Blogger claiming "shared source" is approved by OSI

[Sam Ramji]

Fluke (Ben):

Good to see you are still analyzing Port 25.  The comment I made was intended to narrow the title of the post in deference to the >30,000 OSS projects on Windows that are hosted on SourceForge.  In this one instance I failed to notice that most or all of the projects were under Shared Source licenses.  A failed correction is not evidence of a "dilution".

I have focused on not calling Shared Source projects "Open Source".  The two are not the same, and satisfying the OSD is *not* the same as being approved by the OSI.  I will personally insist that we use clear distinctions between Shared Source and Open Source.

I am confident that you will realize that in a company of >79,000 employees, this education will take time to distribute and absorb.

Sam Ramji
sramji at microsoft.com
+1 (510) 913-6495


-----Original Message-----
From: B Galliart [mailto:bgallia at gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, October 19, 2007 11:23 AM
To: license-discuss at opensource.org
Subject: Re: Blogger claiming "shared source" is approved by OSI

On 10/18/07, Dag-Erling Smørgrav <des at linpro.no> wrote:
> Rui Miguel Silva Seabra <rms at 1407.org> writes:
> > http://blogs.technet.com/openchoice/archive/2007/10/17/shared-source-aprovado-pela-open-source-initiative.aspx
> >
> > The real motivation for the two "open source" licenses Microsoft got
> > through OSI has just came up.
> >
> > As many feared, they are trying to further dillute the "open source"
> > term by now claiming "shared source" to have been approved by OSI.
>
> Uh, no.  Look closer.  Some random blogger claimed that Shared Source
> was approved by the OSI; Microsoft hasn't said anything (yet).
>

The random blogger, Marcos Santos, is an employee of Microsoft.  Take a look at:
http://www.microsoft.com/library/media/2070/portugal/presspass/media/fotos/MarcosSantos_2.jpg

This isn't an isolated event.  As I stated before, Microsoft's Jamie
Cannon has implied that MS-dCPL and MSR-LA covered projects are "Open
Source projects on Windows."  Microsoft's Sam Ramji follows up with:
"This post should be titled 'Open Source Projects on Codeplex.'"
Instead of correcting the title as being "Open Source and Shared
Source Projects on Codeplex" to re-assert a distinction, Sam Ramji
reaffirms the growing trend of Microsoft employees treating "Open
Source" and "Shared Source" as interchangeable terms.

It would be nice to be able to point Jamie Cannon, Sam Ramji and
Marcos Santos to a Microsoft policy which discourages their employees
from diluting the distinction between Open Source and Shared
Source--but no such policy is publicly stated anyplace.  So far, Bill
Hilf isn't offering one either.  Instead, the only offer I have heard
is a distinction will be made on *one* Microsoft web page.  I doubt
this offer will slow the momentum in diluting the concept of Open
Source by Microsoft employee promoting the concept that all Shared
Source is the same.