08.14.19

Being in Favour of Free/Libre Open Source Software Means Rejecting Software Patents

Posted in EFF, Free/Libre Software, Patents at 1:20 pm by Dr. Roy Schestowitz

A decade ago they spoke about this issue, but not anymore

Torvalds on Software Patents
Full interview [PDF]

Summary: Those who believe in Software Freedom cannot at the same time believe that software patents are desirable; we’ve sadly come to a point where many companies that dominate so-called ‘Open Source’ groups actively lobby for such patents, in effect betraying the community they claim to be a part of

“Open Source is nowadays a by-product of Proprietary Software,” Benjamin Henrion wrote or quoted, “permissive licenses, repositories with subscriptions, open client but not the server, “APIs”, cloud lock-in, software patents all over. And hipsters with their Macbooks…”

Like people who run the Linux Foundation and lie to everyone…

“Open Source” is nowadays a whole different beast, different if not wholly distinguishable from what it was two decades ago. Back then it was supposed to just be a substitution of Free software, but today it is just proprietary software with some openwashing (for marketing purposes or bait); so we’ve ‘lost’ the cause and must revert back to Free software, this time insisting that openwash isn’t credible and cannot be tolerated (those who do this should state upfront it’s proprietary).

“On the patent front we got our way; openwashing is another, newer problem. We’re nowadays focusing more on the latter one.”Henrion went further; he mentioned software patents and linked to this new tweet from IAM (“In an exclusive interview with IAM, @danielnazer of @mozilla shares top tips for software IP protection, his evolving role as Senior IP & Product Counsel and why he’s looking forward to speaking at #SoftwareIP this October.”). Oddly enough a former EFF lawyer/attorney, who fought software patents, decided to participate/speak at an event of the patent trolls’ lobby to give false impression of ‘balance’. He represents Mozilla, which isn’t supposed to use terms like “software IP protection”. It’s typically the likes of OIN who are attending this event, but they're pro-software patents, unlike most Mozilla staff.

Observation worth making: most patent blogs went totally or almost totally silent this year; few remain active and they’re hardly covering Section 101 cases anymore. Coons et al have gone nowhere with their bill, either, so it’s just like in prior years and just what we predicted all along. We’re winning the patent policy battles and IAM became irrelevant. On the patent front we got our way; openwashing is another, newer problem. We’re nowadays focusing more on the latter one. █

Share this post: These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

Permalink Mail Send this to a friend

If you liked this post, consider subscribing to the RSS feed or join us now at the IRC channels.

Pages that cross-reference this one

What Else is New

Links 10/7/2020: Debian 8 Long Term Support EOL, Mobian Project, Mesa 20.1.3

Links for the day
[Humour] COVID-19 is Very, Very Afraid of Human Beings Making More Monopolies Instead of Fighting Together

The European Patent Office (EPO) to the rescue! Fighting a dangerous pandemic one profitable monopoly at a time!
The News is Never 'Slow', It's Just Journalism That's Slowing Down (and Investigative Journalism Coming Under Attack)

A mix of censorship and subtle mind control contribute to misinformed societies that shape their perception or misunderstanding of the world based on false measures of authority (where money can determine what is true and what is untrue); many topics remain completely untouched, leading to apathy in a vacuum; it's very much applicable to international organisations, which are presumed benign by virtue of being multi-national or supranational
Social Control Media is About Social Control and If It Doesn't Ban You It'll Shut Down Everyone's Account (One Day)

It’s time to leave the ‘Internet rot’ which is social control media well behind us; blogging and RSS/XML may seem like a thing of the past, but they may as well become the future (again; if we make the correct and informed choices)
Microsoft's Fingers in Every Pie: The Cult Mentality That Society Needs to Become Wary of

Microsoft and its co-founder (pretending to do his for-profit 'charity' via the Gates Foundation) are trying to control the world; in the process they've moved to control even their most potent competitor, according to Gates himself, which is GNU/Linux
Links 9/7/2020: Google’s Open Usage Commons, GNOME 3.36.4, Neptune 6.5

Links for the day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, July 08, 2020

IRC logs for Wednesday, July 08, 2020
Links 8/7/2020: SUSE to Acquire Rancher Labs, Btrfs as Default in Fedora, Qt Creator 4.12.4

Links for the day
Yes, Master

When the Linux Foundation tells us to tone down our language we ought to remember what kind of hypocritical stance these people have (note: the above have nothing to do with slavery, either)
Fraunhofer is Again Evergreening Software Patents to Maintain Its Codecs Cartel, Forcing Everyone to Pay to View/Stream Multimedia Files

The roller-coaster of software patents on multimedia isn't stopping; we know the culprits who can be named for perpetuating this injustice
[Humour/Meme] Focusing on the Bombings and Who's Included in the Bombings

Supremacist agenda disguised as "tolerant and inclusive" is still objectionable supremacist agenda
Manners Are a Good Thing. The Yardstick or the Standard of Manners Changes Over Time.

Entirely legitimate grievances of African-Americans are being exploited by people who aren’t even African-American (and usually don’t speak for African-Americans) to warp the debate from one about software ethics and technical issues, not to mention war crimes of companies that employ many programmers, to something which is unlikely to really help African-Americans (also, they don't employ any African-Americans)
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, July 07, 2020

IRC logs for Tuesday, July 07, 2020
Links 8/7/2020: Huawei’s GNU/Linux PC, Sparky 5.12, and Endless OS 3.8.4 Released

Links for the day
[Humour] Television Channels That Don't Speak of Real Looting But Participate in Looting

People may need to look beyond (or outside) the television screen to grasp what's going on
(Software) Freedom is Elusive Without the Ability to Concentrate

Software is consuming people's minds; to make matters worse, people have become so attached to such software that they're unable to see it and get away from it (they associate that software with "social life")
Monopolies Erode Freedom, Freedom Erodes Monopolies

"There are so many reasons that GitHub makes projects less free."
Links 7/7/2020: NomadBSD 1.3.2, Clonezilla Live 2.6.7 and DRM Comes to Cars

Links for the day
[Humour] IAM Ranked Top for Quality of EPO Propaganda

Contrary to what the European Patent Office (EPO) keeps saying, patent quality is slipping very fast in Europe (based on the EPO's own analysis!) but patent trolls-funded publishers deny that
When They're Done With Patents on Foods and Recipes They'll Have Patents on Fashion, Taste and Smell

The mental dysfunction — an infectious condition — that says everything in the world must be patented should be resisted; it overlooks the fact that patents were introduced to protect/promote actual invention, not thoughts, feelings, nature and art
[Humour/Meme] IBM's Money is Unhealthy to the Free Software Foundation (FSF)

IBM will never be happy as long as RMS (Richard Stallman) has a say in the FSF — directly or indirectly — or even in the GNU Project, both of which he himself created back when IBM was the biggest monopolist
IRC Proceedings: Monday, July 06, 2020

IRC logs for Monday, July 06, 2020
Never Let IBM/Red Hat Lecture Us on Morality

Ethics and morality should not be taught by those who themselves need a lesson; in the meantime we're losing the courage to speak freely and those who commit atrocious acts like it a lot better that way
[Humour/Meme] Wear the Red Hat as the Open Org Becomes Openwash

IBM is changing Red Hat and not for the better; sooner or later IBM will become another Microsoft and changing from one to the other will be like swapping 'masters'
IBM is Imposing Non-Free, Privacy-Infringing Tools and Patent Tolls on Red Hat Staff

There are signs that Red Hat under IBM will be more like assimilation to IBM, not IBM assimilating to the 'Red Hat way' or the so-called 'open org'
They Tell the Free Software Community That It is Racist While Saying Nothing at All About Trump's Racism (Because He Gives Them Government and Military Contracts)

While their president compares 'foreign' people to a virus (using innuendo, dog whistles and racist rhetoric reminiscent of the Nazi era) the big US corporations (American surveillance giants) turn their attention to rather innocuous words inside people's code (which almost nobody sees anyway)
LibreOffice 'Personal Edition' Seems Like a Marketing and Communication Fluke

Had LibreOffice developers (and the Document Foundation) communicated these changes more openly, they would have averted/avoided some of the FUD
It Almost Feels Like Microsoft Has Already 'Bought' Canonical

Canonical's disturbing trajectory and betrayal of the community continue unabated; one can easily get the impression that Ubuntu exists to help Microsoft at some level
Update to GNU Project Bleeding into Microsoft

Update
Microsoft is Going to Get Tired of Whining About “GAFA” and Accept That It's Just as Bad If Not a Lot Worse at Privacy

Microsoft is being treated by the US government as if it's not abusing anything, let alone people's privacy; if anything, this demonstrates the degree to which Microsoft infiltrated or 'vendor-captured' regulatory branches