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[FYI] MS-Mundie: Why open source is still questionable
- To: debate@fitug.de
- Subject: [FYI] MS-Mundie: Why open source is still questionable
- From: "Axel H Horns" <horns@ipjur.com>
- Date: Fri, 18 May 2001 09:05:24 +0200
- Comment: This message comes from the debate mailing list.
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- Sender: owner-debate@fitug.de
http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/zd/20010517/tc/mundie_why_open_source_is_
still_questionable_1.html
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Mundie: Why open source is still questionable
By Craig Mundie, Special to ZDNet
Responding to critics, Microsoft's Craig Mundie says the licensing
model used by many open source firms turns existing concepts of
intellectual property rights on their heads.
[...]
The GPL turns our existing concepts of intellectual property rights
on their heads. Some of the tension I see between the GPL and strong
business models is by design, and some of it is caused simply because
there remains a high level of legal uncertainty around the GPL--
uncertainty that translates into business risk.
In my opinion, the GPL is intended to build a strong software
community at the expense of a strong commercial software business
model. That's why Linus Torvalds (news - web sites) said last week
that "Linux (news - web sites) is never really going to be a rich
sell."
This isn't to say that some companies won't find a business plan that
can make money releasing products under the GPL. We have yet to see
such companies emerge, but perhaps some will. Recent history tells
us, however, that finding a business model that works is difficult.
According to ZDNet News, "Ransom Love, CEO of Caldera Systems...said
he thinks Microsoft was right in its claim that the GPL doesn't make
much business sense."
What is at issue with the GPL? In a nutshell, it debases the currency
of the ideas and labor that transform great ideas into great
products.
Alfred North Whitehead, the renowned British philosopher, logician
and mathematician, observed: "It is a great mistake to think that the
bare scientific idea is the required invention, so that it has only
to be picked up and used. An intense period of imaginative design
lies between. One element in the new method is just the discovery of
how to set about bridging the gap between the scientific ideas and
the ultimate product. It is a process of disciplined attack upon one
difficulty after another."
In other words, a critical flow of information and experimental data
follows every major scientific discovery and results in the
verification, refutation or refinement of the new idea or theory. To
facilitate this process, neither copyright nor patent protections are
available for abstract ideas or theories. This is as it should be.
Legendary inventors such as Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Edison and
Henry Ford (who held thousands of patents between them) succeeded
precisely because they were able to use funding, management and
market insight to deliver their innovations as unique, practical and
useful products. Arguably, the creativity and inventiveness needed to
deliver their products was comparable to that needed for the
underlying theory or discovery that made their business possible in
the first place.
When comparing the commercial software model to the open-source
software model, look carefully at the business plans and licensing
structures that form their foundations. This comparison leads to the
conclusion that the commercial software model alone has the capacity
for sustaining real economic growth. Intellectual capital has always
been, and will remain, the core asset of the software industry, and
of almost every other industry. Preserving that capital--and
investing in its constant renewal--benefits everyone.
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