Monday March 31, 2008 links for 2008-03-31
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The I'm-stuck-at-Terminal-5-and-I-want-BA's-head pocket guide.
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Looks set to be instantly digested by the clickerati.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 31 2008, 01:36:45 AM PDT )
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Sunday March 30, 2008 links for 2008-03-30
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OK, Americans, here's your chance to listen to the French President's wife...
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We have a guest this weekend who confirms it's definitely worth avoiding.
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Seems to sum things up nicely.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 30 2008, 01:35:45 AM PDT )
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Saturday March 29, 2008 Thanks!
Many thanks to the people who voted for me in the OpenSolaris Governing Board election last week. I was very surprised to receive so many votes, especially considering the strength of the field and who else was elected. I was also pleased that both the constitutional amendments I proposed were approved - I edited them into the Constitution this evening.
I've dived straight in on the ogb-discuss mailing list and IRC. Our first OGB meeting is on Wednesday and I welcome input, especially conversation on the OGB IRC where I try to show up at 10pm UK time each evening if I am free to do so.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 29 2008, 07:01:35 PM PDT )
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Wednesday March 26, 2008 Happy Document Freedom Day
Happy Document Freedom Day! Today, March 26th, is the first such global celebration of open documents. When I look back to 2002 and the ridicule that we faced when the first proposed that the world needed a stanard for office productivity documents, it's amazing to see those same mocking voices six years later advocating XML-based open document formats as if they thought of the idea!
We still have a long way to go. There is more to this than just standards. Our freedom depends on being able to implement, being able to influence future evolution and on having collective ownership of document standards. Today, only ODF offers the hope of that so here's to the ISO 26300 Open Document Format today, Document Freedom Day.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 26 2008, 01:41:22 PM PDT )
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Comments [4]
Tuesday March 25, 2008 links for 2008-03-25
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Brilliant marketing idea.
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Guns never make me feel safe. The risks they are trying to control always seem far lower probability than the risks they create.
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Interesting discussion from Don. The patent stuff here needs more discussion since there are are other dimensions to the origin of patents. The trademark stuff - well, I think there is scope for reasoned discussion beyond this impasse.
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Cool Twitter application threads @ replies on Twitter.
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Fascinating, especially the observation that complex objectives or governance lead to fragmentation.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 25 2008, 01:22:45 AM PDT )
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Monday March 24, 2008 Why Adoption-Led Is Not Trialware
In response to my posting Adoption-led is Not Shareware, IBM's Savio Rodrigues continues the exploration of the adoption-led concept in another blog entry. As an explanation of his view that "adoption-led" is a synonym for "shareware/trialware" he has modified my original explanation to read:
In this approach, developers select from available Shareware or Trialware and try the software that fits best in their proposed application. They develop prototypes, switch packages as they find benefits and problems and finally create a deployable solution to their business problem. At that final point, assuming the application is sufficiently critical to the business to make it worthwhile to do so, they seek out the creator of the Shareware or Trialware to provide support, services (like defect resolution) and more. Adoption-led users are not all customers; they only become so when they find a vendor with value to offer.
Savio is correct to note, as Zack does, that Free software is easier to evaluate. The trap Savio is falling into here is to go no further and to be focus only on the procurement of the software. That's a natural reaction given the dominance of procurement-driven thinking, but it hides the natural progression of software in an adoption-led context. What matters is not the freedom to procure the software, but the freedom to adopt it. The two are only the same in a procurement-driven world.
Freedom to Use
With trialware/shareware, one is only free to use the software for evaluation purposes. Once one switches to production, one is compelled to pay for a license to the software in order to take it into production. This causes significant problems in an adoption-led context:
- It frequently means that the features needed for production are not present in the software in use.
- It erects a barrier between evaluation and deployment that most likely involves a switch of versions, resulting in a need for re-evaluation. For example, if the evaluation was on Fedora, to go to supported production the system will need to move to RHEL, since Red Hat do not support Fedora (as far as I know).
- It erects a payment barrier in the adoption process, one which is located at an arbitrary point known only to the vendor's legal team. Does one have to pay between evaluation and development? Between development and pilot? Between pilot and initial roll-out? Between initial roll-out and full production? Who knows?
True Free software (software with the freedoms left in) doesn't have these problems. There are no artificial barriers or toll-booths on the path to deployment, and adoption is a process that can be conducted under the control of the adoption team. As they progress they can decide at each stage whether to go buy a subscription from a vendor to meet their sustaining needs, or whether to engage experts from the open source community around the code to do it, or whether to just absorb the risk themselves.
This is the key to the adoption-led approach. It's about adoption of software, not about the procurement of software. It puts control in the hands of the adoption team. It's about freedom - freedom from vendor control, freedom to use the software how you want.
[Previous: Adoption-led as a Force of Nature | Next: An Adoption-Led Business Model]
Posted by webmink
( Mar 24 2008, 01:21:00 AM PDT )
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links for 2008-03-24
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This one is pretty outrageous. Just like all the other data gathered in the UK you just know it will end up in the wrong hands eventually, like the Congestion Charge camera data.
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This is a pretty revolutionary step in trademark licensing for open source, and the sort of experiment I hope will inform a future Open Source Trademark Definition.
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"And the original upstream is not just giving some standards or source code drops, they are actively helping us. In fact, "they" are "us" now!"
Posted by webmink
( Mar 24 2008, 01:19:52 AM PDT )
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Sunday March 23, 2008 links for 2008-03-23
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Symbian have always been keen defenders of software patents so it's natural they should trigger the UK's test case. Much though I respect David, I hope they lose, for everyone's sake.
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Thank goodness this one desn't belong to a black-hat.
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I notice the iPod Touch does this automatically already.
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I guess the end of the period when NBs can change their vote must be drawing close, and since none seem to have done so maybe desperate measures like this are all that's left?
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Much as I would love to be able to move the OSI, I'm afraid they usually ignore me! But I appreciatethe compliments.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 23 2008, 01:18:59 AM PDT )
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Saturday March 22, 2008 Election Ending
The OpenSolaris elections are ending soon (they close at 7am UK time on Tuesday). If you have a vote, please use it!
In particular, I'd draw your attention to my election statements as I would be grateful to receive your vote. You may also be interested by my comments on the constitutional amendments.
Do please vote - those amendments need a "yes" from 50% of the overall electorate if they are to pass so I doubt we have enough "yes" votes so far to pass these very rational and widely agreed amendments.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 22 2008, 06:49:20 PM PDT )
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Friday March 21, 2008 links for 2008-03-21
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Get the best support on the market for OpenOffice.org
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Love it. You can hear the dog panting with its tongue out as it speaks.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 21 2008, 01:26:22 AM PDT )
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Thursday March 20, 2008 links for 2008-03-20
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First look at the programme for the conference in Porto Alegre next month.
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Great set of new features here, can't wait to try it.
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Evolving nicely.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 20 2008, 01:28:01 AM PDT )
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Wednesday March 19, 2008 links for 2008-03-19
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Fabrizio commenting on the need for software to be AGPL-licensed. Perhaps we should consider this for OpenOffice.org?
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The StorageTek people come through with the source code to SAM/QFS. Delighted to see this happen.
Posted by webmink
( Mar 19 2008, 01:30:58 AM PDT )
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Monday March 17, 2008 Software Freedom: More Than Copyright
I was surprised last week to see a posting from Michael Tiemann, the President of the Open Source Initiative and a VP at Red Hat. Any posting with a subject of line of "Simon Phipps Was Right" is bound to catch my eye, but this one was especially unexpected because in the original discussion I had thought that Michael was largely right! Michael's posting graciously said:
Simon, I'm beginning to think that you were right and I was wrong. You said a standard's process is a crucial aspect of the standard's product, and a process that is not open cannot be trusted to produce a product that can be considered open. I maintained that I had seen and used many wonderful standards that took absolutely zero input from me, and therefore I didn't see my participation as a necessary prerequisite for assuring quality in the future. I believed that no matter what the process, a standard should be judged by the product. Watching the fallout settle from the [ISO ballot resolution meeting] in Geneva, I'm beginning to think that you were right and I was wrong.
I've been thinking about the posting for a week or so now and I've tried to respond thoughtfully. Here is the response I sent to Michael (still awaiting moderation):
Thank-you, Michael - it's not often I see a posting like this. Actually, when we spoke about this at OSCON I found I agreed with many of your arguments, even if that doesn't show in the on-list discussion. The problem is that standards are orthogonal to open source, and attempting to define them in a way that promotes and protects software freedom may be impossible. It's been said that when we create any system we create the game that plays it. The standards system is fully mature and as such is fully gamed, as the DIS29500 debacle you reference is proving.Maybe a more productive approach going forward is to try to do for the other kinds of so-called intellectual property what the Open Source Definition (OSD) currently does for copyright licensing. Perhaps we need to rename OSD to "Open Source Copyright Definition" and then work on an "Open Source Patent Definition", so that we can avoid the kind of entrapment that software patents can threaten? And as you know I am convinced we need an "Open Source Trademark Definition" to help us as a community of communities to avoid the IceWeasel problem.
If these are interesting, I'd be pleased to spend time exploring them together. Let me know.
New Definitions
The current Open Source Definition doesn't actually define Open Source - rather, it defines a subset of the requirements that protect software freedom, in this case the copyright license. I actually think renaming it ("Open Source Copyright Definition"?) would be good since there's more to Open Source than just the copyright license. I then suggest we explore creating an "Open Source Patent Definition" and an "Open Source Trademark Definition".
What would be in these two new definitions? Both would need to define what promotes software freedom and how it can be protected. Both would need to be pragmatically principled.
- An Open Source Patent Definition would do for patents what the OS(C)D does for copyrights. I've posted a lot on this subject before, notably in Protecting Developers from Patents and Ten Reasons The World Needs Patent Covenants, so I'd go mining there for my contributions to the discussion. But it may also be that in addition there needs to be a call for patent law reform, maybe as I outlined in Seven Patent Reforms While We Wait For Nirvana.
- When it comes to an Open Source Trademark Definition, we would need to similarly define the signs that a developer or user needs to know whether software freedom is being promoted in a trademark policy. I've not written about this yet, but I do believe we need to collectively understand the bounds trademark law places on people who have responsibility for trademarks (read: all developers and open source communities as well as all vendors). We then need to construct a path that promotes software freedom without placing impossible demands on trademark owners to behave in ways that are contrary to their responsibilities.
This is not easy stuff. But I do believe that certain recent events between the open and proprietary software worlds mean that it's time for software freedom fighters to get together and work on these things. I'm ready to work on it. What do you say, Michael?
Posted by webmink
( Mar 17 2008, 02:07:17 AM PDT )
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Comments [5]
Sunday March 16, 2008 links for 2008-03-16
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Cool tip. Wish Apple would do it for real though.
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Australian view: "Microsoft now seems to have been too clever by half, to its own detriment and that of consumers."
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This looks like a pretty rational step. All the development of the code-base (and optionally the distros themselves) on OpenSolaris.org and all the user/sysadmin forums and downloads on opensolaris.com
Posted by webmink
( Mar 16 2008, 01:18:49 AM PDT )
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