For Approval: Open Source Software Alliance License

Mike Wattier geek at devcompany.com
Thu Sep 25 21:23:00 UTC 2003


Personally, the OSSAL is a step in the right direction, once it's finished I 
am thinking of adopting it myself. It reflects current day needs among small 
shop developers (eg. self employed programmers/consultants). Which I might 
add, is a segment of this community who's needs are seemingly never fully 
addressed, by the OSI or FSF. 


> The OSI is a political organization 

yeah.. and IMHO this is the very reason that many who want to support the Open 
Source community, will not do so. It is slowly becoming a cheerleading 
section for the GPL. Will the supporters of the GPL ever shed the notion that 
the GPL is "the answer to everything".  Guess what, if diversity in your 
politics is a good thing than why does it seem to be an uphill battle every 
time someone does something that may not conform to the 'copyleft' side of 
the debate? Why does the "non-GPL" view have to be seen as "dissent" ? Why 
does the opensource community/OSI have to have one view on any given topic?


>``dedicated to managing and
> promoting the Open Source Definition for the good of the community.''

Well..there are those within the "community" to which the GPL is a hindrance, 
plain and simple. Those of us who do not work for mega corporations or 
universities with seemingly unlimited resources from multiple revenue streams 
and legions of underpaid code slaves.  
Those of us who own small businesses have needs that are not being met by 
currently defined OSI approved licenses, and quite honestly open source in 
general is taking a beating because of it, but the remedy is to submit new 
licenses, the OSI has provided a process for doing this, however the trend on 
new license submissions is always "use an existing license" or "use the GPL" 

If a hobbyist, or user, or whomever wants to license under the GPL thats fine, 
I'm glad they contributed, however, it is narrow minded and arrogant to think 
that the same rights that protect a user would be an acceptable in all other 
circumstances. 


I hope the OSI approves this license in short order.

Have a great day!
Mike
















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