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RAND: Not So Reasonable?
Microsoft's case against Motorola brings into the spotlight some politically correct jargon hiding unpleasant truths about standards
by Simon Phipps
Fair, Reasonable, Non-Discriminatory - surely that all has to be good stuff? RAND sounds so good, and it's been showing up in all sorts of news lately. It's a key part in the negotiation of licenses for patents that apply...
November 17, 2010 2:00 PM Read Full Post
The End Of The Road For Web Services
A decade of corporate politics by the big software companies is finally over as WS-I shuts up shop and gets folded in to OASIS.
by Simon Phipps
They haven't put their press release on a web page anywhere as far as I can tell but WS-I ("Web Services Interoperability Organization") has finally run out of runway and will now be absorbed by OASIS according to their PDF...
November 11, 2010 7:00 AM Read Full Post
Links: Copyright Reform; Who Will Benefit?
The UK Government put copyright reform on the legislative agenda last week. But will it be the kind of reform the digital age of open-by-rule technology needs to flourish?
by Simon Phipps
UK copyright laws to be reviewed, announces CameronAs part of his announcements about trying to create "Silicon East End", David Cameron announced a review of UK copyright law. "The founders of Google have said they could never have started...
November 8, 2010 12:25 PM Read Full Post
Community Escrow
What do you do when your supplier changes track or goes out of business and the product you depend on is canned? Open source offers an option other than "quit and switch".
by Simon Phipps
I've written previously about the freedom to leave, but there's another value delivered by the liberties open source provides, one which it would even be worth paying extra to get. When your vendor changes direction, what do you do? Traditionally...
November 2, 2010 8:00 AM Read Full Post
Links: Case Studies In Corporate Open Source
The last week has provided a number of interesting - and perhaps surprising - case studies in corporate engagement with open source. This Monday's Link Post takes a look.
by Simon Phipps
Microsoft: Our Strategy With Silverlight Has Shifted“Silverlight is our development platform for Windows Phone,” [Bob Muglia] said. Silverlight also has some “sweet spots” in media and line-of-business applications, he said. But when it comes to touting Silverlight as Microsoft’s vehicle...
November 1, 2010 9:00 AM Read Full Post
DRM Is Toxic To Culture
Digital Restriction Measures (DRM) aren't just a nuisance that treats all customers as if they had stolen what they actually paid for. They also threaten our future cultural heritage.
by Simon Phipps
It's possible that you think that unauthorised use of copyrighted music, films and books is such a serious problem that it's worth giving away a little of your convenience and freedom in exchange for stopping it. If you do, I'd...
October 27, 2010 8:00 AM Read Full Post
Links: Parting Words, Public Statements
Friday and the weekend saw a surprising number of notable public departures and statements in my old neighbourhood. Here's a link round-up.
by Simon Phipps
It's autumn, the leaves are falling and the nights are drawing in. The season for endings is upon us. (updated twice as news emerged) Mike Shapiro Leaves OracleAnother of the top Solaris guys quits. A key figure in the development...
October 25, 2010 8:00 AM Read Full Post
Apple Tosses Java Off The Mac
The ripples of Oracle's takeover of Sun continue to rock boats, as Apple tigtens their proprietary grip on the Mac.
by Simon Phipps
Apple has finally lost patience with Java and tossed it from the Mac. It was already banned from the iPhone (presumably to make portability of apps to Android harder), but the OS X update that just happened is the last...
October 22, 2010 6:32 PM Read Full Post
License Compliance: Not An Open Source Issue
Open source software does not place a license compliance burden on users, and we should reject attempts by corporate interests - of all kinds - to create fears that it does.
by Simon Phipps
License compliance is a major and costly issue for proprietary software, but the license involved in that case is an End User License Agreement (EULA), not a source license delivering extensive liberties. When we compare like-for-like, we discover open source...
October 20, 2010 3:00 PM Read Full Post
Links: IBM Joins OpenJDK - Good For Java?
This is the first of a new series of link-summary posts, exploring the news that IBM is ending support for Apache's harmony project and joining Oracle's OpenJDK implementation of Java under the GPL.
by Simon Phipps
IBM joins the OpenJDK community and dumps Apache Harmony "IBM will work with Oracle and the Java community to make OpenJDK the primary high performance open source runtime for Java. IBM will be shifting its development effort from the...
October 12, 2010 1:43 PM Read Full Post
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