FSF should also acknowledge that these are Free Software licenses

FSF should also acknowledge that these are Free Software licenses

Posted Oct 17, 2007 20:29 UTC (Wed) by rickmoen (subscriber, #6943)
In reply to: FSF should also acknowledge that these are Free Software licenses by Tashlan
Parent article: OSI Approves Microsoft License Submissions

Tashlan wrote:

That is a good point, but Microsoft isn't promoting the GPL publicly.

Granted. The rest of us are obliged to take up the slack. ;-)

(They didn't ever exactly trumpet to the skies, either, their very first product for Linux, the NetShow 2.00 beta released as a statically linked Linux binary in 1997. I cheerfully hounded the firm for years after that, correcting their respresentatives' claims that they've never seriously considered releasing code for Linux, pointing out that they'd already done so, and thanking them for the effort.)

They didn't create the MSPL for nothing. They put a lot of thought into crafting the MSPL license rather than use the existing GPL license.

Well, we'd actually like to think so, I imagine. At the same time, the club of mutually incompatible copyleft licences is getting to be quite a club, n'est-ce pas?

Microsoft has created a separate tide-pool to swim in rather than jump into the existing sea. The pool will divert some of the sea's life into its waters. The net effect on the sea may be unmeasurable, but they are creating a separate body of water. That is divisive and while it isn't likely to drain the ocean of life, the effect is that some life will be confined to their pool that otherwise would have swam free.

Fair enough -- but, again, that horse long ago left the stable. Licensing incompatibility, and even the deliberate kind, certainly didn't start with Microsoft Corporation.

Rick Moen
rick@linuxmafia.com

---

(Log in to post comments)

> .. that horse long ago left the stable. Licensing incompatibility, and even the deliberate
>  kind, certainly didn't start with Microsoft Corporation.

Yes, that is true.  License proliferation is a serious issue that didn't start with Microsoft.
I was merely commenting that creating such a license fits well into their playbook.
Unfortunately, most corporations take this route as well.  :(

yes and no.  In the early 2000s, they were all publishing their own licences, but afterward,
Mozilla did a big relicense to GPL, and Sun's latest big liberation (Java) went GPL.

I think the trend might be in reverse now.