Reading Software Licences

Catching up late on some old threads....

The issue with EULAs and shrinkwrap licenses is a failure of the free
market. Most people aren't throwing up their hands because they
don't care about the rights they're signing away, but rather because
they don't feel like they have a decent alternative. It's one thing
to choose among five different shareware utility programs; quite
another to run up against a licensing issue in QuickTime, OS X, or
Microsoft Office.

It's for this reason that many people have switched over to open
source and Creative Commons-licensed software, where the rules are
much more clearly defined, and generally much more in favor of the
end-user. Fact is, it *is* generally possible to avoid the tangle of
the worst of the licensing rules, but it requires a certain level of
work and self-education to do so.

In the long run, though, the licenses and supporting laws will
continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
their disposable income. Since this is a community of people with
above-average tech savvy and concern about such things, it's worth
noting that if it's not happening here, it's sure not going to happen
elsewhere.

Best,
Jeff

On May 28, 2005, at 10:16 AM, Jeff Porten wrote:

> It's for this reason that many people have switched over to open
> source and Creative Commons-licensed software, where the rules are
> much more clearly defined, and generally much more in favor of the
> end-user.

_Many_ people? Be serious... A tiny minority, maybe a couple of percent?

As Microsoft would probably say, "The most popular type of software
license is pirated." :-)


Kirk

              Read my blog: Kirkville -- http://www.mcelhearn.com
           Musings, Opinion and Miscellanea, on Macs, iPods and more
       Kirk McElhearn | Chemin de la Lauze | 05600 Guillestre | France

>In the long run, though, the licenses and supporting laws will
>continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
>their disposable income. Since this is a community of people with
>above-average tech savvy and concern about such things, it's worth
>noting that if it's not happening here, it's sure not going to happen
>elsewhere.
>
>Best,
>Jeff

I think that your comment about there being on alternatives is right.
Licenses aren't negotiable, so it's a "take it or leave it"
situation. I don't agree that "the licenses and supporting laws will
continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
their disposable income." When there is no real alternative, there
is no place else to spend the money. And of course, even where there
are equivalent alternatives to particular software it isn't
competitive unless people know about it. And people know about it
from advertising, placement in retail stores and the like. I haven't
seen much open source software being advertised or on store shelves.
Apart from folks such as those on this list who are tech savvy and
interested in licensing issues, very few people could even tell you
what open source licensing is, how it differs from common commercial
licensing, or why it may (or may not) be preferable.

Because of the perception (often a true perception) that there aren't
any real alternatives to commercially licensed software, most folks
simply ignore the software license as necessary annoyance. Having no
idea what's in them, honest folks simply play by the simple rule that
you don't copy or distribute software. For most folks, whether we
"own" the software or simply have a right to use it is a distinction
without a difference.

Brady

On May 28, 2005, at 4:16 AM, Jeff Porten wrote:
> In the long run, though, the licenses and supporting laws will
> continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
> their disposable income. Since this is a community of people with
> above-average tech savvy and concern about such things, it's worth
> noting that if it's not happening here, it's sure not going to happen
> elsewhere.

But the problem is that the license is one issue in a multitude of
factors that influence software choice. If the open source
alternative were always a match for the program with a more
restrictive license, in features, usability, and performance, the
open source alternative would be the clear choice. And in cases
where they're competitive, the open source alternative is popular and
successful; in cases where they're not, the freedom of the license
isn't enough to make the program attractive for use. I don't see
this as a market failure, but as the market rewarding the things that
most people actually find important. It's frustrating when what most
people want is not what we want, but that isn't necessarily a sign of
a flaw in the market.

Charlton


--
Charlton Wilbur
cwilburchromatico.net

> 4. Re: Reading Software Licences
>
> Message #6: Re: Reading Software Licences
> Posted by: brady Date: May 29, 2005.
> I think that your comment about there being on alternatives is right.
> Licenses aren't negotiable, so it's a "take it or leave it"
> situation. I don't agree that "the licenses and supporting laws will
> continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
> their disposable income." When there is no real alternative, there
> is no place else to spend the money. And of course, even where there
> are equivalent alternatives to particular software it isn't
> competitive unless people know about it. And people know about it
> from advertising, placement in retail stores and the like.

Knowing about it isn't the point either, especially when you need to
exchange files with various corporate entities and they all use Word,
Photoshop, etc. You just can't make a living on a computer without
working with the same few commercial programs.
-Shel

On Jun 6, 2005, at 10:37 PM, r2ggentlysloping.com wrote:

>> 4. Re: Reading Software Licences
>>
>> Message #6: Re: Reading Software Licences
>> Posted by: brady Date: May 29, 2005.
>> I think that your comment about there being on alternatives is
>> right.
>> Licenses aren't negotiable, so it's a "take it or leave it"
>> situation. I don't agree that "the licenses and supporting laws will
>> continue to be onerous until people vote for better options with
>> their disposable income." When there is no real alternative, there
>> is no place else to spend the money. And of course, even where there
>> are equivalent alternatives to particular software it isn't
>> competitive unless people know about it. And people know about it
>> from advertising, placement in retail stores and the like.
>>
>
> Knowing about it isn't the point either, especially when you need to
> exchange files with various corporate entities and they all use Word,
> Photoshop, etc. You just can't make a living on a computer without
> working with the same few commercial programs.
> -Shel

I have worked in all areas of the computer industry from
semiconductors to distribution. There are a couple of things that
you should know. Despite what your sales person or support person
may say, depending upon how the license is written, it can be
contested. The problem is that most people don't know much about the
law. But think about it, first of all, it is not really a contract
because, even if you "agree, " if you don't understand the contract
completely, you are actually agreeing to what you do understand which
is not the intent of the contract and therefore, you are agreeing to
something that doesn't exist.

Additionally, to create a binding contract, several discrete actions
have to take place which are virtually impossible in a "license"
situation.

Think about it.

Gina de

>> It's for this reason that many people have switched over to open
>> source and Creative Commons-licensed software, where the rules are
>> much more clearly defined, and generally much more in favor of the
>> end-user.
>
> _Many_ people Be serious... A tiny minority, maybe a couple of percent

Well, that depends what you're measuring. Pretty much everyone who uses the
web uses open source software. Most web sites run Apache, for example*.
Firefox appears to have 25% market share now. All OSX users are using the
open source FreeBSD, and maybe the KHTML rendering engine in Safari, and a
host of other open source applications.

Now, those users haven't all sat down and thought "I'm going to use this
software because there are no licensing issues", but they are using the
software because someone somewhere (a developer, for example) has had that
thought.

So, it may be a small percentage of people who are _consciously_ aware that
they're using open source software because of the licensing issues. But, a
majority of computer users DO use open source software, and ALL of them owe
that to the licensing freedoms that open source offers.

*<http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp>
--
Ian Eiloart
Servers Team
Sussex University ITS

> Now, those users haven't all sat down and thought "I'm going to use this
> software because there are no licensing issues", but they are using the
> software because someone somewhere (a developer, for example) has had that
> thought.

Exactly. "Someone somewhere" made the decision to use open source software -
*not* the end user. I think it's quite fair to say that only a tiny minority
of end users have actually decided to 'switch' to open source software; if
they're using it, it's as infrastructure that a programmer or developer put
in their product. Firefox is about the only open source product I can think
of that's actually achieved significant end-user share as an independent
product; even 'big-name' open source software like the GIMP, Open Office and
even Firefox's partner Thunderbird are still barely even a blip on the
radar, so far as I can tell.

The initial post seemed to be implying that there was a large groundswell of
user support for open source software, as a more-or-less political statement
against software licensing agreements; I agree with the second post, I think
that's anything but the case here. If ordinary users have started using OSS
on their computer (I don't count servers, the user has no control over
that), it's because a developer chose to integrate it into an end-user
product that they like, not because it's 'open source.' Firefox is a good
mainstream end-user product, but in that sense it's no different from any of
the other good freeware that's come out for the Mac - open source or not.

--On 7 June 2005 11:48:51 -0500 Travis Butler <tbutlerbirch.net> wrote:

> Exactly. "Someone somewhere" made the decision to use open source
> software - *not* the end user. I think it's quite fair to say that only a
> tiny minority of end users have actually decided to 'switch' to open
> source software;

Yes - that's what I said. The point is that even if the users don't know
it, they're using open source because it's free (as in speech).

> if they're using it, it's as infrastructure that a
> programmer or developer put in their product. Firefox is about the only
> open source product I can think of that's actually achieved significant
> end-user share as an independent product; even 'big-name' open source
> software like the GIMP, Open Office and even Firefox's partner
> Thunderbird are still barely even a blip on the radar, so far as I can
> tell.
>
> The initial post seemed to be implying that there was a large groundswell
> of user support for open source software,

It did say that, and it's true.

> as a more-or-less political
> statement against software licensing agreements;

It didn't say that.

> I agree with the second
> post, I think that's anything but the case here. If ordinary users have
> started using OSS on their computer (I don't count servers, the user has
> no control over that), it's because a developer chose to integrate it
> into an end-user product that they like, not because it's 'open source.'

That isn't really the point. Nobody wants people to choose software as a
political statement. Even free software advocates don't do it to make a
political statement - they do it because it makes sense to them to be able
to change the code.

--
Ian Eiloart
Servers Team
Sussex University ITS

On 6/8/05 12:02 AM, "Ian Eiloart" <ianesussex.ac.uk> wrote:

> Even free software advocates don't do it to make a
> political statement

Well, except Mr Stallman.

  --John

The people who write these are all lawyers who don't dare think originally. They cobble together exerpts of every license they can get their hands on. Because there is virtually no case law, these licenses are extreme beyond all belief. The lawyers have no choice. The only way to abolish the current system is to have the problem solved by a) a consortium of the 10 largest software dealers and the ABA, b) Congress (ha, ha ;) or c) the california attorney general. We'll get hit by a meteor first.

At 7:04 AM -0700 6/7/05, Gina de Miranda wrote:
>Additionally, to create a binding contract, several discrete actions
>have to take place which are virtually impossible in a "license"
>situation.
>
>Think about it.
>
>Gina de



Unfortunately, several cases go the other way. I believe that one of
the first articles I wrote for Tidbits was about shrinkwrap
licensing. That was issue 201 back in Nov '93 and the key cases on
software licenses hadn't yet been decided. Unfortunately, my
prognostications seem to be being borne out, which means that the law
is headed in the wrong direction, in my view.

First, a license isn't a contract in the traditional sense of the
word. Certainly there are licenses that come in the form of a
contract, but in the case of software the cases generally say that
the copyright/patent holder (don't get me started on the issue of
patenting vs. copyrighting software) can put pretty much anything
they want to into their licenses and make it stick. No negotiation
or consent is necessary - the consent comes from purchasing and using
the product. Don't like the terms? Don't use the product. In
traditional contract terms this is an adhesion contract, but the
courts have declined to apply adhesion contract analysis to software
licenses. At least, this appears to be the direction the courts are
taking on the subject. You can certainly find examples of courts
that have gone the other way, but they are increasingly in the
minority.

Second, the issue is still very much up in the air in the courts.
There are a handful of cases that talk in some detail about software
licensing and what can or cannot be included/enforced in a license,
but they cover specific fact situations and hardly touch the broad
array of circumstances in which issues arise. So while the cases
that do exist tend toward allowing the holder of IP rights free
reign, those cases don't (in my view) represent the whole universe of
software licensing. More folks will have to challenge licenses and
get more cases decided at the appellate level before we have
meaningfully complete precedent on the issue. Again a caveat - on
this point I am talking about licensing in general, not just
shrinkwrap licensing. You can certainly make the argument that a
different analysis applies, although I don't agree with it. The
large software vendors often (but not always) take just as much of a
"take it or leave it" approach to their business clients as with
their smaller customers like you and me.

Third, let me correct a misunderstanding about the law. Even if you
sign a contract where you did not understand the terms, you are bound
to that contract. Similarly, saying that someone read a license and
accepted the software, but then wanted evade the provisions of the
license because they weren't a lawyer and didn't understand it isn't
going to get very far in court. There is an axiom in law that
"ignorance of the law is no excuse," and it applies in this situation.

Finally, you are entirely right that these things can be challenged.
But a very practical question is who is going to challenge them? Not
you or me, or probably anyone on this list. Unless we've got a few
million dollars burning a hole in our pockets, we can't afford the
challenge. But you can bet that the software company issuing the
license can outspend us and outlawyer us easily. So the rest of us
peons have to wait until someone with big bucks decides it makes
sense for them to fight that battle, and that means that new cases on
this will be few and far between.

Brady

On 6/7/05 at 9:40 PM, ianesussex.ac.uk (Ian Eiloart) wrote:

> > Exactly. "Someone somewhere" made the decision to use open source
> > software - *not* the end user. I think it's quite fair to say that
> > only a tiny minority of end users have actually decided to 'switch'
> > to open source software;
>
> Yes - that's what I said. The point is that even if the users don't
> know it, they're using open source because it's free (as in speech).

That may have been the point you were trying to make; my point is that
if the decision is made by a few programmers/server administrators, and
end users don't know and don't care if it's open source, then you can
hardly interpret it as 'broad user support for open source.'

> > if they're using it, it's as infrastructure that a programmer or
> > developer put in their product. Firefox is about the only open
> > source product I can think of that's actually achieved significant
> > end-user share as an independent product; even 'big-name' open
> > source software like the GIMP, Open Office and even Firefox's
> > partner Thunderbird are still barely even a blip on the radar, so
> > far as I can tell.
> >
> > The initial post seemed to be implying that there was a large
> > groundswell of user support for open source software,
>
> It did say that, and it's true.

I don't buy this; see above. Server software, or open source components
used in non-open-source projects (i.e. OS X or embedded systems), don't
count as 'user support for open source', because the end user has no
involvement in the decision to use open source; how can one claim he's
supporting it if he didn't make the decision?

True user support for open source would be measured by users themselves
deciding to use open source software, and the closest way I can think of
to measure that is by looking at the adoption rate of end-user open
source programs. And as I said above, as far as I can tell, this isn't
happening. Firefox is the only end-user OSS I know of to actually see
significant mainstream adoption; OSS advocates trumpet OpenOffice, or
the GIMP, or AbiWord, but I have yet to see any ordinary people actually
using them.

Even Firefox is a questionable example, because most of the people I
know who use it don't realize it's open source, or even know what open
source is. They don't know or care about being able to modify the code;
all they care about is that it's a good application. And being a good
application is orthogonal to being open source.

> > as a more-or-less political statement against software licensing
> > agreements;
>
> It didn't say that.

'Political statement' isn't the best phrase, but I can't think of any
better way to put it off the top of my head. Being 'able to change the
code,' in your own words, is completely irrelevant to the vast majority
of users who aren't programmers and never will be. You can't argue that
it's necessary for programmers to develop good end-user applications;
sure, it can be helpful, but Mac programmers have been writing both good
software, free (as in beer) software, and good free software since the
very beginning of the platform, much if not most of it without the
benefit of OSS. So when OSS advocates talk about it as a universal good,
as if it were an end in itself, it comes across to me as a statement of
faith and not fact. (Using politically-linked phrases like 'free (as in
speech)' doesn't exactly change this impression, either.)

> > I agree with the second post, I think that's anything but the case
> > here. If ordinary users have started using OSS on their computer (I
> > don't count servers, the user has no control over that), it's
> > because a developer chose to integrate it into an end-user product
> > that they like, not because it's 'open source.'
>
> That isn't really the point. Nobody wants people to choose software
> as a political statement. Even free software advocates don't do it to
> make a political statement - they do it because it makes sense to
> them to be able to change the code.

Only if you're a programmer, which doesn't describe the vast majority of
us. And really, only if you're a programmer with enough time to invest
in learning the code, immersing yourself in it to the point where you
can actually do something useful with it. Most people probably couldn't
care less how a program is developed, as long as it's a good program.
And getting back to the thread topic, I don't think most people are
going to pick licensing terms ahead of the quality of the software; if
the software was as good, sure, I could see picking by licensing terms.
But the fact that end-user OSS is languishing outside of Firefox
suggests that's not the case.


Travis Butler
tbutlermac.com

...Cats are the proof of a higher purpose to the universe.

[Be very careful - this is a thread about software licenses, not the merits of open source, which is a huge rathole. -Adam]


--On 11 June 2005 00:53:10 -0500 Travis Butler <tbutlerbirch.net> wrote:

> On 6/7/05 at 9:40 PM, ianesussex.ac.uk (Ian Eiloart) wrote:
>
>> > Exactly. "Someone somewhere" made the decision to use open source
>> > software - *not* the end user. I think it's quite fair to say that
>> > only a tiny minority of end users have actually decided to 'switch'
>> > to open source software;
>>
>> Yes - that's what I said. The point is that even if the users don't
>> know it, they're using open source because it's free (as in speech).
>
> That may have been the point you were trying to make; my point is that
> if the decision is made by a few programmers/server administrators, and
> end users don't know and don't care if it's open source, then you can
> hardly interpret it as 'broad user support for open source.'

One way to support open source is simply to use it.

>> > if they're using it, it's as infrastructure that a programmer or
>> > developer put in their product. Firefox is about the only open
>> > source product I can think of that's actually achieved significant
>> > end-user share as an independent product; even 'big-name' open
>> > source software like the GIMP, Open Office and even Firefox's
>> > partner Thunderbird are still barely even a blip on the radar, so
>> > far as I can tell.
>> >
>> > The initial post seemed to be implying that there was a large
>> > groundswell of user support for open source software,
>>
>> It did say that, and it's true.
>
> I don't buy this; see above. Server software, or open source components
> used in non-open-source projects (i.e. OS X or embedded systems), don't
> count as 'user support for open source', because the end user has no
> involvement in the decision to use open source; how can one claim he's
> supporting it if he didn't make the decision?

Well, I think that the end results are the important thing, not the
process. So someone who chooses MacOSX over Windows IS deciding to use open
source - even though they don't know it. A useful analogy might be food.
Most people don't look to see what's in their food. They don't know, for
example, that most biscuits (cookies) contain animal products (either fats
or whey). They're still supporting the livestock industry by eating those
products - regardless of who actually paid for the biscuits.

> True user support for open source would be measured by users themselves
> deciding to use open source software, and the closest way I can think of
> to measure that is by looking at the adoption rate of end-user open
> source programs. And as I said above, as far as I can tell, this isn't
> happening. Firefox is the only end-user OSS I know of to actually see
> significant mainstream adoption; OSS advocates trumpet OpenOffice, or
> the GIMP, or AbiWord, but I have yet to see any ordinary people actually
> using them.

How about all the o/s wiki and blogging s/w out there. Wikipedia isn't just
creative commons licensed content - it's also open source software. There's
also loads of other o/s web applications out there.

> Even Firefox is a questionable example, because most of the people I
> know who use it don't realize it's open source, or even know what open
> source is.

That doesn't matter. Presumably they use it because they like it. It
doesn't matter to me that they don't know *why* it's good. That's an
unachievable measure - almost by definition an "ordinary" user doesn't know
about the development process.

There has to be a way of measuring "ordinary user" support for s/w other
than (1) paying for it or (2) advocating the development process. (1)
generally doesn't apply for o/s and (2) generally doesn't apply for ANY
s/w. What's left apart from (3) just liking it enough to use it?

> They don't know or care about being able to modify the code;
> all they care about is that it's a good application. And being a good
> application is orthogonal to being open source.
>
.
.
.

>> That isn't really the point. Nobody wants people to choose software
>> as a political statement. Even free software advocates don't do it to
>> make a political statement - they do it because it makes sense to
>> them to be able to change the code.
>
> Only if you're a programmer, which doesn't describe the vast majority of
> us. And really, only if you're a programmer with enough time to invest
> in learning the code, immersing yourself in it to the point where you
> can actually do something useful with it.

Yes, but the time required to successfully modify code needn't be very
much. For example, I made a feature request to Exim developers. They didn't
want to fix my very esoteric problem, but did tell me which line to fix - I
just needed to adjust a couple of constants. That kind of interaction isn't
possible with closed source code.

> Most people probably couldn't
> care less how a program is developed, as long as it's a good program.

> And getting back to the thread topic, I don't think most people are
> going to pick licensing terms ahead of the quality of the software; if
> the software was as good, sure, I could see picking by licensing terms.
> But the fact that end-user OSS is languishing outside of Firefox
> suggests that's not the case.
>
>
> Travis Butler
> tbutlermac.com
>
> ...Cats are the proof of a higher purpose to the universe.



--
Ian Eiloart
Servers Team
Sussex University ITS

Travis Butler wrote:
> On 6/7/05 at 9:40 PM, ianesussex.ac.uk (Ian Eiloart) wrote:
>>Yes - that's what I said. The point is that even if the users don't
>>know it, they're using open source because it's free (as in speech).
>
> That may have been the point you were trying to make; my point is that
> if the decision is made by a few programmers/server administrators, and
> end users don't know and don't care if it's open source, then you can
> hardly interpret it as 'broad user support for open source.'

By that same logic, there isn't much support for proprietary software
either. ;-)

Most end users tend to be astoundingly ignorant of the terms of their
licensing agreement (and it kind of makes sense, I mean, if I can buy a
calculator without signing a license agreement, why should I have to
agree to one to use a calculator program?). I suspect this won't change
until DRM systems are in place with actually enforce the terms of these
agreements. Despite this ignorance, consumers benefit from the
advantages of the terms of how software is licensed (open source or
otherwise).

There is an interesting case in history when users very much did have a
choice and went with an "open source" solution despite strong and
aggressive market positions by proprietary vendors: the Internet. Prior
to the breakout success of the Internet there were a lot of other
proprietary online solutions being offered from AOL, Compuserve, Apple,
etc. With Windows95's release Microsoft was jumping in to the fray and
expected to take over the online world (this was a big enough deal that
the courts almost stepped in and blocked the sale of Windows95). Instead
the Internet, built on open standards but more importantly an open
source code base (even the TCP/IP implementation in Windows was a port
of BSD sockets).

It may be that large scale networks are a unique circumstance where the
advantages of open source provide a distinct advantage, and that this is
not true in other cases, but this nonetheless is a very profound example
of consumers choosing an open source product.

> Even Firefox is a questionable example, because most of the people I
> know who use it don't realize it's open source, or even know what open
> source is. They don't know or care about being able to modify the code;
> all they care about is that it's a good application. And being a good
> application is orthogonal to being open source.

Not necessarily. There is a fairly strong argument to be made that the
forces at play with open source software encourge "goodness" of a lot of
applications. As anyone who's worked on software development will tell
you, the quality of the end result is more often than not influenced by
non-technical factors.

> 'Political statement' isn't the best phrase, but I can't think of any
> better way to put it off the top of my head. Being 'able to change the
> code,' in your own words, is completely irrelevant to the vast majority
> of users who aren't programmers and never will be.

I'm programmer, but I'm really not very handy with tools. I can't do
much on my car, and I'm remarkably limited by what I can do with my
house. When something breaks, I have to pray it's not my phone, because
I'm going to be making a phone call to make it work (and sadly in once
incident I actually used VoIP over a "borrowed" wireless LAN because the
land line was screwed up ;-). Despite this, I benefit significantly from
anyone being allowed to work on my car (although car manufacturers are
increasingly making this more difficult) and my house. If I was
restricted to getting services from those who built the car or the
house, there would be no competition for repair services, and therefore
a monopoly. I could expect higher prices, longer waits for service,
slower service, and lower quality service. I could also probably expect
the house and the car themselves to be lower quality, because the
manufacturers would have an economic incentive to have them require
regular servicing. Having that competition is immensely helpful to me
even though I'm challenged doing anything more than putting up a
painting on the wall.

Now being a programmer, I can also tell you that in the context of
software, there are actually unique advantages above and beyond what is
available with houses and cars. In particular, software development
benefits substantially from constant refactoring and code review, both
of which are possible on a much larger scale with open source software.
There are also issues with auditability, which is of much more of a
concern with software than houses or cars, because the latter are far
more carefully regulated for consumer protection. Finally, there are
huge benefits to interoperability and portability (there is a reason why
languages like Perl and Python somehow end up being more cross-platform
than Java).

> You can't argue that
> it's necessary for programmers to develop good end-user applications;
> sure, it can be helpful, but Mac programmers have been writing both good
> software, free (as in beer) software, and good free software since the
> very beginning of the platform, much if not most of it without the
> benefit of OSS.

The fact that the software was classified as "good" doesn't actually
make it so. A lot of DOS users thought Windows 3.1 was good until they
sat down at a Mac. Such judgements are relative. We'll never know how
"good" a lot of the software you're talking about could have been if it
was licensed differently.

> And getting back to the thread topic, I don't think most people are
> going to pick licensing terms ahead of the quality of the software; if
> the software was as good, sure, I could see picking by licensing terms.
> But the fact that end-user OSS is languishing outside of Firefox
> suggests that's not the case.

I don't think you can say that "end-user OSS" is languishing. There are
some proprietary applications that are doing very well, but a lot of OSS
projects are doing better than the vast majority of their proprietary
competition. If you look at a lot of market segments, sure the #1
position might be a proprietary software package, but the #2 and #3 are
often open source. You take a swing at Open Office, but it's got a much
larger installed base than every other proprietary office package
besides Microsoft Office. Of course of ton of the programs we all enjoy
on OS X is actually open source software. The GIMP actually has better
market penetration on it's targetted platform (keep in mind the Windows
and OS X versions are ports of an application targetted for X11 Unix
systems) than any of it's proprietary competitors have on their
targetted platforms.

In general, owning the platform you're developing on is a substantial
advantage (just look at the success of Apple's proprietary software
releases for OS X), and the truth is that end-user OSS platforms still
have very limited market penetration. It's a very tough business, where
an entrenched position provides significant market inertia. Barely over
5% of the market is using a platform from a supplier who's entered the
market in the last two decades, and almost all of that is OSS platforms.
Despite this, OSS platforms have the highest growth rates of any
platform out there.

--Chris

On Jun 13, 2005, at 6:06 PM, Ian Eiloart wrote:

> That doesn't matter. Presumably they use it because they like it. It
> doesn't matter to me that they don't know *why* it's good. That's an
> unachievable measure - almost by definition an "ordinary" user
> doesn't know
> about the development process.

You just zoomed by the most important fact in the post.

People use the software they do because they like it.

I think the incredible success of Firefox is not inherently because
it's open source, but because it's better than MSIE and because
there's a perception out there that if you use Firefox you don't have
to deal with the same vulnerabilities that you do with MSIE. It
doesn't cost anything to download, either, so there's no reason *not*
to download it and try it out.

My mother uses Firefox and iTunes on her computer. It doesn't matter
to her one whit that iTunes is free because Apple is giving it away
to entice iTMS purchases and that Firefox is free because it was a
creation of volunteer effort. It also doesn't matter to her that
Microsoft Windows XP is "free" because the license fee is included in
the price of the computer. The software does what she wants done,
and that's that.

Charlton






--
Charlton Wilbur
cwilburchromatico.net

One of the conundrums of software licensing is that by opening the shrinkwrap
you're agreeing to a license that you can't read until you open the
shrinkwrap.
And stores don't allow returns of opened software, so even if you
disagree with
the license you can't get your money back.

Someone filed a lawsuit that this was improper and the companies involved
(CompUSA, Microsoft, Adobe, Symantec, Stapes and Best Buy) settled with an
agreement that states "The Settlement Agreement provides to the General Public
of California, amongst other things, the right of consumers to return
applicable Symantec, Adobe and Microsoft software for full monetary refunds
even if the shrink-wrap has been opened."

Additionally, they agreed to "In addition, Symantec, Adobe, and
Microsoft agreed
to provide EULAs for the applicable software products on their web site and
notices on their respective software packaging of the web addresses to such
EULAs so consumers can review such EULAs prior to purchase of the software."
CompUSA, Best Buy and Staples "agreed to provide such EULAS to consumers upon
request prior to sale of the above software at their retail stores in
California and to provide notices to consumers in such stores to
effectuate the
above."

This may only apply in California -- but it's a good step.

<http://www.gripe2ed.com/scoop/comments/2004/12/20/8257/4850/0/post>

Kevin

--On 13 June 2005 19:04:47 -0400 Charlton Wilbur <cwilburchromatico.net>
wrote:

> You just zoomed by the most important fact in the post.
>
> People use the software they do because they like it.

I didn't zoom by that fact. I made that point myself.

> I think the incredible success of Firefox is not inherently because it's
> open source, but because it's better than MSIE and because there's a
> perception out there that if you use Firefox you don't have to deal with
> the same vulnerabilities that you do with MSIE.

Well, they like it because it's better than MSIE, and it's free. Those
things both owe something to the fact that they're open source. Compare
Firefox with Netscape before they went open source, for example.
Indirectly, then the underlying reason *is* open source.

--
Ian Eiloart
Servers Team
Sussex University ITS

> Not necessarily. There is a fairly strong argument to be made that the
> forces at play with open source software encourge "goodness" of a lot of
> applications. As anyone who's worked on software development will tell
> you, the quality of the end result is more often than not influenced by
> non-technical factors.

If you're interested, my master's thesis was on exactly this topic: Opening
the Code: Software Excellence as a Function of its Development
Environment. While it's a few years old (2001), I did delve into some of the
discussions we've been veering off into in this licensing thread. :)

<http://pluo.net/dsmcl/>

Enjoy,

--
David McLaughlin

At 03:13 PM 06/13/2005 -0700, Christopher Smith wrote:
>Not necessarily. There is a fairly strong argument to be made that the
>forces at play with open source software encourge "goodness" of a lot of
>applications. As anyone who's worked on software development will tell
>you, the quality of the end result is more often than not influenced by
>non-technical factors.

And unfortunately, one of the social factors in play at present is the
attitude of "we don't need no stinkin' end-user documentation". It's become
really bad. And it's not just a matter of few people wanting to write the
docs, or of no one having the skills -- I've seen a strong attitude of
"we're better off putting our effort into code", to the extent of actively
discouraging documentation work, or at least failing to set up structures
which would encourage collaborative documentation. (How hard is it to set
up a wiki after all?)

Commercial software is following the lead and cutting back drastically on
documentation -- just when many other forms of end-user help (courses,
telephone help, tutorials) are also waning. What's left are online forums
and commercial third-party books, which are thriving. The result has been
that all software is becoming harder to use. I don't blame OSS for the
commercial truncations (that's just cost-cutting), but OSS certainly hasn't
provided a significant alternative in this respect.

The result is that open source software currently appeals mostly to
tinkerers -- generally to those who are willing to put in extra time, lots
of it, either because they enjoy tinkering or because they have economic
incentives.

I agree that open review of software can greatly improve the quality. I saw
it happen long before the modern OSS movement. Back in the 1970s I was
using Burroughs systems, and Burroughs' policy was that customers had
access to the source of all software they used -- the MCP (the OS),
utilities, compilers. I think this was one of the reasons that Burroughs
software was so noticeably higher quality than that of its competitors.

But I make a distinction between open review, open development, and open
documentation. Open review has, I think, shown its advantages clearly. I
don't think the case for open development is nearly as strong. And the
total failure of open documentation is dragging down open development.

Edward
Art Works by Melynda Reid: http://paleo.org