Subject: Re: Sleepycat Software DB 2.x library licensing vs. NetBSD
To: NetBSD-current Discussion List <firstname.lastname@example.org>
From: Greg A. Woods <email@example.com>
Date: 09/19/1998 21:55:52
[ On Sat, September 19, 1998 at 09:12:57 (-0500), firstname.lastname@example.org wrote: ]
> Subject: Re: Sleepycat Software DB 2.x library licensing vs. NetBSD
> In message <m0zKGQD-0009MEC@most.weird.com>, Greg A. Woods writes:
> >In strictly philisophical (and possibly some legal) terms I don't think
> >one can consider software that can be "hijacked" and turned into
> >proprietary software to be truely "open" and free.
> How can anyone ever hijack your code? Let's say they take the entire NetBSD
> source tree, slap a label on it, and sell it as a closed source system.
That's almost exactly what I mean by "hijack", but....
> Your code is still in the NetBSD source tree, being given away, and is still
> not proprietary.
> It's not like a book of which there's only one copy. If some people rip
> pages from their copies, or scribble on their copies, the other copies are
> still fine.
Folks making proprietary software from what was once free software
rarely leave it all exactly the way they found it. Just ask the
hundreds (or is it thousands) of programmers world-wide who've had end
users of such software ask them for support only to find out that the
bug was introduced by the proprietary vendor. Even worse many such
users will expect *free* support just because they're using what they
think is a freeware component of the application they're using.
Indeed the original copy is still A-OK, but that's not where the
problems come from.
Greg A. Woods
+1 416 218-0098 VE3TCP <email@example.com> <robohack!woods>
Planix, Inc. <firstname.lastname@example.org>; Secrets of the Weird <email@example.com>