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New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog)New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog)Posted Oct 27, 2009 23:15 UTC (Tue) by endecotp (guest, #36428)In reply to: New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) by ntl Parent article: New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog)
> Such a license would not be Open Source
Exactly. To me, not killing people and free software are both important, but the former is more important than the latter. The people who defined "open source" to include the "no discrimination against a field of endeavour" bit presumably consider the priorities reversed.
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New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 1:17 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (subscriber, #2510) [Link] Person who defined, not people. A person named Bruce Perens.I was going mainly by the University of California's previous history with the Berkeley SPICE license. This license prohibited use by the Police of South Africa. But many years had gone by since Apartheid, and the license still prohibited the now-Black police from using the software. Not that they ever wanted to. I suppose you could make a license prohibiting use in a weapon. But your software isn't going to be used in one anyway. Beyond that, you have vehicles, heads-up-displays, etc., which have both peaceful and belicose purposes. So, you will probably end up restricting what you do not wish to restrict. The FSF's call on this is that you should not restrict use at all. And RMS says he might be against one war or another, but he is not in general a pacifist. I guess that goes for me too.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 3:44 UTC (Wed) by donbarry (guest, #10485) [Link]
RMS named that some years before you did Bruce, in his Freedom Zero.
Your retelling did take things in somewhat different directions, emphasizing pragmatics over principle. We disagree over those divergent courses but it is a disagreement that two may reasonably have. But primacy of the concept of agnostic use-specific restrictions in software can easily be verified to be RMS' contribution.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 5:17 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (subscriber, #2510) [Link] RMS' four freedoms had been published in print at that time, in one of the very earliest "GNUs Bulletin" distributed at MIT. Possibly a few copies still existed. They were so unknown at the time that nobody in the month-long discussion in which we formed the DFSG thought to bring them up. I didn't know the four freedoms document existed, and when I showed RMS the DFSG, he didn't point it out to me. We did, however, have the text of the GPL to work from.Sometime later, RMS dredged the four freedoms up as a counter to Open Source and republished them.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 5:53 UTC (Wed) by jordanb (subscriber, #45668) [Link]
Well I'm sure glad that's cleared up.
We'll have to make sure the Nobel committee is aware of your contributions so they can award Stallman's prize jointly to you.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 15:03 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (subscriber, #2510) [Link]
And I'll tell teacher to give you a gold star for spelling. Too bad about the "plays with others" part.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 21:34 UTC (Wed) by donbarry (guest, #10485) [Link]
That's actually rather interesting, but perhaps not for the reasons
you point out. I recall discovering the GPL and Stallman's discussions of its rationales in the 1980s with delight and astonishment at its vision. I too disagreed with the lack of use restrictions at first read, until I realized the necessity for a larger vision. It was a transformative discovery. If you did not know of Stallman's work at that level, then it would appear a certain amount of due diligence was missing. He's the foundational author in the field.
New DoD memo on Open Source Software (David Wheeler's Blog) Posted Oct 28, 2009 22:48 UTC (Wed) by BrucePerens (subscriber, #2510) [Link] I didn't just know of Richard's work, I was corresponding with him routinely at the time. I was really clear on what the purpose of FSF and GNU was, and had been so for years. I was one of the leading people in the field of Free Software at that particular moment. I knew enough to construct a good definition of Free Software, which we're still using. And I had never seen a statement of the Four Freedoms.I really, really, think that FSF was not promoting that particular document at that point in time. I have no other logical explanation that fits the facts. I think Richard recovered the Four Freedoms and started talking about them more as a counter to the OSD.
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