Ubuntu Edge Campaign Set To Close At $12M USD

[bkor]

Do you think the Apache Foundation is also secretly planning to create closed source versions of its software? How about Gentoo? Are they evil for having a CLA? And QT project must be even worse, not only do they have a CLA, they really do dual-licence the code!

Could you first start making a good comparison before asking me questions? I'm not in the habit of answering stupid questions. I already explained why FSF is a bad comparison. Then trying various other things does not change fuck all.

Canonical is a commercial entity and they specifically said that they want to make things proprietary. If you want GPL license, the CLA goes against it. Really fucking simple to me.

Now adding Apache, Gentoo, QT and so on does not change anything if you don't look at their specific CLA. Apache license IIRC already is pretty similar to BSD IIRC. Gentoo no fucking clue, do your own homework. QT is exactly what I meant! If you want GPL, don't agree to a CLA.

Now could you please fuck off before suggesting that a CLA is totally acceptable? thanks.

[chrisb]

I think the reason a lot of people are upset with CLA agreements is that there is a chance it won't stay GPL exclusively. Yes, once the code has been released with the GPL, that code will always be GPL, but the CLA means that Canonical can make a nonGPL release.

Unfortunately the problem with Wayland licence is even worse. It isn't even GPL. There is no guarantee that any contributions you make will remain open source. Any company can make a closed source non GPL version, and even if you disagree there is nothing you can do about it.

[bkor]

I think the reason a lot of people are upset with CLA agreements is that there is a chance it won't stay GPL exclusively. Yes, once the code has been released with the GPL, that code will always be GPL, but the CLA means that Canonical can make a nonGPL release.

I totally agree. Within GNOME we have clear guidelines. See https://wiki.gnome.org/CopyrightAssignment and https://wiki.gnome.org/CopyrightAssignment/Guidelines. After creating these pages, they (anyone who wants the copyright assignment, not just Canonical) now focus on CLA instead of copyright assignment. But the issues addressed in the wiki are the same, which is logical as there was a clear concious decision to be able to release the software under a different license. Trying to address our issues with what copyright assignment entails by just focussing on something new which allows for the exact same things (CLA) is IMO meaningless.

Often it is raised like "ah, just a CLA, it's fine". It is totally not. Special rights just for one entity is bad. I dislike FSF having a CLA, but at least they have ensured it cannot be used in a bad way.

[chrisb]

Could you first start making a good comparison before asking me questions? I'm not in the habit of answering stupid questions. I already explained why FSF is a bad comparison. Then trying various other things does not change fuck all.

Canonical is a commercial entity and they specifically said that they want to make things proprietary. If you want GPL license, the CLA goes against it. Really fucking simple to me.

Now adding Apache, Gentoo, QT and so on does not change anything if you don't look at their specific CLA. Apache license IIRC already is pretty similar to BSD IIRC. Gentoo no fucking clue, do your own homework. QT is exactly what I meant! If you want GPL, don't agree to a CLA.

Now could you please fuck off before suggesting that a CLA is totally acceptable? thanks.

1. I didn't mention FSF

2. Canonical already said they want to go closed source? You are either trolling or ignorant. Shuttleworth: "we'll ship this with Android and Ubuntu, no plans to put proprietary applications on it." They are licensing their own stuff GPLv3 - the preferred licence of the FSF, so in many ways more open than most others.

3. You seem to have an unnecessarily rude and arrogant attitude. If this is an example of the Gnome project no wonder it's failing http://ploum.net/the-last-guadec/

[chrisb]

Haha. So this is the new official "Gnome is DOOMed" link? How pathetic. Last year it was Otte's blog. Too bad he went to GUADEC this year and gave a talk about GTK to infinity and beyond. Sure we all know KDE is losing pace and developers, but there is no reason for you to lash out at Gnome who is doing very well.

Actually I want Gnome to succeed - there is room for more than one desktop, and it is a shame to see any open source project fade away. I apologise for suggesting that bkor's attitude might be representative of Gnome developers; it was unfair, I'm sure that there are many developers out there who are much more reasonable and polite.

As for copyright assignment, it is just a boring topic by now. Everyone has their own opinions and arguing will change nothing. The reason that a lawyer will tell you to have copyright assignment is that it makes registering copyright and enforcement actions possible in the US. Eben Moglen says:

"Under US copyright law, which is the law under which most free software programs have historically been first published, there are very substantial procedural advantages to registration of copyright. And despite the broad right of distribution conveyed by the GPL, enforcement of copyright is generally not possible for distributors: only the copyright holder or someone having assignment of the copyright can enforce the license. If there are multiple authors of a copyrighted work, successful enforcement depends on having the cooperation of all authors.

In order to make sure that all of our copyrights can meet the recordkeeping and other requirements of registration, and in order to be able to enforce the GPL most effectively, FSF requires that each author of code incorporated in FSF projects provide a copyright assignment, and, where appropriate, a disclaimer of any work-for-hire ownership claims by the programmer's employer." http://www.gnu.org/licenses/why-assign.html

If you don't believe him, then hire an American lawyer and ask them about the issue; they will almost certainly tell you the same thing - that under US copyright law it is desirable to have sole ownership. You might not agree, I might not agree, but it is what it is, and it would be foolish to ignore professional legal advice.

As for the debate being boring, sorry but this issue is over a decade old. I remember exactly the same arguments over Gentoo - some people objected, done people were worried that drobbins was secretly planning to make a closed source embedded version of Gentoo. None of these things came to pass. http://archives.gentoo.org/gentoo-de...11d64803f5.xml

[danielnez1]

Haha. So this is the new official "Gnome is DOOMed" link? How pathetic. Last year it was Otte's blog. Too bad he went to GUADEC this year and gave a talk about GTK to infinity and beyond. Sure we all know KDE is losing pace and developers, but there is no reason for you to lash out at Gnome who is doing very well.

If I could interject in your trolling rampage for a second, please enlighten me how on KDE is "loosing pace and developers"?

[ворот93]

Could you first start making a good comparison before asking me questions? I'm not in the habit of answering stupid questions. I already explained why FSF is a bad comparison. Then trying various other things does not change fuck all.

Canonical is a commercial entity and they specifically said that they want to make things proprietary. If you want GPL license, the CLA goes against it. Really fucking simple to me.

Now adding Apache, Gentoo, QT and so on does not change anything if you don't look at their specific CLA. Apache license IIRC already is pretty similar to BSD IIRC. Gentoo no fucking clue, do your own homework. QT is exactly what I meant! If you want GPL, don't agree to a CLA.

Now could you please fuck off before suggesting that a CLA is totally acceptable? thanks.

Is it butthurt over Unity being a more popular shell than GNOME's? It surely looks so.

[danielnez1]

You can get the data from Ohloh or trends from KDE's commit digest. Be sure to understand that both sources are maintained by KDE people. And please do this before you start your process of denying facts derived from emperical data. Maybe you prefer to live in a reality distortion field where cherrypicked blog posts by Gnome devs is the TRUTH, but in real life KDE is going down the drain

But by the same token doesn't the data from Ohloh show a downward trend for GNOME too? From what I can see form KDE's commit digest, the average Commits have remained fairly stable, but if you can show otherwise be my guest. So far, you have failed yet again to prove anything.

[LinuxGamer]

1. I didn't mention FSF

2. Canonical already said they want to go closed source? You are either trolling or ignorant. Shuttleworth: "we'll ship this with Android and Ubuntu, no plans to put proprietary applications on it." They are licensing their own stuff GPLv3 - the preferred licence of the FSF, so in many ways more open than most others.

3. You seem to have an unnecessarily rude and arrogant attitude. If this is an example of the Gnome project no wonder it's failing http://ploum.net/the-last-guadec/

Wrong http://phoronix.com/forums/showthrea...for-commercial

[dee.]

Unfortunately the problem with Wayland licence is even worse. It isn't even GPL. There is no guarantee that any contributions you make will remain open source. Any company can make a closed source non GPL version, and even if you disagree there is nothing you can do about it.

You seem to have misconceptions about the MIT license.

MIT, and other BSD-style licenses, do not allow you to take the code and release it as proprietary. You can distribute binaries of the MIT/BSD-licensed code without including the source, and you can even make changes in it that you don't have to publish, but the license of the original code still stays the same, and you will have to include the MIT/BSD copyright notice with the binaries.

To my knowledge, Wayland doesn't require copyright assignment, so if you contribute to Wayland, your code will stay open - it's just a more permissive form of open, and can be used with closed projects - but also with GPL-licensed projects. No one can relicense Wayland unless they get permission from all copyright holders.

MIT/BSD-style licenses are good enough for projects like Wayland, where the aim is to make it as accessible as possible, and as widespread as possible. The license makes sense for protocols and standards, because the permissiveness of it allows it to proliferate. In cases like this, GPL might actually be counter-productive, even though it's a great license for most other things (like kernels).