MESSAGE
| DATE | 2002-10-24 |
| FROM | Ruben I Safir
|
| SUBJECT | Subject: [hangout] Fwd: Re: [novalug] Congress Members Oppose GPL -- Tom Davis election [Ross.Patterson@catchfs.com]
|
On 2002.10.24 09:35 Ross Patterson wrote:
On Wednesday 23 October 2002 11:59 pm, Jameson C. Burt wrote:
> Notice that our (NovaLug) US representative (for Northern Virginia) Tom
> Davis is up for re-election.
...
> Each of us, his constituents, should let him know that his district
> is arguably the largest center of open source in the world.
> As he doesn't seem to be supporting his voters on this issue,
This particular firestorm seems to have started at NewsForge
(http://newsvac.newsforge.com/newsvac/02/10/23/1247236.shtml?tid=4), and even
there it's been heavily criticised as mis-informed. The commentary at
Slashdot
(http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/10/23/1320238&mode=thread&tid=117) has
been well-balanced for a change, but leaning towards the "they're right, the
GPL *is* restrictive" camp. LawMeme's analysis
(http://research.yale.edu/lawmeme/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=435)
focuses on the legal aspects ('natch), but gets ta bit of he history wrong.
In general, though, I think the letter is correct and that Tom Davis is right
to have written it. And I'm generally not a Davis supporter. The letter is
actually pro-Open Source, not anti-. The only specific case cited is a clear
reference to commercialization of the BSD Unix TCP/IP implementation, which
was Federally-funded research, and which would not have been possible had it
been released under the GPL. The letter isn't pro-Free Software, but then
lots of folks in the Open Source and NoVA hi-tech communities aren't FSF
zealots either. If this letter had come to light by some means other than a
cover letter from the Senator for the great state of Microsoft ... er ...
Washington, it might have been received better over all.
Let's not forget that Open Source isn't always the same as GPL - the BSD
license is an OSI-approved license, after all
(http://opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php)!
--
Ross A. Patterson
CatchFIRE Systems, Inc.
5885 Trinity Parkway, Suite 220
Centreville, VA 20120
(703) 563-4164
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