cat Xerox | Apple | Microsoft ?

From: Frank McConnell <fmc_at_reanimators.org>
Date: Sat May 23 12:25:58 1998

Sam Ismail <dastar_at_wco.com> writes:
> The problem is you're comparing an OS that will forever remain trapped in
> the academic realm to an operating system that is transitioning over into
> the commercial market. You've got companies making commercial use of
> Linux and selling it to mainstream customers. This trend will continue to
> grow.

*chuckle* Sam's been reading the propaganda again....

You've got companies making commercial use of FreeBSD and selling it
to mainstream customers too. And you know what? They aren't bound by
the GNU Public License to release (in some cases significantly
modified) source to anyone under any conditions if they don't want to.

Well, except for those parts of the typical stock FreeBSD system that
are encumbered by the GPL. You might note that the FreeBSD folks have
been careful to keep those separate in their source tree, and that it's
possible to have a running OS without those parts: it's not much of a
desktop user or development system but it'll get your packets where
they need to go.

Now that's something you can do with FreeBSD that you can't do with
Linux -- derive your own work without having to make the source
accessible outside your organization. Believe it or not, some
commmercial concerns think that this will better protect their
intellectual property, and in spite of what Stallman and some other
folks might like you to believe that is sometimes the right way to go
about it.

ObClassic: this model's been around a while, it's how a significant
portion of Wollongong's networking products worked. Though in those
days you needed a Unix source license from Western Electric so you
could get your hands on the BSD 4.[23] sources from which you could
derive your own work, which in Wollongong's case was porting to
other Unixes (and sometimes non-Unix OSs, like MPE).

-Frank McConnell
Received on Sat May 23 1998 - 12:25:58 BST