Am Thu, 28 Aug 2014 11:08:29 +0100
schrieb Russel Winder via Digitalmars-d
<digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:

> Jérôme,
> 
> On Thu, 2014-08-28 at 11:53 +0200, "Jérôme M. Berger" via Digitalmars-d
> wrote:
> […]
> > PPS: IANAL but I have had lots of contacts with patent lawyers and I have taken part in several patent disputes as an expert witness. However, this was in France so most of my knowledge applies to French law and things may be different in the US.
> 
> Are you tracking the new EU unitary patent and TTIP activity? We need to make sure the US does impose on the EU the same insane patent framework the US has.

Haha :*). Don't worry, we EU citizens are more concerned about
the issues of privacy, food regulations and corporate entities
suing states for changing laws that cause them profit losses.
A rubber stamping patent system without professionals
investigating the claims has already been established years
ago.
All in all I am not too worried about TTIP anymore, seeing
that the US reps didn't move in all the years of negotiations.
With NGOs running against TTIP and an overall negative public
stance I don't see it being bent over the knee.

-- 
Marco

Am Thu, 28 Aug 2014 12:12:14 +0200
schrieb Daniel Kozak via Digitalmars-d
<digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>:

> V Thu, 28 Aug 2014 11:53:35 +0200
> "Jérôme M. Berger" via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com>
> napsáno:
> > 
> > 	I should have said that in D it is used when declaring an
> > instance (i.e. at the place of the instance declaration) whereas in
> > the patent it is used when declaring the type. For a patent lawyer,
> > this will be enough to say that the patent is new.
> > 
> 
> I don't agree completly
> 
> // immutable is used when declaring the type IS
> immutable struct IS {
> 	string s;
> }
> 
> IS s = IS("fff");
> s.s = "d";
> writeln(s);

^ That I agree with! Prior art.

-- 
Marco

On Sun, 2014-08-31 at 09:35 +0200, Marco Leise via Digitalmars-d wrote: […]
> Haha :*). Don't worry, we EU citizens are more concerned about the issues of privacy, food regulations and corporate entities suing states for changing laws that cause them profit losses.

This is certainly the major issue against TTIP as far as the UK Greens are concerned. Government passes law for voters good. Company doesn't like it because it ruins their income stream, sues government for loss of income. Due to TTIP, government loses. Tobacco companies are going to love this.

> A rubber stamping patent system without professionals investigating the claims has already been established years ago.

The EU patent office yes, but not the UK one. The issue here is to stop the EU patent office becoming the only one. There is a very serious strategy issue here and it isn't a done deal thankfully.

> All in all I am not too worried about TTIP anymore, seeing that the US reps didn't move in all the years of negotiations. With NGOs running against TTIP and an overall negative public stance I don't see it being bent over the knee.

TTIP and CETA are still very serious issues so people should continue to worry. Even if there is negative public opinion, the politicians will ram it through on the grounds they are the elected representatives, even though in reality they are doing it because their corporate paymasters of the future tell them to.

In the UK the government are using the Scottish independence referendum as a smoke screen to avoid TTIP becoming news. This is a clear indicator it is bad for voters.

-- 
Russel. ============================================================================= Dr Russel Winder      t: +44 20 7585 2200   voip: sip:russel.winder@ekiga.net 41 Buckmaster Road    m: +44 7770 465 077   xmpp: russel@winder.org.uk London SW11 1EN, UK   w: www.russel.org.uk  skype: russel_winder

On Sunday, 31 August 2014 at 04:25:11 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> And I *do* appreciate that GPL, unlike BSD, can *realistically* be cross-licensed with a commercial license in a meaningful way and used on paid commercial software (at least, I *think* so, based on what little anyone actually *can* comprehend of the incomprehensible GPL).

What?  Did you mean to write "BSD, unlike GPL?"  Explain what you mean.

As for Stallman, his problem is that his "all software must be free" crusade happens to have a few real benefits from some source being open, but will never happen to his idealistic extreme of all source becoming free because closed source has real benefits too.

That's why when linux finally got deployed to the majority of computing devices over the last 5 years- though still not on the desktop ;) - it wasn't a full GPL stack but a permissively-licensed Apache stack (bionic, dalvik, ART, etc) on top of the GPL'd linux kernel combined with significant closed binary blobs and patches.  That mixed model is dominant these days, whether with iOS/OS X and their mix of open source (mach, darwin, llvm, webkit, etc) and closed or Android with its greater mix of open source.  As such, his GPL, which doesn't allow such pragmatic mixing of open and closed source, is an antiquity and fast disappearing.

On 8/31/2014 2:59 AM, Era Scarecrow wrote:
> On Sunday, 31 August 2014 at 05:53:39 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>> Well, that page was an article written and posted by Stallman, not a
>> TV sound bite.
>
>   Would you really be able to sift though possibly a 10-100 page
> description that you can't properly decipher unless you were a lawyer?
>

I have a hard time believing there's no middle ground there.

Shoot, even theoretical physics has simplified explanations ("A Brief History of Time"). No doubt this could be summarized too without resorting to "MS try be bad. GPLv3 stop MS be bad. Ug."

>> straightforward about things. And not pretend that "GPL incompatible
>> with GPL" somehow isn't one hell of a gaping whole in that big 'ol
>> "GPL == Freeeedooooom!!!!" assertion.
>
>   The updated GPL handles cases that weren't come up with before the
> previous version was drafted. Like you mentioned with Tivoization.
>

Yea, I know there were reasons a new version needed to be created. But if a license designed with the specific and sole purpose of promoting openness can't even get along with another version itself, then something's clearly gone horribly, horribly wrong with it.

I can link BSD 2-clause, 3-clause and even 4-clause all into the same program just fine. Forget the usual "BSD vs GPL" argument about GPL viral unwillingness to play nice with other licenses, the thing can't even play nice with *itself*!

Know what I really want to see? I wanna see some smart-ass make a GPL program statically linking GPLv2 code with GPLv3 code. Then drift it past the FSF's nose. I'd be fascinated to see what happens.

Does FSF conveniently drop the "GPLv2 and GPLv3 are incompatible" bullshit and just let it slide? Or do they lawyer-up in an idiotic brawl against their own creations? Or do their heads just spin around, let out a puff of smoke and explode?


>> In a more general sense, I think Stallman/FSF have a very unfortunate
>> habit of letting the strict goals and evangelism get in the way of the
>> practical realities of actually *attaining* said goals and
>> successfully getting the messages across.
>
>   He is strict probably because taking any steps back could have
> horrible consequences. Sometimes you can't accept the lesser evil.
>

So, through his stubbornness to accept the lesser as a stepping stone to his ultimate goal, he allows the larger evil to thrive instead. Brilliant strategy. Bravo. A real win for freedom.

It's like a little kid kicking and screaming about not getting a 20lb crate of candy when he's already being offered a chocolate bar the size of his head. Or a third place runner who pouts and storms off because he didn't get the gold.

Take what you *can* get, and *then* continue moving towards the real goal. All-or-nothing is self-defeat.


>
>   Stallman was around when software was free and sources were open;
> There was no copyright in effect, and everyone helped with everything;
> You shared source and specs and programs and got your work done. Then
> NDA (Non-disclosure agreements) and closed source from corporations
> preventing you from being able to help everyone because they didn't want
> to share the source or specs on how to use it. (At the time it was XeroX
> printers i believe) which was a big warning of what was to come.
>
>   He watched first hand as software and the computer industry went from
> thriving and open and growing, to closed and proprietary and secretive.
> His goal and wish is never to have it all so closed again that can't do
> anything besides sell your ethics or soul to get by day to day.
>

Yea, that's a fascinating story. But honestly, I really am totally with him on all that. I *really* genuinely am, no BS.

But reality doesn't give a crap how much he wants openness or what his background is: Things aren't going to go his way just because he wants it badly enough. He has attempt his goals within the framework of reality.

Displace proprietary junk in favor of open? Hell yea, I'll take some of that. Absolutely. But without giving people what they want, even if what they want happens to include a little bit of *eeeeviiilll* closed stuff, then THEY'RE NOT FUCKING GONNA JUMP ON BOARD. It just NOT going to happen. It's been how many freaking decades and it *HASN'T* happened. Has he really not noticed, after all those years, that the puritanical all-or-nothing approach DOES NOT WORK?

Shoot, "pragmatic" distros like Mint and Ubuntu have done FAR more to get people onboard with, and embracing, and pushing for more open software than ANY purity distro. This is plainly evident. He can't *not* see it.

It's basic marketing: Offer them what they want. Give them a taste. They might want more. But *don't* offer what they want, and you seriously think you'll get takers? Fat chance. I'm not sure Stallman really gets this. Or if he does, then he's too stubborn about it for his own good. (And believe me, I know a thing or two about being stubborn ;))

Luckily, he has followers who *do* grasp basic marketing and *do* get it right (again, Mint and Ubuntu as a couple modern examples), and *they're* the ones dragging his stubborn idealism down the road towards success.

Seriously, I have about a metric shit-ton of direct experience being highly non-mainstream on things. Stubbornly so. And I've watched things in the world go from good, to bad, to worse. Believe me, I know from experience: You do NOT get people onboard with something by trying to convince them. And certainly not by wanting them to or telling them to.

*No* amount of well-reasoned well-explained logic works, at least not on any meaningful scale. People don't get logic, people don't like reason, people don't give a crap what sounds good on paper or what's in their best interest. "In my best interest" is boring. Dancing cats aren't.

No, the way to get them onboard with something is to make it *into* what they want. Or at least make it appear to be what they think they want (Most people can't tell the difference). Give them the right gimmicky dumb hook, and they'll bite just about anything (Steve Jobs proved that...man did he prove that...to an incredibly depressing degree). Luckily, it'll work even on something people find as unpalatable as ethics and their own freedom.

tl;dr:
Gotta hide that vitamin in people's doggie biscuit. It's usually the only way.

>
>   'Open' can merely means you can see the source, nothing else. Really
> comes down to the license it's attached to.

We can bang the dictionary all we want, but really, aside from the ultra-pedantics, nobody actually means that narrow definition when they say "open source".

On Sun, 31 Aug 2014 09:23:24 +0000
Joakim via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:

> As such, his GPL, which doesn't allow such pragmatic mixing of open and closed source, is
...a great thing to stop invasion of proprietary software. hey, i'm not *renting* my smartphone, i'm *buying* it! and i want to be able to change it's software as i like. yet what i got is a bunch of blobs and a locked loader. i don't want to pay my money for jailing me: the ones who want to put me in a jail should pay to me to compensate my inconvience.

i don't care about what is good for some corporation out here. what i really care about is what is good for *me*. GPLv3 makes me happy. BSDL makes corporations happy. so it's obvious choice.

On Sunday, 31 August 2014 at 09:37:35 UTC, ketmar via Digitalmars-d wrote:
> On Sun, 31 Aug 2014 09:23:24 +0000
> Joakim via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:
>
>> As such, his GPL, which doesn't allow such pragmatic mixing of open and closed source, is
> ...a great thing to stop invasion of proprietary software. hey, i'm not
> *renting* my smartphone, i'm *buying* it! and i want to be able to
> change it's software as i like. yet what i got is a bunch of blobs and
> a locked loader. i don't want to pay my money for jailing me: the ones
> who want to put me in a jail should pay to me to compensate my
> inconvience.
>
> i don't care about what is good for some corporation out here. what i
> really care about is what is good for *me*. GPLv3 makes me happy. BSDL
> makes corporations happy. so it's obvious choice.

Good luck with that, let me know when you find a GPLv3 smartphone to buy.  I'll predict when that'll happen: never.

That's because _you_ may care about changing the software on your smartphone and don't want to use the binary blobs that make switching harder, but almost nobody else does.  Those who want to change the software right now simply work around and reuse the blobs, ie cyanogen, AOKP, etc.  At least you can do that when there's a mix, as opposed to the previously dominant model of pure closed source, which didn't allow such updating at all.

On 8/31/2014 5:23 AM, Joakim wrote:
> On Sunday, 31 August 2014 at 04:25:11 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
>> And I *do* appreciate that GPL, unlike BSD, can *realistically* be
>> cross-licensed with a commercial license in a meaningful way and used
>> on paid commercial software (at least, I *think* so, based on what
>> little anyone actually *can* comprehend of the incomprehensible GPL).
>
> What?  Did you mean to write "BSD, unlike GPL?"  Explain what you mean.
>

There is some precedent for a commercial software package to be released like this:

"This is available under either a commercial license or GPL. You can freely download and use the software and its source code, at no cost, under the terms of the GPL. Companies that do not wish to be bound by the GPL can purchase a commercial license instead."

Or there will be a common variant like:

"Students, home users and small businesses can use it under the terms of GPL, but companies with annual revenue >= $xxxxx require a commercial license."

Or something roughly along those lines anyway.

I don't know what the FSF would have to say about it, or how well it works in practice, but the idea is that the source code is both free and free, AND since the OSS license used is GPL, there is still (at least in theory) sufficient added value to to justify a paid version (beyond just premium support. Being a support-based business has its own pros/cons - if you're just a group of developers trying to make a living, the Red Hat model may not be a great option). And, the OSS-version, being GPLed, cannot easily be used by another company *as* a competitor to you.

Theoretically, you *could* do that with BSD/MIT/zlib/etc instead of GPL. Nothing's explicitly prohibiting it. But then where's the "added value" in the paid version? They can already do anything they want. Or how do you restrict the OSS version to small businesses or home users only? It's BSD, it already permits *anyone* to use it or re-grant the same permissive license to anyone else. And what's to stop a competitor from competing against you with your own product?

Don't get me wrong, I like BSD/MIT/zlib/etc., and I use such licenses whenever my intent is to get my software USED rather than directly make money off it. But trying to mix them with a commercial model (for example, if you want to make a living directly off your software) seems very problematic. Being a support company seems the only theoretical way, and even then, anyone else, any corporation, etc., can still just pop up and offer support for your software too, and without the overhead of being a primary developer.


> As for Stallman, his problem is that his "all software must be free"
> crusade happens to have a few real benefits from some source being open,
> but will never happen to his idealistic extreme of all source becoming
> free because closed source has real benefits too.
>

Yea, I can agree there's some truth to that. And even if you can argue that closed doesn't TRULY have real genuine benefits, it still doesn't matter: As long as people perceive a benefit, then that's real enough in its effects.


> That's why when linux finally got deployed to the majority of computing
> devices over the last 5 years- though still not on the desktop ;) - it
> wasn't a full GPL stack but a permissively-licensed Apache stack
> (bionic, dalvik, ART, etc) on top of the GPL'd linux kernel combined
> with significant closed binary blobs and patches.  That mixed model is
> dominant these days, whether with iOS/OS X and their mix of open source
> (mach, darwin, llvm, webkit, etc) and closed or Android with its greater
> mix of open source.  As such, his GPL, which doesn't allow such
> pragmatic mixing of open and closed source, is an antiquity and fast
> disappearing.

Yea. I hate that the mixing is necessary, but big business has all the money, and big business likes closed/proprietary, so if you want some of the money (*or* just a significant chunk of the market), then you have to please them enough to get them to fork it over. *Then* you can go from there and swing around as much clout as you've earned.

It's sickening, but that's where things are right now. At least it beats the hell out of the Windows model. And it *could* still lead to further acceptance of and demand for even more openness. Like burgers or crack: Give 'em a taste, maybe they'll like it and want more. And maybe by then you'll have earned enough clout that you'll be *able* to given them more.

The world may not be ready for full-on Stallman openness yet, but the mixed model at least gets the foot in the door. It's a step in the right direction.

On Sun, 31 Aug 2014 10:23:42 +0000
Joakim via Digitalmars-d <digitalmars-d@puremagic.com> wrote:

> Good luck with that, let me know when you find a GPLv3 smartphone to buy.  I'll predict when that'll happen: never.
keep tolerate "permissive licenses", this will greatly help me to find such smartphone, yes.

On Sunday, 31 August 2014 at 09:23:28 UTC, Nick Sabalausky wrote:
> I have a hard time believing there's no middle ground there.
>
> Shoot, even theoretical physics has simplified explanations ("A Brief History of Time"). No doubt this could be summarized too without resorting to "MS try be bad. GPLv3 stop MS be bad. Ug."

 It's all based on the legal system and if it is taken to court, so that's where it's at. I'd love to say there's no middle ground, but i honestly don't know. Could ask him for exact details.


> But if a license designed with the specific and sole purpose of promoting openness can't even get along with another version itself, then something's clearly gone horribly, horribly wrong with it.

 I've glanced over sources and put in my own for License GPLv2 or later. Each progressive version adds more protection. It's probably only incompatible so someone can't take a GPLv3 of a program and slap a GPLv2 on it 'cause it's compatible' then use the lesser protection to get around it for which the v3 was specifically giving. Beyond that both licenses work to grant and protect the author as much as possible.

> I can link BSD 2-clause, 3-clause and even 4-clause all into the same program just fine. Forget the usual "BSD vs GPL" argument about GPL viral unwillingness to play nice with other licenses, the thing can't even play nice with *itself*!

 The viral nature is to ensure programs and software grows (hopefully) and stays to it's original intent. A sed program suddenly no longer being free or changing owners would be scooped up by a greedy company in a heartbeat, especially if it's heavily used.

> Know what I really want to see? I wanna see some smart-ass make a GPL program statically linking GPLv2 code with GPLv3 code. Then drift it past the FSF's nose. I'd be fascinated to see what happens.
>
> Does FSF conveniently drop the "GPLv2 and GPLv3 are incompatible" bullshit and just let it slide? Or do they lawyer-up in an idiotic brawl against their own creations? Or do their heads just spin around, let out a puff of smoke and  explode?

 As for GPLv2 and GPLv3 code, depends on the license in the sourcecode. As mentioned the GPLv2 code could automatically be upgraded as it would offer no disadvantages, especially if the source says you can use v2 or later... no problems.

 Course if some software does have to link there's always the LGPL for libraries and whatnot...

> But reality doesn't give a crap how much he wants openness or what his background is: Things aren't going to go his way just because he wants it badly enough. He has attempt his goals within the framework of reality.
>
> <snip>

 The ones to control who or what works is the people who vote with their wallets. If no one buys proprietary software, then it won't work. Unfortunately even if no citizens bought it, businesses still do. It's entirely possible things will go his way, and i surely hope so since the vision is a very good one.

 However i don't feel up to a really long rant or discussion on this, this isn't why i brought this all up.


> We can bang the dictionary all we want, but really, aside from the ultra-pedantics, nobody actually means that narrow definition when they say "open source".

 Perhaps not. But quite often you can only take it 'to the letter'. And the lawyers love to take it 'to the letter'; Along with companies that own the 'open source' that is spoken about.