Rants, Sun, and Stallman

Didn't Sun make that silly PL that was supposed to revolutionize the 
world?  What was it called again?  Cafe?  Latte?  Oh well.  I do like 
the mafia analogy below...

...and thanks for fixing rants.  Not that I have anything to rant, but 
thanks.  On a side note, I also have a connection that screen prints 
some very nice tshirts for minimal cash on sweatshop free clothing if 
anyone is interested.  I am working on a BH design to order up 25 or so 
and get a first batch running.  I'll post progress as it happens.

Pick up a CO detector if you don't already have one in your house.  You 
can leave the duct tape and rolls of plastic there when you pass them, 
but I would say it's a solid $20 investment.

happy almost February heads,

-j

Title 	   	Sun's no-op announcement
Date 	   	2005.01.31 8:01
Author 	   	Richard Stallman
Topic 	  	
http://trends.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/01/31/1310231

Last year IBM took a significant step forward in cooperation with the 
free software community, by offering blanket licenses for 500 of its 
patents to all free software developers. This does not cover all of 
IBM's software patents, which must number in the thousands. And there 
are other areas where IBM does not yet cooperate with the free software 
community--they have not provided the necessary information to port a 
free BIOS to ThinkPads, for instance, and they are still pursuing 
Treacherous Computing. Nonetheless, this is a real step. Recently Sun 
made an announcement that superficially seems similar. It said that Sun 
had given us "free access to Sun OpenSolaris related patents under the 
Common Development and Distribution License." But those words do not 
really make sense. The CDDL is a license for the copyright on software, 
not a policy for licensing patents. It applies to specific code and 
nothing else. (Copyright and patents have essentially nothing in common 
in the requirements they impose on the public.)

So what has really happened here? Reading the announcement clearly, I 
think that it doesn't announce anything at all. It simply describes, in 
a different and grandiose way, the previously announced release of the 
Solaris source code as free software under Sun's idiosyncratic license, 
the CDDL. Outside Solaris, few or no free software packages use that 
license--and Sun has not said it won't sue us for implementing the same 
techniques in our own free software.

Perhaps Sun will eventually give substance to its words, and make this 
step a real one like IBM's. Perhaps some other large companies will take 
similar steps. Would this make free software safe from the danger of 
software patents? Would the problem of software patents be solved? Not 
on your life. Neither one.

We can be quite sure that not all large patent holders will do this. In 
fact, there is one company with lots of patents that surely won't take 
such a step. That is Microsoft, which says it is our enemy. Microsoft 
would love to make useful free software effectively illegal, and has 
plenty of money to pay lawyers to use whatever avenues governments 
provide them.

But the danger is not only from those that specifically consider us 
their enemies. It also comes from patent holders that are the enemy of 
everyone. These are the patent parasites--companies whose sole assets 
are patents, and whose only business is threats. Patent parasites don't 
really produce anything, they only suck the blood of those who do. As 
regards their choice of victims, they have the scruples of a mosquito, 
so you're only safe if they don't think you're worth biting.

Consider, for instance, the company founded by ex-Microsoft executive 
Myhrvold, which cheerfully says it is spending $350M to buy up patents 
(not specifically in software) so it can go around threatening and 
bullying everyone else. Of course, these parasites don't like to 
describe their activities in such terms. Much as the mafia, when it 
threatens to attack local businesses unless they pay, says it is 
charging for "protection", Myhrvold's company prefers to say it is 
"renting out" the patents. It expects this investment in what we could 
call the "patent protection racket" to pay off handsomely. For that to 
occur, lots of people have to get bitten.

The danger of software patents is not limited to free software, which is 
why the opposition to software patents is not limited to free software 
developers. Everyone involved with computers, aside from the 
megacorporations, must expect to lose. For instance, proprietary 
software developers are much more likely to be the victims of patents 
than to have a chance to use patents for aggression. Although I don't 
think proprietary software is ethically legitimate, it is a fact that 
developers of proprietary software are in the same danger from patents, 
and many of them know it.

Then think of all the software that is neither free nor proprietary: 
private-use software, software developed for and used by one client. 
Most software is private-use software. The developers of this software 
can also be sued for using patented techniques, and so can the users of 
the software. Any software patent holder, including the pirates, can sue 
computer users as well as software developers. Threatening the users is 
a common technique for an unscrupulous patent holder to put the screws 
on a developer.

We can honestly thank IBM for agreeing not to sue us with 500 of its 
patents, and if Sun does likewise, we will be able to thank Sun too. But 
defusing a small fraction of the landmines in the field of software 
won't make it safe to walk around. We mustn't let these partial measures 
lull us into thinking that computing can tolerate the patent system. The 
battle against software patents, in Europe and elsewhere, must continue!

Copyright 2005 Richard Stallman
Verbatim copying and distribution of this entire article are permitted 
worldwide without royalty in any medium provided this notice is preserved.
Links

    1. " Treacherous Computing" - 
http://trends.newsforge.com/http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/can-you-trust.html
    2. " nothing in common" - http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/not-ipr.xhtml
    3. "battle against software patents" - http://www.ffii.org/