NewsForge | Open source project adds “no military use” clause to the GPL — Here is a Pandoras box: Open Source with political use restrictions. Unless the Open Source community rejects this sort of idocy then the next thing you know there will Open Source projects than can only be used by a group of whites, or Chnese-only. No gays can use the software could be a restriction. What’s to prevent it if this is acceptable? I suspect that members of the NRA could be banned next. This is a bad precedent in every way.
GPU is a Gnutella client that creates ad-hoc supercomputers by allowing individual PCs on the network to share CPU resources with each other. That’s intriguing enough, but the really interesting thing about GPU is the license its developers have given it. They call it a “no military use” modified version of the GNU General Public License (GPL).
Tiziano Mengotti and Rene Tegel are the lead developers on the GPU project. Mengotti is the driving force behind the license “patch,” which says “the program and its derivative work will neither be modified or executed to harm any human being nor through inaction permit any human being to be harmed.”
All this just makes me think about the line “There is no such thing as bad publicity.” Excluding the military (any military) using Asimov’s 1st robotic law gives just that: publicity.
[Grin]
3 laws of robotics:
1.A robot may not injure a human being, or through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws.
Fabrizio Marana
Mr. H. Fusion
“Just to clarify something. If you violate the EULA, you commit copyright infringement. You will not be prosecuted.”
Do you want to bet on that?
Mr. H. Fusion
“Just to clarify something. If you violate the EULA, you commit copyright infringement. You will not be prosecuted.”
Do you want to bet on that?
Comment by J — 8/16/2006 @ 6:17 am
I would, but not knowing you and doubting you would ever send the winnings, I will decline the offer.
Simply put, copyright infringement is a tort action. That is where you sue someone because you have suffered a financial loss. Criminal action is where the State (or local) Prosecutor files a criminal charge because of an act listed in the Criminal Code. There is no crime involved with copyright infringement unless it is a side issue to a crime such as fraud or forgery. Selling forged copies of Windows XP is a crime. Putting the same legally purchased copy of XP on two computers isn’t.
Mr. H. Fusion
Installing on 2 machines is copying AND distribution.
Read and learn.
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000506—-000-.html
http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FWE/is_4_8/ai_n6108144
Mr. H. Fusion
You shouldn’t pretend to know the law when you clearly don’t!
Sorry that link was broke
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000506—-000-.html
one more time
http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/html/uscode17/usc_sec_17_00000506—-000-.html
crap his blog is screwing it up when I send it up.
Replace the dashes between the 6 and 0 with 4 minuses that will get you to the right place
J
use tinyurl.com