Re: legal Q about masm

From: Herbert Kleebauer (klee_at_unibwm.de)
Date: 03/02/05 

Date: Wed, 02 Mar 2005 18:02:34 +0100

Donkey wrote:
> Herbert Kleebauer wrote:

> my views on the GPL or "Great Programming Lie"

> I am anti-GPL, but not in any malicious way. I simply believe that if I
> give a piece of software away, with or without source, that I do so
> without any restrictions.

Seems you didn't understand the purpose of the GPL.

Suppose you buy a new television. Some of them are shipped with
a circuit diagram, for others you can order the circuit diagram
and for some you will never be able to get a circuit diagram.
I prefer the one with the circuit diagram, because if there is
a failure you can try to repair it yourself. Now, if the companies
decide to no longer make the circuit diagrams available, what can
the buyers do? To say "then I don't buy your TV" doesn't work
if there are only low-grade TV's with circuit diagrams available.
The only way is, to design an own high quality TV and publish the
circuit diagram. Anybody is allowed to build and sell this TV (and
thus make money using this design) if he delivers the circuit diagram
together with the TV and also for any improved TV based on this
design. This way the knowledge is not owned by a single company but
by the whole community and anybody who profits by this knowledge
(manufactures and sells the TV) has to give back any additional
knowledge (an improvement of the TV) to the community. And if this
initial design is really good, then any company which doesn't
participate in this system will loose in the long term.

> The GPL is used by large companies such as IBM
> and Sun to farm code from unsuspecting idiots who believe that it is
> "ethical". To do this, they put out a piece of code like "Open Office"
> and then have the GPL community make all of the improvements and
> enhancements as well as fix all of their bugs for free, then use the
> package as a value-added addition to their hardware sales.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with making profit using the
common knowledge as long as any new knowledge (not money) is given
back to the community. There is also nothing wrong with people
spending there free time to improve the common knowledge without
being paid. There is also nothing wrong with people or companies,
who don't make there knowledge public available, even if in the long
term they have no chance to compete with the common knowledge IF
AND ONLY IF there is enough support for the common knowledge (it needs
a minimum critical mass). But there is something wrong with people who
give away their knowledge to the "public domain", which then can be used
by the companies to fight against the "common knowledge".

> The GPL is a
> way to force the programming community to publish their source so the
> hardware companies can extract value and sales from their work without
> having to pay one cent. The GPL simply lines the pockets of the likes of
> IBM and Sun while keeping the programmers poor and deluding them into
> thinking that they are doing some altruistic thing.

What's wrong if I get my new high quality TV cheaper because the company
didn't have to spend any money to design the TV? And what's wrong when
this company is forced to give any new knowledge to the other companies,
so this companies also can produce cheaper?

 
> I have never sold any software.

There is nothing wrong with selling software. But if you give it away
for free, then you should give it only to the community and not also
to companies which hide there own knowledge, which means, you should
give away your software only under the GPL for free (or sell it to
the company).

> The most important thing to me is that I never have restrictions on my
> source or software, with the exception that I ask that the source not be
> used in any program licensed under the GPL or LGPL. But even this is
> simply asked as a courtesy and is not enforced or required.

This is like you are a prisoner in a jail house and have discovered
a way to escape, but because you don't want any restriction on
your knowledge, you give the information not only to the other
prisoner but also to the jailer. Yes, then your knowledge is free,
but you still are a prisoner.

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