fouts@orville (Marty Fouts) (12/22/86)
In article <1572@mit-trillian.MIT.EDU> martillo@trillian.UUCP (Yakim Martillo) writes: > >You can call Stallman's point of view as naive and unrealistic as you >want but he is totally upfront and clear about what he wants. Some of >us were hacking Unix back since 1975 when ATT used to give it away >practically free to universities. We were under the impression that >our work would remain free and available, because we were told ATT >can't sell software. Then after the consent degree was promulgated, >suddenly all our work was owned by ATT and they were selling it as >their property as a trade secret. Something is very wrong if the >laws permit such sleaze. With Richard, such practices do not happen. The copy of the 6th edition Unix that I bought for $300 in 1975 came complete with a nondisclosure agreement. AT&T has done some questionable things, but they aren't exactly what you are implying. AT&T has never to my knowledge claimed ownership of software someone developed using a Unix system, or of changes someone else made to the Unix system. They "merely" restricted your right to distribute software directly derived from an AT&T distribution. Berkeley "solved" their problem with AT&T by having to require that you get a source license for some AT&T unix before you got one from Berkeley. This has now become a way of life, and all of the vendors we are currently dealing with require this; because AT&T requires it of them. The qustionable nature comes from the prices AT&T is now charging for a product over which they hold a monopoly. But that's what the market wants. If the people who buy Unix thought it was valuable enough to do so, they would have long ago have done what Stallman is trying to do, provide an alternative. This has been done. Look at all of the succesful IBM PC Clones and the number of copyrights they have had to work around. Including having to write BIOS software which is compatable with, but not identical to or derived from IBM's.
ron@brl-sem.ARPA (Ron Natalie <ron>) (12/24/86)
In article <101@ames.UUCP>, fouts@orville (Marty Fouts) writes: > AT&T has never to my knowledge claimed ownership of software someone developed > using a Unix system, or of changes someone else made to the Unix system. They > "merely" restricted your right to distribute software directly derived from an > AT&T distribution. As a matter of fact, many years ago they announced that you were free to use programs that included parts of the licensed binary libraries as you pleased without any other arrangement with AT&T. > The qustionable nature comes from the prices AT&T is now charging for a > product over which they hold a monopoly. But that's what the market wants. I'm not sure monopoly is the word. There have been several totally UNIX compatible non-AT&T operating systems on the market for a long time. These failed through no anti-competetive schemes of AT&T. > If the people who buy Unix thought it was valuable enough to do so, they > would have long ago have done what Stallman is trying to do, provide an > alternative. I feel no animosity towards Stallman's aim to create a usable software system that is free. I don't believe that software sales and licensing is the evil that he does, but he is not campaigning to outlaw it, only to counter it with his own free product. Stallman feels that the software hoarding counters the development of the great software innovations that came out of MIT in the previous decade. My only regret is that RMS is spending so much time and effort redoing ten year old programs to make them free rather than developing the next innovative advancement in computers. Perhaps, RMS is right. UNIX was developed in an open environment before anybody ever started in on it as a commercial product, most of the innovative improvements come as a result of University or Government funded work that makes these changes available to everyone. A competing operating system, totally commercially based has failed. But one man's fruit is another's emetic, there are ardent UNIX-haters that dislike UNIX for precisely the things that were caused by it's open evolution. -Ron
kent@decwrl.DEC.COM (Christopher A. Kent) (12/30/86)
AT&T has been involved in some sleaze. So has Berkeley. Said sleaze tends to consist of slapping your own copyright/license agreement on code developed elsewhere, with no regard for the original copyright, nor acknowledgement of the original developer. Two cases in point: Berkeley distributes a system for interpreting troff output on Versatec printers. To my knowledge, the code is marked with a copyright benefiting the Regents of the University of California. The code was originally developed and copyright by the University of Toronto; no mention is made of this fact. AT&T includes with system V a version of cron that was originally developed at Purdue University, and left Purdue with a staff member that went to work for (then) Bell Labs. The code was copyright the Purdue Research Foundation. Said staff member spread said version of cron throughout Bell Labs, and it finally hit the Unix development group, who slapped a AT&T copyright on it and included it in the next distribution. No acknowledgement of Purdue is made. Purdue considered raising a ruckus (I was involved) but we determined it wouldn't be worth the effort. Berkeley isn't making money out of the deal, so I'm more likely to forgive them. AT&T has given us all so much hassle about licensing and non-disclosure that it really gets me that they pull this kind of nonsense. chris -- Chris Kent Western Research Laboratory Digital Equipment Corporation kent@decwrl.dec.com decwrl!kent (415) 853-6639