Carlo Piana :: Law is Freedom ::

The Free Software Foundation Europe is the facilitator of a legal network comprising hundreds of experts from private practice, corporations, universities around the world. One of the Special interest groups has spent almost one year producing a document explaining how differently licensed software programs and libraries can and cannot mixed to make or not to make a derivative of each other.

The result is what we call "the linking document". It might not be perfect, but it's a valid platform for discussion around a topic that provide headache to many players in the field. To find a comparable discussion, albeit controversial and limited to the GNU licenses,  one should redress to the FSF's FAQ.

Some clarity at last.

Ifosslr Volume 2, issue 1, is out with an article of mine on a recent case on which the Italian Constitutional Court has ruled in favour of giving preference to Free Software in Public Administration. Here is the Abstract

Today we celebrate the Document Freedom Day 2010. Documents strive to be free.

With today's press release, FSFE cheers the advent of the browser choice ballot screen, a facility that would notify users that Freedom is within reach. Windows (TM) users will be presented with a graphic interface within MS Internet Explorer whereby they can choose to install an additional web browser, including the most successful and innovative Free Software one, Mozilla Firefox. 

The programme of the SFScon 2009 has been published.

South Tyrol Free Software Conference 2009

The SFScon of the 13th November 2009 -  the South Tyrol Free Software Conference - is an International Conference on Free Software, which is held annually in South Tyrol. This years topic of the SFScon is: "Free Software: For Innovative Business!".

Amazon's announcement that it is launching cloud-based MySQL services come at a convenient time. It shows how money to support Free Software development can come from unexpected sources, and without a proprietary license appearing anywhere in the picture.

This is not really good news for Free Software. However, Amazon gives us the best evidence that MySQL can be "monetized" by offering it in a Software As a Service setting. This can happen with GNU GPL licensed software and without receiving any special permission from the copyright holder, contradicting all claims that there is no viable way to fund development of a Free Software project without a dual license. The impatient reader can jump directly to the section where I deal with the cloud, but I invite you to follow all the argument.

Sometimes I wonder who the worst enemies of Free Software are. And it occurs me that sometimes the worst enemies are ourselves, the proponents of it (or self-described as such).

The same thought struck me yesterday reading a press release calling for Mysql to be sold to a third party, separate from the prospect buyer of Sun Microsystem, Oracle. It says:

[Monty Widenius] believes the EU's antitrust regulator is "absolutely right to be concerned" and called on Oracle "to be constructive and commit to sell MySQL to a suitable third party, enabling an instant solution instead of letting Sun suffer much longer.