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?
