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Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3Posted Jul 11, 2012 22:15 UTC (Wed) by marcH (subscriber, #57642)In reply to: Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 by dlang Parent article: Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3
> congress passed laws
The United Nations congress I suppose?
> requiring that they allow aftermarket parts
Do these laws mean anyone can go and manufacture parts in any way they want? If yes then they the pendulum just swung too far back. Defective parts should be removed from the market before accidents happen - not after.
(Moreover firmware is not exactly like any other part. Defective firmware tends to be much more common than defective screws)
> and allow third parties to interface with them
"interface with" does not sound like "reprogram". Or did your laws include that too?
> "Open Source Cars"
I really meant "not locked down cars" here, sorry for the confusion. Open-source and lock down are quite different things, unlike what the GPLv3 activists want us to believe (with apparently some success on my subconscious already... damn)
> ... have been on the road forever, so if you are afraid of them stay away from the roads.
I am doing my best already. Letting practically anyone go and drive something as dangerous as a vehicle on an open road is a crazy idea which has killed, harmed and disabled millions of people already in practically every family - and still counting. Car modding is just a thin, new layer of icing on the road death cake. Just a few extra, statistically insignificant casualties.
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Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 11, 2012 22:32 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
>> congress passed laws
> The United Nations congress I suppose?
no, the US congress, which given the buying power of the US public has prevented every car manufacturer in the world that ever has a hope of selling to the US public from producing cars that are locked down.
> Do these laws mean anyone can go and manufacture parts in any way they want? If yes then they the pendulum just swung too far back. Defective parts should be removed from the market before accidents happen - not after.
It depends on the parts. Some parts have rigorous testing they go through, others don't. Headlights and tires require much more testing than air filters for example. If you see the phrase "DOT approved" in relation to an item, that means that it's a part that's regulated and tested. There are actually far fewer of this sort of part than you would think.
The fear of lawsuits (and getting a reputation for selling junk, which would put you out of business) does most of the work of preventing defective parts overall.
> "interface with" does not sound like "reprogram". Or did your laws include that too?
Yes, the ODB-II interface on cars requires standards for at least some ability to reprogram the car. It's far short of being a complete replacement, but you are allowed to reprogram many parameters of your car that will let you push it into parts of the performance envelope that will damage it.
> I really meant "not locked down cars" here, sorry for the confusion.
so did I. The cars aren't opensource, but they are far easier to modify and tweak than the manufacturers wanted them to be.
> Car modding is just a thin, new layer of icing on the road death cake. Just a few extra, statistically insignificant casualties.
Car modding is hardly new. Car modding has been around as long as the car has. Before that there was buggy modding, before that there was saddle modding.
the thing that's new is the idea that you would take a device and only use it in the way the manufacturer wants and expects you to.
Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 12, 2012 9:20 UTC (Thu) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> no, the US congress, which given the buying power of the US public has prevented every car manufacturer in the world that ever has a hope of selling to the US public from producing cars that are locked down.
Note: It's very cheap to lock down *software* in some countries and not in others. I guess much cheaper than moving the steering wheel from left to right for instance.
> The fear of lawsuits (and getting a reputation for selling junk, which would put you out of business) does most of the work of preventing defective parts overall.
This still leaves the market open to dodgy imports and short lived retailers which do not care about reputation. Of course most buyers would not buy safety-critical car parts there, but I personally do not find "most" good enough in term of road safety.
> Yes, the ODB-II interface on cars requires standards for at least some ability to reprogram the car.
In summary, US law forbids locked down cars but not locked down phones? The only option that does not follow any logic.
I guess too much logic in law would put the traditional lawyers' rip-off at risk...
> the thing that's new is the idea that you would take a device and only use it in the way the manufacturer wants and expects you to.
The other thing that is new is software. It's new in a number of disruptive ways: free to "manufacture" (copy), hard to get right, hard to test and usually impossible to prove right. Oh, and it's also easier to lock down.
Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 12, 2012 20:47 UTC (Thu) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> In summary, US law forbids locked down cars but not locked down phones? The only option that does not follow any logic.
Yes.
This happened because the car manufacturers tried to lock down the cars and force everyone to buy replacement parts only from them.
this affected enough people that complained that laws were passed to prevent such lock-downs.
The same cycle will need to happen for phones and computers.
Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 13, 2012 23:16 UTC (Fri) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> > In summary, US law forbids locked down cars but not locked down phones? The only option that does not follow any logic.
Just realized some logic can actually be found. Wear and tear requires spare parts for cars - not that much for phones.
> > The other thing that is new is software. It's new in a number of disruptive ways...
+ no wear and tear for software (bugs from day one!)
> The same cycle will need to happen for phones and computers.
You wish.
Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 13, 2012 23:28 UTC (Fri) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
> Just realized some logic can actually be found. Wear and tear requires spare parts for cars - not that much for phones.
except that the law was not just about replacement parts, it was also about modifications (theoretically upgrades)
how common is it to hear the open source software vs closed software debate being compared to buying a car with the hood welded shut.
It's exactly this 'hood effectively welded shut' situation that the laws were passed to block
>> The same cycle will need to happen for phones and computers.
> You wish.
we are already seeing signs of rebellion with people getting devices that the vendor won't upgrade to the latest version. Then there is the entire "jailbreaking" or "modding" movement from people who are not part of the opensource community. Let this grow a bit and I do fully expect that there will end up being laws passed saying that once a person has fully paid for a device they have the explicit right to modify the software on that device.
Linksvayer: 5 years of GPLv3 Posted Jul 15, 2012 9:15 UTC (Sun) by marcH (subscriber, #57642) [Link]
> Let this grow a bit
Growing much bigger than jailbreaking is competition from products with "soft" or no lock-down ("soft" just to make sure you don't void the guarantee by accident)
> and I do fully expect that there will end up being laws passed saying that once a person has fully paid for a device they have the explicit right to modify the software on that device.
(you meant: modify and run the software on that device)
Considering the US reform pace about software patents - a legal joke of gigantic proportions actually annihilating the mere concept of a free market - I'm pretty sure we'll be long dead before any legal change happens related to software lock-down.
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