[NH LoCo] I'm writing an opinion piece for the Concord Monitor -- care to weigh in?

Jon 'maddog' Hall maddog at li.org
Wed Feb 24 22:17:11 GMT 2010


Yes, we know that it is crap and we know that FOSS is commercial
software, but the enemies of FOSS (and this includes free information)
have lots of money, hire lots of lobbyists, who takes lots of people to
dinner and whisper things in their ear.

It all sounds on the up-and-up.  The "Business Software Alliance", the
"International Intellectual Property Alliance"...just about the time you
think you have debunked one argument, they have three more
falsehoods....or the same one re-baked.  And these groups sound
important because they "represent" 1900 U.S. companies:

http://www.iipa.com/aboutiipa.html

They are fighting for their lives....they understand that if people
start developing the software they need and sharing that development
along the lines of FOSS, the whole business model that they have built
their companies on will crumble.

They publish nice reports like this one:

http://www.iipa.com/copyright_us_economy.html

and stick them under the noses of our elected representatives, who are
now trying to figure out how to create jobs and keep our economy going.

And a lot of those jobs are dependent on new technologies and ideas,
generally thought of as "IP"....so these legislators and representatives
tend to listen to them, and lump all "IP", including software, into one
large lump.

(sigh) Time for another "these folks are crazy" blog.

md




More information about the Ubuntu-US-NH mailing list