be more specific?

	How can one have freedom without ideals?  This looks like just
another road to serfdom to me... see where anglo-saxon pragmatism has
lead us: WIPO, DMCA, eternal copyrights...


> One of 4 members of the board of DM. TECH.

	What's DM TECH?


-- 
 _   Leandro Guimarães Faria Corsetti Dutra     +41 (21) 648 11 34
/ \  http://br.geocities.com./lgcdutra/         +41 (78) 778 11 34
\ /  Answer to the list, not to me directly!    +55 (11) 5686 2219
/ \  Rate this if helpful: http://svcs.affero.net/rm.php?r=leandro

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Kai Henningsen]

lgcdutra@terra.com.br (Leandro Guimar+es Faria Corsetti Dutra)  wrote on 24.07.03 in <pan.2003.07.24.09.05.00.301892@terra.com.br>:

> On Thu, 24 Jul 2003 08:42:30 +0000, Dean McEwan wrote:
>
> >  After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB* at
> > www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry on June 28th 2003, I
> > am disturbed
>
> 	Yes, that entry is disgusting.  Furthermore, I think one can
> has good philosophical reasons to totally reject these views.

I don't think there are solid philosophical reasons to reject them. I do  
think, however, that it is impractical to implement all of them.

It's not that he's completely wrong (though there are certainly details  
there that aren't quite right), it's that many of the preconditions that  
would make these things not particularly nice, but tolerable, are next to  
impossible to ascertain - and thus, if these things are just plain  
allowed, it's hard to prove that a particular occurrence really did (or  
did not) follow the rules.

And as the ones *not* following the rules are stuff we particularly want  
to prevent ... well, in practice this meens some of the stuff that *does*  
follow those rules must necessarily also be banned.

Which means that absolute statements here are not really very helpful.  
(Then again, rms is rather famous for making unhelpful public statements.)  
It's much more interesting to look at current borderline stuff and ask if  
the line should be moved a bit, and in what direction.

But then, it seems traditional in the US that only absolute statements can  
be made about anything involving sexual ethics, and that "compromise"  
isn't part of anybody's vocabulary.

MfG Kai

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[viro]

On Thu, Jul 24, 2003 at 08:40:48AM +0000, Dean McEwan wrote:
>  After recently reading Mr. Stallman's online *BLURB*
> at www.stallman.org, specifically the diary entry
> on June 28th 2003, I am disturbed, I would like to
> work on helping you people move to a OSL licence,
> work out copyright owners and add the OSL option to each 
> individual file one by one.

<quote>
Also note that the GPL below is copyrighted by the Free Software
Foundation, but the instance of code that it refers to (the Linux
kernel) is copyrighted by me and others who actually wrote it.
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.

                        Linus Torvalds
</quote>

Which makes FSF, let alone personal views of RMS, deeply irrelevant
as far as Linux kernel is concerned.

FWIW, I'm not particulary fond of GPL, but I will *not* accomodate
the kooks with agenda.  IOW, you are politely advised to take your
crusade and shove it up the place where both your and RMS's heads
are wedged in.  I can't speak for anybody else, but I neither need
nor welcome "help" from ideologists of any persuasion.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Samium Gromoff]

> Yeah the bit about "Nasal Sex with Dead Plants" just makes one wonder, is
> a rose just a rose?  (note to self, don't read RMS's diary again)

  Uhhuh, have you people lost your sense o humour?
  Did actually _anyone_ red the Texan history rms describes on his site?

  I personally find the history (where rms was denied to continue his
lisp machine lectures given that absurd excuse he was commiting a
nasal sex with dead plants) quite amusing...
  But here you go, just care to read it before commenting.

  Besides all i find rms diary rather interesting.

>
> Has anyone ever asked why it is okay for RMS to suggest it is okay to
> invalidate another person/company license (BitKeeper is the example) yet

 I`m sure there is a link to a such his statement archived on the web.
 Google returns too much results to be useful, so i`d be rather delighted
if you provide me with en exact link to this his statement.

> become offended when their own license is to desired to be invalidated?
>
> Why is it that nothing but gpl can exist with gpl?
>
> Why is that a superior option to license under which follows the
> original spirit of GPL but goes further to promote the ideas of open
> source is frowned upon?

  Do yo mean rms reacted negatively to the existence of OSL?
  I`m interested in that.

>
> Maybe it has something to do with self pollenation.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Andre Hedrick
> LAD Storage Consulting Group

regards, Samium Gromoff

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Dean McEwan]

>Yeah the bit about "Nasal Sex with Dead Plants" just >makes one wonder, is
>a rose just a rose?  (note to self, don't read RMS's >diary again)

:-) not the point I was talking about, but , still :-)
 Anyway,  I hear you are going to court, y'know 10
months ago I would be in no doubt about verbally murdering
you, but after reading the diary where he says one 
particular type of scum of the universe can trade their 
photos as far as he's concerned. Eurrggh. I feel dirty 
inside for calling myself a "GPL FUNDAMETALIST" to him and
the community.

I believe in FOSS, just not his vision of FOSS. Euuggh.

This court case, do tell.

---
Cheers, Dean.
No Warrantee for incorrectness
after all, Dubya doesn't have one...

One of 4 members of the board of DM. TECH.
a.k.a. Everybody at DM. TECH's Boss.
Member of ATI Open Source development project.
NDA's signed to date = 29.
Number of people who've blocked me = priceless.


Need a new email address that people can remember
Check out the new EudoraMail at
http://www.eudoramail.com

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Stefan Reinauer]

* Dean McEwan <dean.mcewan@eudoramail.com> [030724 13:51]:
> you, but after reading the diary where he says one 
> particular type of scum of the universe can trade their 
> photos as far as he's concerned. Eurrggh. I feel dirty 

RMS> All of these acts should be legal as long as no one is coerced.

Does that one not explicitly exclude what you are talking about?

It's also wise to take not everything for serious that is written by
some dude. ;)

> inside for calling myself a "GPL FUNDAMETALIST" to him and
> the community.
 
Fundamentalists should always feel dirty. In so far this is pretty ok.

Stefan

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Samium Gromoff]

> And MS  Word allows to  export data in  plain text or html.   But it's
> still allowed to  reverse MS Word to make  a .doc import/export plugin
> for OpenOffice or Abiword.
>
> This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
> protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
> to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
> protocols.

 Please stop pissing off Larry and spread FUD.

 Go help Tom Lord to write arch instead.

cheers, Samium Gromoff

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Gaël Le Mignot]

 >> And MS  Word allows to  export data in  plain text or html.   But it's
 >> still allowed to  reverse MS Word to make  a .doc import/export plugin
 >> for OpenOffice or Abiword.
 >> 
 >> This is  exactly the  same. As  long as there  is a  data format  or a
 >> protocol involved,  European laws allow users to  reverse engineer it,
 >> to  be  able to  create  another program  using  the  same format  and
 >> protocols.

 >  Please stop pissing off Larry and spread FUD.

 >  Go help Tom Lord to write arch instead.

So people from Abiword or  OpenOffice.org should stop pissing off Bill
and  should work  on  LaTeX instead  of  trying to  make  a good  .doc
import/export filter ?

-- 
Gael Le Mignot "Kilobug" - kilobug@nerim.net - http://kilobug.free.fr
GSM         : 06.71.47.18.22 (in France)   ICQ UIN   : 7299959
Fingerprint : 1F2C 9804 7505 79DF 95E6 7323 B66B F67B 7103 C5DA

Member of HurdFr: http://hurdfr.org - The GNU Hurd: http://hurd.gnu.org

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[John Bradford]

>  >> Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
>  >> whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
>  >> get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...
>
>  > Oh, I see, you violate our license, your license is revoked, and
>  > now you have the write to reverse engineer BK?  Show me the law which 
>  > says that is true.
>
> I was working  on a project during  my free time using BK,  and then I
> get employed  by a company  contributing to Subversion. My  license is
> then void, but I want to be  able to still use the files and servers I
> used before. Reverse is allowed, and moral, in this case.

What if a patent is discovered which is owned by somebody other than
Larry, which covers something in BK?  If nobody is allowed to use BK,
how would we get the data out?

John.

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Valdis.Kletnieks]

[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 719 bytes --]

On Fri, 25 Jul 2003 16:33:24 BST, John Bradford said:

> What if a patent is discovered which is owned by somebody other than
> Larry, which covers something in BK?  If nobody is allowed to use BK,
> how would we get the data out?

And more importantly, what would you put the data back *INTO*?

There's no guarantee that said patent doesn't also screw over all CVS users,
or SCCS, or what have you.

Also, there's a *very* good chance that any patent that hits BK would *also*
afflict a BK clone, unless they were lucky enough to use a totally different
algorithm to achieve the same on-the-wire result.  And if the patent is against
the *idea* of doing XYZ with a computer, then the algorithm won't matter anyhow.




[-- Attachment #2: Type: application/pgp-signature, Size: 226 bytes --]

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[Hank Leininger]

On 2003-07-25, Jesse Pollard <jesse () cats-chateau ! net> wrote:

> On Thursday 24 July 2003 16:57, Larry McVoy wrote:
> [snip]
> > 
> > In other words, reverse engineering is ok if the product doesn't
> > provide access to your data, we do that already, poof, no reverse
> > engineering allowed.  So it's illegal to reverse engineer BK.

> Nonesense. If the business no longer has the licence to use BK (for
> whatever reason) then it no longer has access to the data. Now to
> get access to the data you must reverse engineer BK...

Or, just ask.  Larry has always been (or given the appearance of being)
open to handling special cases/requests reasonably[1].  Seriously, do you
think BM would turn down a "Er, we didn't see this coming, is it OK for us
to use our free-licensed BK one more time to export to SCCS or whatever? 
We promise there won't be a guy from the SCM team shoulder-surfing or
tcpdumping while we do so" request?  If they *did* turn down a reasonable
request, *then* maybe there would be something legitemate to flame them
about.

[1] Of course, the definition of "reasonable" will now be debated to death.

--
Hank Leininger <hlein@progressive-comp.com> 
  

Re: Switching to the OSL License, in a dual way.

[John Bradford]

> reverse engineering / copying is much easier than creating in the
> first place

In your opinion.

John.