Posted by: Anonymous Coward
on January 29, 2005 11:36 PM
Very eloquently put, and I fully concur.
Unfortunately, Apple Computer, which I believe had a great opportunity with OS X, also decided to take the path of trashing the GPL, while embracing the BSD license. Why? Same reason Microsoft did. Remember that Apple, who had the lion's share of the market back in the Apple ][ days, was arrogant, arrogant, arrogant (they still are, BTW). It was Apple who was the one most eager to sue people for anything that they felt they could get away with.
Today, it is Microsoft. Tomorrow, it might be Sun, or IBM, or Intel, or whomever. Who it is doesn't matter; any bosses of any proprietary software development company would love to see the GPL eliminated somehow, for the reasons listed in this article. The GPL is our check on any such company or person, and this is why I believe the GPL must continue to succeed and be used pervasively. The way I support the GPL is by voting with my dollars. I do not buy hardware which does not work with Free Software. Period.
I would love to feel like I could buy one of those new Mac Minis. However, I won't. The reasons are twofold:
1.) You can't upgrade your DRAM or hard disk yourself without voiding the warranty. By comparison, my UltraSPARC, Athlon, Pentium 4, and PowerPC G3 briQ boxes (the latter running Yellow Dog Linux) have no such limitations.
2.) Apple has a very nasty habit of not releasing the specs for their hardware so that Free Software will fully work on it. Terra Soft Solutions frequently has to reverse-engineer Apple's hardware. To date, the iMac G5 doesn't even boot the Linux kernel, and the eMac has no support for video and thus is unusable with GNU/Linux.
As for the "oh, they're just protecting their intellectual property" argument, I own too may boxes of too many architectures, all of which work perfectly with GNU/Linux, to accept that argument. There is no good reason to not release the specs for your hardware so that people can write Free Software drivers. None. When Apple changes its tune that way, then I will again look at purchasing a Mac Mini.
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You said it, brother
Posted by: Anonymous Coward on January 29, 2005 11:36 PMUnfortunately, Apple Computer, which I believe had a great opportunity with OS X, also decided to take the path of trashing the GPL, while embracing the BSD license. Why? Same reason Microsoft did. Remember that Apple, who had the lion's share of the market back in the Apple ][ days, was arrogant, arrogant, arrogant (they still are, BTW). It was Apple who was the one most eager to sue people for anything that they felt they could get away with.
Today, it is Microsoft. Tomorrow, it might be Sun, or IBM, or Intel, or whomever. Who it is doesn't matter; any bosses of any proprietary software development company would love to see the GPL eliminated somehow, for the reasons listed in this article. The GPL is our check on any such company or person, and this is why I believe the GPL must continue to succeed and be used pervasively. The way I support the GPL is by voting with my dollars. I do not buy hardware which does not work with Free Software. Period.
I would love to feel like I could buy one of those new Mac Minis. However, I won't. The reasons are twofold:
1.) You can't upgrade your DRAM or hard disk yourself without voiding the warranty. By comparison, my UltraSPARC, Athlon, Pentium 4, and PowerPC G3 briQ boxes (the latter running Yellow Dog Linux) have no such limitations.
2.) Apple has a very nasty habit of not releasing the specs for their hardware so that Free Software will fully work on it. Terra Soft Solutions frequently has to reverse-engineer Apple's hardware. To date, the iMac G5 doesn't even boot the Linux kernel, and the eMac has no support for video and thus is unusable with GNU/Linux.
As for the "oh, they're just protecting their intellectual property" argument, I own too may boxes of too many architectures, all of which work perfectly with GNU/Linux, to accept that argument. There is no good reason to not release the specs for your hardware so that people can write Free Software drivers. None. When Apple changes its tune that way, then I will again look at purchasing a Mac Mini.
--Terrell Prude', Jr.
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