SRL Archive - Discussions & Debates

Yup. Now people are getting even smarter in government and saying that open-source software may be worse than piracy.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/blog/2010/feb/23/opensource-intellectual-property

This is a terrible step in the wrong direction.

Discuss.

I never heard of the IIPA before this, and yet I hate them so, so much. Oh, look, the RIAA and the MPAA are members.

This is only within USA, right?

ROLF! xD
It's becouse they think that it's too "socialistic" and will ruin the actual market competitors xD
I'll bet It's becouse RSBot.com couldn't handle the competition anymore, so they contacted thoese morons with a lot of $$, but please say they aren't in charge of anything!

Cartman, apparently this is already in effect in some places around the world. So I'm not sure how far it will be.

And Senrath, that was one of the first things that made me completely disgusted with this proposition. :/

From: Cartmann
This is only within USA, right?

As far as I know, yes. It's just US being stupid again.

Even if it is just in the US, have you seen the other Internet "security" acts and bills lately? It's ridiculous. And Xerox suing Google and Yahoo..

Oh, along with suing, Eric and Mark Snellman from RSCA are getting sued by Jagex. :p

If open-source gets illegal, there goes linux in USA

The most free country there is.

Me loves Canada just sitting on their rears not making stupid new laws :>

To me the article was saying not that open sauce is illegal, but governments that push towards the use of open sauce software are being anti-capitalist by negatively affecting the proprietary software market, which is a fair enough point. It may perhaps be a completely unjustified point in other areas, such as from a business point of view rather than an economy, but based on what they said it seems like a fair claim to make. I do think that the consequences they want is a bit too much, but then again I don't know what that silly 'watchlist' entails or the like.

The market has decided on the cheapest, most effective solution.

Death to proprietary software!

Mixster, while that is a good point, and I agree with you (mainly that it doesn't say it's illegal), it says that it's "worse than piracy." Which is illegal. So I just inferred that they'd make OSS illegal, since that's kinda what the MPAA and RIAA do (criminalize things on teh intarweebs).

Idiocy at its best.

~RM

which is what i dont have respect for my own country.. :\

GO CA-NA-DA ;)

From: Awkwardsaw
which is what i dont have respect for my own country.. :\

GO CA-NA-DA ;)

:p

But yeah, the US is terrible with this stuff.. I say everywhere follows Sweden. :3

Canada is actually one of the worst countries in the world right now according to them. You can only sue someone for $500 per song and they have better-defined fair use laws. Obviously, both are unacceptable and need to be changed as soon as possible.

From: Widget
Canada is actually one of the worst countries in the world right now according to them. You can only sue someone for $500 per song and they have better-defined fair use laws. Obviously, both are unacceptable and need to be changed as soon as possible.

Canada has government funded health care. USA Doesn't

Thanks, cycrosism..

Anyway. I think he more meant that Canada is the worst for subjects related to software/piracy/etc..

SELinux anyone? That's open source and developed by the US military and security service. So, if open source IS illegal within the US, then…

It's not illegal right now.. :p and they'd just close the source. :p

Actually it would be kinda anti-capitalising to do so, many companies develop their strategy based on open-source, they use it in order to get traffic on their website, so they might buy something else, click some adds, what-ever, it's the google principle.

From: i luffs yeww
It's not illegal right now.. :p and they'd just close the source. :p

No, no. That's not the point. If they were to close source it, then they'd have to actually use their own kernel (not Linux).

From: i luffs yeww
It's not illegal right now.. :p and they'd just close the source. :p

Do you mean like violate the Linux license (GPL)?

From: Wizzup?
Do you mean like violate the Linux license (GPL)?

Either way, it would be illegal

:p Couldn't they just pay Linus? I'm pretty sure the U.S. army could find a way to use Linux by paying.. ;)

Like I said earlier, I'm pretty confident the article isn't about the US wanting to make open sauce illegal. It seems like this is just turning into a thread for people to say "US sucks - no more open sauce!" when it doesn't say that.

As a country it seems they want to do something about some governments pushing agencies to open sauce software rather than using the "best software available", proprietary or open sauce, making it harder for software companies to makes monies (with no real basis behind said governments reasoning), thus being anti-capitalist.

From: mixster
Like I said earlier, I'm pretty confident the article isn't about the US wanting to make open sauce illegal. It seems like this is just turning into a thread for people to say "US sucks - no more open sauce!" when it doesn't say that.

As a country it seems they want to do something about some governments pushing agencies to open sauce software rather than using the "best software available", proprietary or open sauce, making it harder for software companies to makes monies (with no real basis behind said governments reasoning), thus being anti-capitalist.

Which is also bad right now as the economy sucks. I don't see how they can enforce this though? Make the government agencies require the best software instead of free software.

Yeah turn it illegal because people writing stuff as a hobby are better than people getting laid to do it……….

I don't understand the logic behind "This software costs 5000$ thus it is superior to the free alternatives.". In many cases it's true, but the differences usually aren't that big, so if you really don't need the best software you can get then the free ones will usually suffice.

From: gratz
Yeah turn it illegal because people writing stuff as a hobby are better than people getting laid to do it……….

Wat.

From: GoF
Wat.

I think his theory behind that is that because they get paid for it, women will immediately be sexually attracted to them. Which isn't true. Sure, wealth pays a large role, but if you're butt ugly and fap all day without bathing, then women won't fuck you just for a chance at some cash..

From: Narcle
Which is also bad right now as the economy sucks. I don't see how they can enforce this though? Make the government agencies require the best software instead of free software.

Because the economy sucks, they should be switching to FOSS. Doing so will allow the citizens to be taxed less and to therefore have more money to spend on products they actually want.

Government contracts can seriously benefit a small company though.

Of course, but if that company has a good product, it should not need the help of a government. The free market will provide it with the money it deserves.

Besides, AFAIK, governments usually contract with companies like Microsoft which already have a large, stable financial base.

No, no, they contract with small companies too. I mean, they need to have a good idea, but lots of small companies get government contracts.

Solution: Shoot the people who disagree with you.