[OT] What is Open Source? (was Re: ANN: Twisted 0.16.0...)

[Stephen J. Turnbull]

>>>>> "Clark" == Clark C <Clark> writes:

    Clark> On Sat, Apr 13, 2002 at 04:32:15PM +0900, Stephen
    Clark> J. Turnbull wrote:

    >> rms's fundamental position is radical: property rights in
    >> software are morally wrong.  Unfortunately, even rms himself
    >> seems incapable of behaving in a way consonant with this
    >> belief.  (Ie, he clearly believes that he has a special right
    >> to manage development of projects he has initiated, such as
    >> Emacs, gcc, or glibc.

    Clark> There is a difference between "trademark" and "copyright".
    Clark> RMS firmly believes in trademarks;

Interesting but beside the point.  The law provides one primary remedy
for trademark infringement: make the offender stop using the name.
rms does not do this AFAIK (although many people will respect his
priority voluntarily when they fork).  He certainly does try to
control the development of the code itself.  Thus "trademark" is a red
herring here.

    Clark> There is nothing wrong with this,

Nobody said anything was wrong, merely inconsistent.

    Clark> as it does not hurt your ability to fork the code and
    Clark> do-as-you-please.

Hmm.  This is a good point.  rms certainly displays an emotional
attachment to some of the code (especially Emacs)[1], which I have
confused with belief in a property-like right to control.  But what
really is happening is that he uses his control over GNU and FSF
resources (eg, for development and distribution), and moral suasion.
He's not using control over the code itself.

So this is consistent with denial of property right in software.
Rather, he's saying "don't hijack my _effort_ for purposes I don't
like; isn't the software itself enough?"

Thank you, that helped.

    Clark> Not that you have to believe in RMS's vision, but please
    Clark> don't mis-represent what he stands for...

But I do believe in RMS's vision of a free-software-only world.[2] And
to the best of my knowledge, I have not misrepresented his position on
property in software.  (URLs on request; I may have mail copies but
the archives of the mailing list are not easily searchable, and
apparently aren't googled.)


Footnotes: 
[1]  As do we all.

[2]  I just believe that GNU and the FSF are not primus inter pares
any more, and that the concentration of ownership of free software in
the FSF is no longer especially useful.

-- 
Institute of Policy and Planning Sciences     http://turnbull.sk.tsukuba.ac.jp
University of Tsukuba                    Tennodai 1-1-1 Tsukuba 305-8573 JAPAN
              Don't ask how you can "do" free software business;
              ask what your business can "do for" free software.