Why We Still Need OSI 108
ChiefMonkeyGrinder writes "In response to a comment on yesterday's blog, Simon Phipps writes about the old rivalry between the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative (OSI). 'I have been (and in plenty of ways still am) a critic of OSI, as well as a firm supporter and advocate of the FSF. I believe OSI should be a member organisation with a representative leadership. ... But the OSI still plays a very important and relevant role in the world of software freedom.' For instance: Licence approvals have become a much more onerous process, with the emphasis on avoiding creation of new licences, updating old or flawed ones, and encouraging the retirement of redundant ones. It would be great to see the stewards of some of the (in retrospect) incorrectly approved licences ask for their retirement."
Re:So tell me... (Score:3, Interesting)
And the OSI does a very nice job of categorizing them for the convenience of others. What exactly is your issue with them? That they recognize licenses as open source licenses of some kind that you personally dislike?
Re:OSI is getting exactly what they pushed (Score:4, Interesting)
So quick to disregard BSD advocates...
Re:OSI is getting exactly what they pushed (Score:5, Interesting)
BSD is good for some things, but not this: (Score:2, Interesting)
The quote in question:
I think we can all agree now that GPL V3 was a good idea because it would prevent our current situation of half-open devices.
BSD leaves us with completely closed devices (OSX, i, etc.) not exactly the solution to 'half-open devices' that GPLv3 advocates are looking for.
Re:we need OSI to keep their paperwork current (Score:4, Interesting)
Note that the story here was that, much to the current Board's surprise, it turned out that accounts for some previous years well in the past had been created but for some unknown reason not filed with the State of California. The first the current Board knew of this was when we heard about the suspension. We immediately located the old accounts and arranged for them to be retrospectively filed, and in response the State lifted its suspension.
Naturally there are people who want to keep the memory of this incident alive and are doing their best to raise it every time OSI is mentioned. While not desirable, we've since heard from many sources that this is an all-too-common event for all-volunteer organisations.
Re:BSD is good for some things, but not this: (Score:5, Interesting)
The point is, we can't. I'm not saying the BSD license is a "solution" to the "half-open devices 'problem'". I'm saying BSD advocates don't view it as a problem.
Furthermore, OSX is not completely closed: see Darwin.
Re:FTFS: (Score:4, Interesting)
Actually, no, US fixed it. French borrowed it from Latin (licentia). When French borrows a word from Latin that like licentia ends in -entia, it becomes -ence. When English borrows a word from Latin that like licentia ends in -entia, it becomes -ense (sentia). But in this case, British borrowed the word from French, while Webster (as he did with color and meter) went back to the Latin original, defrancifying the word.