This post originated from an RSS feed registered with Agile Buzz
by James Robertson.
Original Post: if SCO isn't right, someone else will be
Feed Title: Cincom Smalltalk Blog - Smalltalk with Rants
Feed URL: http://www.cincomsmalltalk.com/rssBlog/rssBlogView.xml
Feed Description: James Robertson comments on Cincom Smalltalk, the Smalltalk development community, and IT trends and issues in general.
So says Charles Cooper of CNet. His contention - OS developers don't really pay any heed to potential IP issues. So even if SCO gets no traction with their claims, this issue will come back to bite open source projects eventually:
The unauthorized incorporation of intellectual property (IP) is an obvious no-no in the real world, where laws and rules of behavior govern the limits of fair use. In contrast, the open-source world is a veritable swap mart where source code remains freely distributed and available to the general public. With the General Public License (GPL), anyone can see, change and distribute an application's source code, so long as they publish any changes they make before distributing it.
So far, that's worked out nicely and helped create the conditions for Linux's explosive growth. But it also leaves the door wide open for a code jockey version of Jayson Blair to rip off somebody's IP and disseminate it without permission.
Open-source defenders say that this is all a pig in a poke and that there are stringent review processes in place to prevent mischief. What's more, they say the code is open for anyone to examine.
Yeah, sooner or later I expect to see a suit claiming that some code was inappropriately placed under the GPL by someone with no right to do so.
Previous Topic
