November 1, 2016

0x5E: Conservancy's ContractPatch Initiative

Summary

Bradley and Karen discuss Conservancy's ContractPatch Initiative that will help Free Software developers negotiate their agreements with employers.

This show was released on Tuesday 1 November 2016; its running time is 00:50:29.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:38)

• Software Freedom Conservancy has two blog posts and a mailing list to discuss the Contract Patch initiative (02:40).
• Bradley searched for the NPR story he mentioned but just couldn't find it, but he did fine a similar one covering terms of service agreements (08:30)
• Karen mentioned the the Outreachy Project of Conservancy. (09:30)
• The Google Map API ToS states that you have to pay for it after a certain amount of usage (17:30)
• Bradley mentioned the book, What Color Is Your Parachute? (24:30)
• The “put it in writing” commercials from AT&T and MCI. (46:44)

Tags: faif, commercial, Conservancy

December 30, 2014

0x53: Can Plagiarism Happen Under Copyleft?

Summary

Bradley and Karen discuss what plagiarism is (or isn't) and how it interacts with copyleft licenses.

This show was released on Tuesday 30 December 2014; its running time is 01:16:43.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:00:37)

• Please donate to to send Dan to a conference. There's a progress bar on faif.us now.
• You can also donate to support Software Freedom Conservancy, where Bradley and Karen work, by becoming a supporter.
• Karen mentioned her blog post about the supporter program. (00:08:30)
• Bradley mentioned his blog post about the supporter program as well. (00:09:30)

Segment 1 (00:16:16)

• Bradley and Karen pick up on a topic original discussed in Segment 1 of FaiF 0x02. (00:16:50)
• Bradley discussed the Laurie Stearns' article from the California Law Review, entitled Copy Wrong: Plagiarism, Process, Property, and the Law (00:23:50)
• Bradley mentioned The GNOME Foundation Copyright Assignment Guidelines that he co-authored. (00:28:05)
• Bradley mentioned the Doris Kearns Goodwin Plagiarism controversy, and how it would have been simply redressed if the material she reused had been copylefted. (00:29:26)
• Karen mentioned that Flickr made different policies for CC-BY-SA'd works when selling printed versions. (32:30)
• Bradley mentioned that even software freedom advocates just comply with the copyleft licenses and don't work collaboratively, particularly during hostile forks, using Conservancy's Kallithea project as an example. (00:35:25)
• Bradley reiterated a point he made in FaiF 0x08, where he discussed that Linus Torvalds switched to GPL for Linux because he realized non-commercial restrictions weren't appropriate. (00:37:50)
• Bradley mentioned the hostile fork of GCC called egcs. The H-Online years later wrote a long article that discussed the egcs fork egcs fork. (00:39:46)
• Bradley mentioned that plagiarism is ultimately about attribution, and modern DVCS systems makes attribution easy and renders plagiarism impossible (if DVCS logs are accurate). (00:44:15)
• Bradley mentioned that he continually has learned the lesson that if you let your employer keep copyright, you lose everything you had when you switch employers (if the work isn't copylefted). (00:47:00)
• Bradley discussed the methods of attribution required in GPLv3. (00:50:05)
• Bradley mentioned that copyright notices are the primary method of attribution in copyleft licenses, and even non-copyleft ones too. (00:53:19)
• Karen discussed the attribution requirements in text of CC-BY-SA 4.0. (00:53:49)
• Bradley wants to do a whole FaiF show about how CC-BY-SA may not be a true copyleft since it has no source code requirement (00:54:40)
• Bradley mentioned the “fake name” that film directors use when they wish to disavow a work they aren't happy with. The name is, in fact, Alan Smithee, and indeed the 1984 film Dune lists Smithee as a director even though David Lynch is known publicly to be the director. (00:58:40)
• Bradley mentioned the unfair accusations against Red Hat when they stopped publishing their internal Linux Git repository and instead released a more standard ChangeLog. (01:05:30)

Tags: faif, GPL, Creative Commons, commercial, licensing, plagiarism

December 11, 2014

0x51: Why Licenses Requiring Use of Trademarks are Non-Free

Summary

Bradley and Karen play and discuss Pam Chestek's talk entitled Why Licenses Requiring Use of Trademarks are Non-Free that she gave on Sunday 2 February 2014 at FOSDEM 2014.

This show was released on Thursday 11 December 2014; its running time is 01:10:00.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:00:34)

• You can donate now to send Producer Dan Lynch to a Free Software conference. Donations will be made to Conservancy and any proceeds raised beyond the amount needed to send Dan to a conference will support Conservancy generally. (05:30)
• Dan will of course need to follow Conservancy's travel policy since Conservancy will fund his travel. (06:50)
• Bradley discussed the backstory on the Groupon attempt to steal GNOME's name. GNOME Foundation had to go public to raise funds to fight Groupon (10:05)

Segment 1 (00:13:26)

Pam Chestek gives a talk entitled Why Licenses Requiring Use of Trademarks are Non-Free. You can watch the video instead of listening to our audio and follow along with Pam's slides.

Segment 2 (01:00:37)

• Bradley mentioned Pam's talk from the previous year, which was played on 0x3C. (01:01:32)
• Bradley mentioned that GPLv3§7 allows for removal of additional restrictions that abuse that clause of GPLv3. (01:04:24)

Tags: faif, commercial, licensing, FOSDEM, trademarks

November 11, 2014

0x50: Big Announcements & Evans' FOSDEM 2014 Talk

Summary

Karen and Bradley announce Conservancy's DMCA filing and Conservancy and FSF's joint launch of the copyleft.org project, and then discuss Eileen Evans' FOSDEM 2014 talk, entitled Licensing Models and Building an Open Source Community.

This show was released on Tuesday 11 November 2014; its running time is 01:13:10.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:36)

• Conservancy file a DMCA petition regarding so-called “Smart TVs”. (02:00)
• Bradley mentioned the magic marker that was as circumvention technique under DMCA. Here's an amusing joke press release about the issue. (03:10)
• There isn't much documentation online of Bruce Perens live DMCA violation, but this article appears to be the main one on the subject, and there is also this interview (06:46).
• Bradley and Karen talked about the joint FSF/Conservancy copyleft.org announcement. (09:10)
• Bradley first pulled together the materials for copyleft.org for FSF's CLE seminars, particularly the one in March 2014. (10:00)
• Karen noted that Conservancy donated the time to write up a pristine example of good complete, corresponding source code for a GPL'd product. (11:30)
• Bradley discussed the incorrect GPLv2§2(a) violation accusations that some made against Red Hat regarding its changes to its publication of RHEL's Linux fork. (12:00)
• Karen and Bradley encouraged listeners to submit talk proposals for the FOSDEM 2015 Legal and Policy Issues DevRoom (15:03)

Segment 1 (19:38)

This is a recording of Eileen Evans' FOSDEM 2014 talk, entitled Licensing Models and Building an Open Source Community. If you'd rather watch the video, which includes the slides from her talk, it's available on FOSDEM's site.

Segment 2 (46:40)

• Bradley and Karen discuss Eileen's talk.
• Bradley mentioned the OpenStack CLA fight, which was covered in a panel discussion on FaiF 0x4B. (56:16)
• Karen mentioned the 501(c)(6) issues that OpenStack Foundation has faced, which were discussed already on FaiF 0x4E. (56:34)

Tags: faif, commercial, licensing, non-profit, copyright, CLAs, copyleft

October 23, 2014

0x5A: Gamergate's Free Software Connection

Summary

Note: Episode 0x5A was released out of sequence, but they are in the order of release date on faif.us (rather than numerical order).

Karen and Bradley discuss connections between the so-called “Gamergate” controversy and how it relates to the Free Software community and a few obvious legal issues.

This show was released on Thursday 23 October 2014; its running time is 00:55:31.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:37)

• Karen asked if Bradley had heard of the Gamergate situation. (01:30)
• Matthew Garrett wrote a blog post regarding this topic entitled Actions have consequences (or: why I'm not fixing Intel's bugs any more) (10:23)
• Mathew was attacked on LKML about this blog post (10:50)
• Lennart Poettering also wrote an essay recently about aggression and attacking people in Free Software communities. (12:12)
• Karen mentioned the harassment Kathy Sierra faced in the late 2000s. (13:00)
• Bradley called out Linux Foundation to ask why they tacitly support the bad behavior by its employees and others in the Linux Project (14:35, 31:10)
• Bradley mentioned that Antti Aumo in his LinuxCon Europe 2011 keynote, said that a great thing about the Internet of Things is that you can put a lock on your fridge when the wife's on a diet. (16:32)
• Bradley mentioned the Eddie Murphy's Saturday Night Live skit, White Like Me, which according to the transcript, originally aired on 1984-12-15 on SNL. (24:45)
• Bradley mentioned FaiF 0x13, which discussed torts and why they're important. (29:50)
• Bradley wrote a blog post about Bradley mentioned his blog post about John Oliver's discussion of the Miss America Pageant (43:30)
• Bradley suggested that Intel should have instead given the Gamasutra money to Society of Women Engineers Scholarship fund. (45:30)
• Karen mentioned the statement Intel published a statement regarding the situation. (47:10)

Tags: faif, commercial, tort, gender

August 5, 2014

0x4B: CLA Panel Discussion

Summary

Bradley and Karen host a panel discussion on CLAs with Van Lindberg and Richard Fontana.

This show was released on Tuesday 5 August 2014; its running time is 00:54:05.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:38)

Bradley and Karen introduce the panel discussion.

Segment 1 (01:28)

• The panel guests are Van Lindberg and Richard Fontana.
• Van quoted from the Apache Corporate CLA. (40:55)

Segment 2 (48:17)

• Bradley and Karen wrap up the discussion.
• Bradley mentioned the AKG C1000S which we use to record the oggcast. (50:40)

Tags: faif, commercial, licensing, CLAs

July 30, 2014

0x4A: See LA?

Summary

Bradley and Karen discuss Contributor Licensing Agreements, which pulls material from Bradley's blog posts on the subject.

This show was released on Wednesday 30 July 2014; its running time is 00:44:34.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:36)

• Bradley mentioned FSF's copyright assignment process. (05:50)
• Bradley mentioned RMS' essay regarding what you should do if a company asks you to assign copyright on Free Software. (14:00)
• Open Stack is reconsidering their CLA.
• Bradley mentioned again that goofy Eclipse contributor poster. (27:22)

Tags: faif, commercial, licensing, copyright, IBM, patents, CLAs

August 14, 2013

Episode 0x41: Interview with Jim Zemlin at OSCON 2013

Summary

Bradley and Karen interview Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of the The Linux Foundation.

This show was released on Wednesday 14 August 2013; its running time is 00:37:16.

Show Notes

Bradley and Karen interview Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of the The Linux Foundation.

Segment 0 (00:00:33)

Bradley and Karen introduce the interview.

Segment 1 (00:03:03)

Bradley and Karen interview Jim Zemlin.

Segment 2 (00:25:23)

• Karen and Bradley wrap up the discussion about 501(c)(3) and 501(c)(6).
• Bradley referenced this post which ocurred in this thread about Linus saying Greg KH is a door-mat. (26:36, 34:55)
• The OSCON session that Bradley chaired was Non-Profits Organizations for FLOSS Projects: There Is No Place Like Home, and the slides are available. (33:21)

Tags: faif, commercial, non-profit

June 7, 2011

Episode 0x11: Corporate Licensing Decisions That Impact the Project's Community

Summary

Dan Lynch (filling in for Karen) and Bradley discuss a few examples where licensing decisions by companies impacts the health of the software development community.

This show was released on Tuesday 7 June 2011; its running time is 01:24:34.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:00:36)

• Dan interviewed the CentOS developers on FLOSS Weekly. (00:05:52)
• Bradley has a blog post that describes RHEL licensing model. His previous blog post to that one, while mostly off-topic here, has a few points of interest. (00:10:36)
• Dan Lynch mentioned The Smoking Man from the The X Files television series. (00:17:22)
• Bradley mentioned that Lennart Poettering is a Red Hat employee working on systemd, which is now in Fedora, but not in RHEL yet (as far as we know). (00:18:53)
• Bradley suggested that developers starting projects read Karsten Wade's The Open Source Way, and Karl Fogel's Producing Open Source Software: How to Run a Successful Free Software Project, and Bradley's blog post about developing in public. (00:22:16)
• Dan and Bradley briefly discussed copyright abolition. Dan mentioned Stallman's writing on the Pirate Party's copyright positions.

Segment 1 (00:32:30)

• Bradley briefly discussed the history of StarOffice, and the creation of OpenOffice.org. (00:33:40)
• Bradley explained issues related to the LibreOffice fork of OpenOffice.org. (00:37:30)
• Bradley has talked about how proprietary relicensing is very dangerous (00:39:50)
• Fedora, Ubuntu, and OpenSUSE all switched to LibreOffice as a default. Bradley didn't know at recording time that the OpenOffice package in wheezy is a transition package to switch to LibreOffice. (00:41:24)
• Bradley and Dan mentioned a blog post by IBM's Rob Weir that misquotes the FSF to support IBM's positions on the OO.o relicensing issue. (00:58:26)
• Bradley mentioned the idea that Apache-2.0 work can be relicensed under LGPLv3-or-later, as he discussed in his blog post about the OO.o relicensing (01:00:45)
• Dan mentioned Jeremy Allison's comment on the aforementioned post on Rob Weir's blog. (01:02:08)

Segment 2 (01:16:09)

Bradley thanked Dan, on behalf of Karen, for all his work to make Free as in Freedom possible.

Tags: faif, novell, commercial, licensing, copyright, LGPL, LibreOffice, OpenOffice, Oracle, IBM

February 1, 2011

Episode 0x08: Strictly Commercial

Summary

Bradley and Karen discuss non-commercial-only commons licenses, particularly the CC-By-NC license, and how they compare to Free Culture and Free Software licenses, and why some authors pick NC licenses instead of Free Culture/Software ones.

This show was released on Tuesday 1 February 2011; its running time is 00:49:32.

Show Notes

Segment 0 (00:36)

• Listeners seeking a show on how to select a Free Software license, differences between copyleft and non-copyleft, and how they interact with copyright are encouraged to listen to episode 0x08 of the old Software Freedom Law Show which covered these topics. Please write in again if that show doesn't cover your questions on the issue. (02:10)
• Bradley reminisced about the crass “Brian and O'Brien” show on Baltimore's B-104 Gary Huddles who was notorious locally in Baltimore because he was implicated in Maryland's version of the 1980s Savings and Loan scandals. (03:30)
• Karen mentioned that freedomdefined.org is the source for the Free Culture definition that defines what licenses are Free Culture licenses. (12:54)
• Bradley suggested listening to some of the old versions of RMS' Copyright vs. Community in the Age of Computer Networks. In fact, there is an audio recording of the one at MIT on 19 April 2001 that Bradley attended, and an audio recording of the one that Bradley heard at Cardozo Law School. There is audio of the Q&A session, wherein RMS engages in that discussion Bradley mentioned with Free Culture activists. (10:10, 14:04)
• Bradley mentioned that Linus Torvalds switched to GPL for Linux because he realized non-commercial restrictions weren't appropriate. (Search the string GPL on that link to find Linus' answer on that.) (19:00)
• Karen mentioned that Creative Commons did a study considering what people understand commercial vs. non-commercial to mean. (20:43)
• Karen and Bradley discussed the text of CC-By-NC. (23:00)
• Karen mentioned various CC-By-SA licensed derivatives that had been made from Sita Sings the Blues. (38:24)
• Bradley discussed the Harry Potter Lexicon case and Karen mentioned the so-called IP Colloquium discussion on it. (44:30)
• Bradley mentioned Memory Alpha, which is a CC-By-NC wiki regarding Star Trek, which is tolerated by Paramount. (45:20)

Tags: faif, Creative Commons, commercial, licensing