Open Source Article

[Richard <nospam [at] sheflug.co.uk>]

Hello

The following came to me through enquiries [at] sheflug.co.uk.  You don't
want to read it but if you do then you are an MS Windows user......


>>r: AOL 4.0 for Windows 95 sub 62 X-Status: N Status: R Return-Receipt-To:<<<<

This was in the header :-(

and so he says.......

 Hi, I write an Internet Business Law column for
Internet.com's Boardwatch magazine . I'm writing a series of articles
on open source and I'd like to get community feedback for my next
article dealing with the question below. Can you post this or email
your group members? If they want to respond or comment they can do so
by emailing me at . I'll review responses until March 31, 2000, the
deadline for the article. I expect the article will appear in the June
magazine and online in July. I'd like to hear dissenting views as much
as those that agree. Best regards, Tony >>>> QUESTION: I believe that
Open Source is a very important freedom movement, because, like
Harvard's Professor Lessig says, code is law, but with a non-human
police force. With closed code, we'll all be prisoners in the very
near future. So I believe that code MUST be open. But can anyone tell
me why software can't be both open and sold like Windows? Why is it
that software has to be basically given away if it's open? I'm not
sure that anyone in Open Source has ever answered this
question. It just seems to be assumed without any critical analysis.
Why can't Open Source developers get a royalty percentage of the sale
price just like writers, recording artists or movie actors, and the
product sold just like Windows is through traditional channels, so
that the developers get paid for their work? 


I should point out that for law you should strike out that word and
put either state law or federal law.  Anyone who knows anything about
international law and the internet wouldn't write this kind of thing
to send to a discusionm list of this sort.  I *have* read law for
twenty years.


This is very much like the sort of mail that I've seen the FBI send to
many discussion lists in the States.

His e-mail address is......

tonstanco@aol.com

Perhaps you should remember to flush the toilet afer using it ?

Thanks

-- 
Richard
Sheffield UK

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