LawFont.com

Whenever someone comes along and suggests re-ordering a well-accepted way of arranging things, it’s always good to scrutinize what they say carefully. Sometimes they may turn out to be a Darwin or a Copernicus. But other times, of course, they may not.

Richard Stallman tries just such a thing in respect of the term ‘intellectual property’.

It has always kind of bugged me, especially after seeing him push the theme (or meme) in one of his public lectures with vigour and eloquence. Because, basically, while he has germs of the right idea in there, he is mostly wrong. And his errors detract from a good cause, instead of assisting it. (more…)

Just found via slashdot an interview with Eric Raymond at ONLamp.com on his keynote speech at a conference in Brazil. Raymond is reported to have said: “We don’t need the GPL anymore. It’s based on the belief that open source software is weak and needs to be protected. Open source would be succeeding faster if the GPL didn’t make lots of people nervous about adopting it.”

Interesting, but I can’t agree. (more…)