Darwin: A matter of privacy?
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In One of my main complaints was that Apple opened up Darwin, the company'sMach-based OS, under a license that wasn't recognized anywhere as opensource. When I wrote the original column, the Since neither the OSI nor the FSF had characterized the APSL as free oropen source, I was accurately able to state that Apple's contributionscouldn't be counted as open source. But that situation changed recentlybecause of a simple vote. Last week, mere days after my column on Apple appeared, the OSI voted toendorse the APSL as an acceptable open source license, and it may evenshow up on OSI's If the OSI had liked what Apple was doing back in 1999, why didn't itendorse the license then? The answer was in the version of the license.What the OSI didn't say in the press release was that the version of theAPSL it was looking at in 1999 contained clauses that prevented it fromactually meeting the With this vote, the OSI nullified my main complaint against Apple, and thecompany can indeed be said to be working with the open source crowd. Thevote doesn't address my other suggestions about how Apple could help theopen source community; but as respondents to my column were quick to pointout, Apple isn't obligated to do any of that. We'll have to agree todisagree about whether Apple has been a sufficiently good neighbor. Butone thing is clear--Apple's claim that it has embraced open source can nolonger be considered an untruth. Having said that, the resolution of one issue appears to have broughtanother to the forefront: In the current version of the APSL we now have amajor license--perhaps the first--that is explicitly accepted as "opensource" by the OSI but is explicitly rejected as "free software" by theFSF. In the discrepancy we can see the first substantive issueillustrating that the difference between "open source" and "free software"isn't purely philosophical. That issue is privacy. In the explanation ofwhy the APSL is non-free, the FSF notes that many previous objectionsto the APSL have been dealt with by the current version, but that onedeal-breaker remains. Clause 2.2 of the APSL requires you to publish (andregister with Apple) not only code that you change and redistribute, butcode that you change and only use internally. The FSF says that this is an invasion of your privacy, and that you shouldhave the right to keep private any modifications that you don'tredistribute. The definition of "open source," however, doesn't sayanything about privacy. "The registration requirement is a real (though in our opinion minor)privacy problem," said OSI head Eric Raymond. "But the Open Source Definition was not written to address privacyproblems." Raymond added that there is no current or foreseeable movementwithin the OSI to include privacy provisions, but "if there arose ageneral feeling that privacy issues needed to be within the OSI's scope,we would respond." The upshot is that, for better or worse, we now have a specific issue bywhich to differentiate the OSI vision of "open source" from the FSF visionof "free software." The terms are no longer interchangeable. While the FSFhas always Now that Apple has its open source license, much (but not all) of mycomplaint against the company is gone. Yet, in the process, the gapbetween the OSI and the FSF has widened. But enough about Apple, the FSF, and the politics of softwarelicensing. I'm going to have another listen to my recording of theoriginal radio version of Does the difference between "open source" and "free software" have anyeffect on you? Let me know in the TalkBack below.
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