Exploitation of open source
p2pnet.net News:- The likes of IBM, HP and Sun are using the open-source community as subcontractors rather than encouraging the community to develop independent commercial products, believes Jesus Villasante, head of software technologies at the European Commission ’s Information Society and Media Directorate General.
“IBM says to a customer, ‘Do you want proprietary or open software`? he`s quoted as saying in a CNET News post. Then (if they want open source) they say, ‘OK, you want IBM open source.’
It is (always) IBM or Sun or HP open source.”
Villasante was at a debate on open-source innovation at the Holland Open Software Conference in Amsterdam and, “Companies are using the potential of communities as subcontractors – the open-source community today (is a) subcontractor of American multinationals,” he stated, going on:
“Open-source communities need to take themselves seriously and realize they have made a contribution to themselves and society. From the moment they realize they are part of the evolution of society and try to influence it, we will be moving in the right direction.
Villasante also used his earlier keynote speech to express concerns about the European software industry, adds CNET, which has him saying:
“What I think is that Europe doesn’t have a software industry today – the only one we have today is in America. In the future we may have China or India. We should decide if we will have a European software industry in the future.
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See:-
CNET News – IT giants accused of exploiting open source, May 31, 2005
June 1st, 2005 at 8:40 pm
As long as I am free to use, copy, modify, and redistribute the code, let them call it whatever they want. Big companies are in business to make money. I am a capitalist, and I am all for competiton on a level playing field. Apparantly, the field is level in this case. Is there anything stopping the smaller folks from using the same code in their own projects? I have modded KDE to be more secure, and I just might add a few features to FireFox. I love free software
I normally agree with posters and writers of articles on p2pnet. However, this time I have to side with the software cartels. What is right is right. If the cartels want to pay coders to write free (speech) programs that can be used by the rest of the world, I am all for it. They are finally doing something right
June 2nd, 2005 at 9:50 am
I have owned numerous computers over the years (my experience goes back to 1969!), and of them all, I found IBM to be the best of the lot. I never experienced any problems with my Aptiva, except for those which were caused directly by Windows 98! IBM was one of the first to publicly endorse open source software. I say “Three Cheers” to them and that they deserve to capitalize on their position. Like the poster, “Readers Write”, I am a capitalist and believe in honestly acquired profits (which is NOT a claim that ever so many software companies can make!)
As for the Europeans, I believe they are inventive and creative enough to fend for themselves in short order (perhaps more so than most Americans who have had little or no alternative to the Microsoft cartel’s profusion of bug-ridden and faulty software).
As I think about it, I have to wonder what, exactly, is the nature of their complaint. A lot of excellent software has been authored by enterprising Europeans — correct me if I’m wrong but isn’t Linux the brain child of a particularly intelligent Finn? And the Mandrake (now Mandriva) OS was authored almost exclusively by Europeans. Name recognition will come with time — and when it comes, I’m sure they will NOT want anonymity!
June 2nd, 2005 at 11:37 am
You are a capitalist, you should be ashamed of yourself and get the world rid of a moron like you, it’s not OK to kill 30 millions people with AIDS just because they can’t support the price of patents on anti-AIDS medications meant only to make stockholders who have never ever worked a single second of their lives. It’s not OK to make people believe in Jesus while there isn’t a single shred of evidence he ever existed. It’s not OK to make the State the armed force defending with the most violence the interests of the psychopaths of the big businesses while destroying the lives of every human on Earth.
I am an anarchist and I tell you : THERE IS NO FUTURE FOR THE EARTH WHILE THERE’S ANY RELIGON/STATE/CAPITAL !
And no, anarchy is not an utopy, it’s participative democracy and plutocracy (governement by the richs, just like we have all other the world)that are utopies !
Btw remember IBM helps the nazis to kill the jews… That says it all about IBM new “virginity” with OSS…
June 2nd, 2005 at 1:22 pm
Actually if you’re a capitalist (so am I) you should be able to capitalise on the value created by Open Source software (which is why it exists) rather than have to compete on business models built on locking the value of Intellectual Property. I suspect that you will agree so far.
The problem is that if Open Source is branded as IBM Open Source people may think it is somehow different from your Open Source. Is it superior? No. You’re using the same code and maybe making some modifications which themselves can be available to others. But when you get into a situation where your OS is competing with IBM OS, you are close to your small software product competing with IBM Websphere. Not identical but close and definitly not a level playing field. This is how IBM salespeople know how to sell. That’s what they’ve done all those years.
And don’t forget that everytime someone buys an open source solution from IBM they get locked into a lot of proprietary applications that go with it, like Websphere, DB2 etc. Not that there’s anything wrong with it, but people need to have their eyes open.
My point is not to be paranoid and over-reacct but it is important to be vigilant and keep such tendecies in check.
June 2nd, 2005 at 2:36 pm
I wrote the comment you are responding to. I am a capitalist. A “capitalist” is a term that has been distorted as far as its original meaning much like the term “hacker.” A capitalist is simply a person who believes it is OK for one to start a business and be able to earn money to live.
By saying all capitalists are evil, greedy swine who care nothing about the welfare of others is like saying that all hackers are cyber burlars.
The reason why capitalism upsets so many people is because so many of the cartels use the word in order to justify immoral and unlawful behaviour. Like you, I strongly disagree with the cartel’s abuse of patents and other “intellectual property.” I believe that we are each “Our brother’s keeper.” If someone has the power to cure a disease, then that person should share the power with the world.
As far as forcing people to “believe in Jesus,” I agree with you. By the way Jesus is only a Greek-Latin transliteration of the real name of Messiah. Just about all Christian churches preach a doctrine that is CONTRARY to what the BIBLE ACTUALLY SAYS, so I can definitely undestand why you dislike organised religion.
I also agree that it is not right for the government to murder millions of people solely to support the interest of the cartels. I did not vote for Bush nor his mirror image John Kerry. Both are thugs as far as I’m concerned. By the way many of the cartels played a hand of killing the Jews in Nazi Germany. In fact, many of my reletives were killed in the camps.
I do not support IBM or other cartels in much of what they do, however, I think IBM contributing to open source is one of the few good things they do. I believe that there are very few (if any) ethical Fortune 500 companies.
As far as governemnts or states are concerned, they are alright ONLY if they work to secure the God-given rights of the people. As far as I can tell there are none today that actually do that. It is time for people to bring about the change.
June 2nd, 2005 at 2:48 pm
I wrote the comment about it being OK.
As far as paragraph two is concerned, I agree with you on most of the points. Yes, I agree that IBM does have more money for marketing. However, this is one case where creative advertising, and innovative marketing can put IBM at a disadvantage. One can make the point, “why pay the rip-off prices that IBM sharges when you can have the same product for less than half price? Open source is free to everyone.” I can and do compete with IBM in my computer security business. I even use IBM-contributed code to compete with them.
As far as IBM mixing open source with proprietary crap, I agree with you that it is something that people should watch out for. I know of many who have been making the switch to open source from Microsoft. If IBM abuses its standing, people will dump them as well.
As far as being vigilent and not over-reacting, I agree with you 100%