Protecting Against Open Source Legal Risks (TechWeb)

Posted Jan 7, 2004 15:42 UTC (Wed) by juvvadi (guest, #7294) [Link]

Text book example of FUD.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 16:14 UTC (Wed) by ami.ganguli (guest, #9613) [Link]

He's just a lawyer promoting a book, which probably promote his services. Scare mongering is a just a way for him to get people to pay for his "legal advice". More on the book of FUD here.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 17:29 UTC (Wed) by chohman (guest, #5519) [Link]

Sorry, this reads like pure and applied FUD to me. As an exercise, edit the article to remove the phrase "open source" and replace it with either an empty string, or "software" as appropriate. What you get is a summary of the processes a company should already have in place to protect itself from proprietary software vendors. Obviously, this makes the marginal cost of starting to use open source - at least in the sense of keeping your legal department happy - zero. The author is being more than simply disingenuous to suggest otherwise.
A question I have is if a proprietary vendor would, if asked, disclose all of the 3rd party proprietary licensed technology embedded in their product. I really have no respect for all of the putative "experts" who pretend that proprietary software provides some magic defense against "legal risks" that is lacking in open source.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 17:37 UTC (Wed) by mmarq (guest, #2332) [Link]

Sometimes it seems that some people have donkey sh*t for brains!

How can anyone, besides the desire of FUD and destrution in behalf of Ma$ters, honestly think of selling any legal advice, book or other, to anyone who is generously contributing and developing "free" Open-Source software ??

I mean if you have to include legal expenses in any Open-Source projects you do, it simply kills you before you start,..., its so damn obvious.

The better guaranty is that in a Open-Source World Wide Community there are millions of eyes that can "instantly" see if you "copyed it" from somewhere else, with no legal fees included.

If you have a US "hiden software patent office" issue, just postit from Europe, in one of many countrys that it dont apply... eventualy it cant then be distributed in the US, but if the "Software Patent Doom Day WAR" breaks loose, neither could the very large majority of proprietary software, i'm tenting to bet...

Sure it may suit M$ billions to buy out any problems and be "the only one",..., but the anti-trust law and US constitution have to be revoked!?.

So, who's going to buy a book or advise on how to better work to his own dead?

Posted Jan 7, 2004 18:05 UTC (Wed) by cpm (guest, #3554) [Link]

It's really kinda funny, in the funny weird sense, as opposed to the
funny humor sense.

What the old school powers, the Bill Gates/Steve Ballmers et al haven't
seemed to have figured out, is that there is no -end game- here.

The concept of intellectual freedom is going to outlive the very
dodgy and totally counter-intuitive and ultimatly destructive
concept of intellectual property in the long run. People will continue
to strive for freedom and knowlege, despite the stumbling blocks
of the "opinion of the day".

Unlike a lot of my IT brethern, I've slaugtered animals before.
Some big animals (bulls) don't go down as easy as one might think.
They've certainly been killed, and eventually they stop doing
damage. As an analogy, I see the same sort of thing. Microsoft, et al
have been threatened. Since they have flat out refused to adapt
to the model that is completely logical, they have dealt themselves
a death blow. They will do a lot of damage before they go down.
But go down they will.

In 20 years, Linux will still be around. It will probably not even
be recognisable as such, but it will be around. In many cases, it
will still be running great chunks of the infrastructure of modern
civilization. Microsoft will be but a memory. Unless, of course, they
wake up and embrace and extend the vision of open software.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 18:42 UTC (Wed) by ccchips (guest, #3222) [Link]

Now the gloves come off. This is the point where people who support volunteerism, freedom, and the right to make their computer do what they want it to without help from a pay-as-you-go software vendor, square off against those who earn their living by lies, paranoia-mongering, and other verious dirty tricks.

It's going to be a bit harder to expose these new players, because they are adept at muddying the water with language. Maybe, in the short run, this is going to turn out to be a battle between PR firms and corporate lawyers.

I hesitate to say that this guy is a MS surrogate, but it does occur to me.

One thing is becoming clear as crystal, though: The open-source movement is scaring the pants off of Microsoft.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 19:22 UTC (Wed) by freethinker (guest, #4397) [Link]

I doubt Microsoft has anything to do with this particular FUDfest, though I'm sure they're delighted to see it. Just another lawyer, with an old-school businessperson / IP lawyer worldview, trying to drum up business.

More on the author here.

Posted Jan 7, 2004 21:40 UTC (Wed) by iabervon (subscriber, #722) [Link]

And since there's no way you could possibly protect yourself against (or
even know about) misappropriated open source code embedded in proprietary
products, the only safe thing to do is to avoid all proprietary software
entirely.

As far as the SCO/IBM dispute, there's a vague possibility that IBM will
lose to SCO. Microsoft, on the other hand, has already lost to SCO, and
has been forced to pay any amount that SCO wants.

Clearly, the risk of open source software is that it could potentially
turn out to be as much of a legal liability as proprietary software.