Avoiding LispWorks Personal annoyances
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From: Kaz Kylheku on 9 Oct 2009 12:50 On 2009-10-09, Raffael Cavallaro <raffaelcavallaro(a)pas.espam.s.il.vous.plait.mac.com> wrote: > On 2009-10-09 05:13:31 -0400, "John Thingstad" <jpthing(a)online.no> said: > >> Must be hard to keep up your moral standards living in this den of thieves :) > > > I personally don't consider it moral to tell creators how they may or > may not control their own IP. Really? So for instance, you don't consider it moral to tell creators that they can't log your keystrokes, or turn your computer into a member of a thousand element botnet which attacks machines no the net? The owner of the computer installation has the right to know what every single instruction of the software does, and to change it if he doesn't agree with it. If I think that a binary has a buffer overflow vulnerability in it, I'm free to whip out my disassembly tools and look for it. > By giving IP creators the ability to > control how others use their IP we allow everything from the GPL to > commercial licenses. The GPL is not a /use/ license but a redistribution license. You don't have to agree to it to use the software. Programs which pop up the GPL during installation are ridiculously wrong. > The moral answer is simple; if you don't like the lispworks personal > license, don't use lispworks personal. > When someone violates any of these licenses, it is asserting that the > violator's wishes for the disposition of that IP are more important > than the wishes of the IP's creator. The wishes of what happens on my computer are law on my computer. If I have a lawfully obtained pece of sofwtare, it's my business how I use it. I can look at every machine instruction with a magnifying glass. A program is exactly like a book or music recording, or any other copyrighted work. You can read every word of a book and understand it. You can write notes in the margin, etc. > This is just selfishness. In order > to be this selfish publicly one must usually be lacking in self > awareness, so such selfish acts are usually accompanied by > rationalizing. Rationalizing is good. Unselfish acts are also accompanied by rationalizing. Everything must be rationalized. If it's not rationalized, it's a mindless act. > As a practical matter, to allow these sorts of license violations is to > create an IP climate in which every license becomes a de facto public > domain license. Public domain has to do with copying, not with use. > This would be a disaster for the free flow of > knowledge; Those who had valuable IP would simply keep it secret. Isn't that what patents are for? Patents mean that you can reveal the IP (sparing the others the need to reverse-engineer). Everyone can understand the invention; they just can't go into business with a very similar invention. A time-limit hack in trial software is not an original invention.
From: Pascal J. Bourguignon on 9 Oct 2009 12:51 Raffael Cavallaro <raffaelcavallaro(a)pas.espam.s.il.vous.plait.mac.com> writes: > On 2009-10-09 05:13:31 -0400, "John Thingstad" <jpthing(a)online.no> said: > >> Must be hard to keep up your moral standards living in this den of thieves :) > > > I personally don't consider it moral to tell creators how they may or > may not control their own IP. By giving IP creators the ability to > control how others use their IP we allow everything from the GPL to > commercial licenses. This is not clear. Don't you consider it a good thing to have a choice between GPL and commercial licenses (and within commercial licenses, and choices between various DRM modes)? If not, do you consider everything should be copyleft? Or always with the most stringent commercial license? (Pay the most hefty sum everytime you try to use (whatever the kind of use) the commercial product?) In what way is it not moral to teach people how to control their work and their work usage? > The moral answer is simple; if you don't like the lispworks personal > license, don't use lispworks personal. Personnaly, I think that GPL is a good way to deal with IP, so I agree that if anybody is not happy with the restrictions of commercial licenes, they should just NOT use or copy commercial software, and rather use AND copy AND let copy GPL'ed software. With this mindset, I agree too, that it may not be a good idea to tell commercial vendors how they may render their commercial license more agreable to customers or potential customers. > When someone violates any of these licenses, it is asserting that the > violator's wishes for the disposition of that IP are more important > than the wishes of the IP's creator. This is just selfishness. In > order to be this selfish publicly one must usually be lacking in self > awareness, so such selfish acts are usually accompanied by > rationalizing. Agreed. > As a practical matter, to allow these sorts of license violations is > to create an IP climate in which every license becomes a de facto > public domain license. This would be a disaster for the free flow of > knowledge; Those who had valuable IP would simply keep it secret. Agreed. I'd add one word about secret IP. The human society could very well decide that the IP used in commercial operations should be published (at the very least, that whole IP should fully disclosed under the form of a kind of patent). Today, it is fiction because corporations are allowed too much rights (IMO), but I think that their rights should be restricted and that such a disposition concerning IP would be good. Notably, a lot of software is being constantly lost because the sources are never published. The patent system could be put to good use if it was required that the source of any software sold be published in a patent. Competitors couldn't use that IP (if there's any real IP inside, that is), but once the corporation dies, or after the patent term, the sources would be available. Another advantage is that we would have to come with a more precise characterisation of intellectual property. If two programs share one line of code, do they share IP? If they share one algorithm? If they share 60% of boilerplate lines of code? -- __Pascal Bourguignon__
From: Kaz Kylheku on 9 Oct 2009 12:53 On 2009-10-09, Espen Vestre <espen(a)vestre.net> wrote: > Dave Searles <searles(a)hoombah.nurt.bt.uk> writes: > >> I don't think that modifying your own property in the comfort and >> privacy of your own home IS abuse, no matter what its manufacturer's >> wishes regarding its use. > > But with most licenses (including the one used by Lispworks), the > ownership of the copy of the software is NOT transferred to the end > user Maybe in the demented minds of some drunken lawyers! But in fact, you do own the copy. You don't own the copyright: the right to make and redistribute other copies. >so you're not free to do whatever you want to it, just like your In fact you are. > public library won't let you modify their books to your own wishes "in > the comfort and privacy of your home". Nice try, genius. But a library book is not a copy. You have to return it. The library does not have that book while you have it out. If you destroy it, that book is then not available to the library and its patrons until they replace it. If I get my own book, I can make margin notes in it, tear out pages, black out or highlight passages, etc.
From: Pascal J. Bourguignon on 9 Oct 2009 12:54 Espen Vestre <espen(a)vestre.net> writes: > Dave Searles <searles(a)hoombah.nurt.bt.uk> writes: > >> I don't think that modifying your own property in the comfort and >> privacy of your own home IS abuse, no matter what its manufacturer's >> wishes regarding its use. > > But with most licenses (including the one used by Lispworks), the > ownership of the copy of the software is NOT transferred to the end > user, so you're not free to do whatever you want to it, just like your > public library won't let you modify their books to your own wishes "in > the comfort and privacy of your home". Exactly, what it is I am forbidden to do with Lispworks' executable? May I not compute its md5sum? May I not copy it from /usr/bin/ to /home/pjb/bin/? May I not cat it to /dev/snd0? May I not cat it to /usr/bin/brainfuck? May I not upgrade my OS libraries? Why couldn't I write my own version of OS libraries and install them on my own computer? -- __Pascal Bourguignon__
From: Kaz Kylheku on 9 Oct 2009 12:55
On 2009-10-09, vippstar <vippstar(a)gmail.com> wrote: > On Oct 9, 2:25�pm, Espen Vestre <es...(a)vestre.net> wrote: >> Dave Searles <sear...(a)hoombah.nurt.bt.uk> writes: >> > I don't think that modifying your own property in the comfort and >> > privacy of your own home IS abuse, no matter what its manufacturer's >> > wishes regarding its use. >> >> But with most licenses (including the one used by Lispworks), the >> ownership of the copy of the software is NOT transferred to the end >> user, so you're not free to do whatever you want to it, just like your >> public library won't let you modify their books to your own wishes "in >> the comfort and privacy of your home". > > What about copying the book and using the copy for my own needs? ... That's a copyright violation. And it's completely irrelevant to this debate. Why? Because, recall, the debate is about analyzing and modifying a program of which you already have a *lawful* copy. |