Re: [tlug] Yes! Another argument about the GPL! You knew you wanted it....

["Stephen J. Turnbull" <stephen@example.com>]

Curt Sampson writes:
 > On 2009-08-12 18:54 +0900 (Wed), Stephen J. Turnbull wrote:
 > 
 > > Specifically, using the best available code did not prevent Microsoft
 > > from publishing several versions of rather buggy TCP/IP stacks, no?
 > 
 > I didn't remember the stacks being all that bad,

I don't remember the details.  It's possible they weren't, and I'm
just having bad dreams from internal conflicts between my admiration
for Bill's policy acumen (both business policy at Microsoft and public
policy in picking malaria treatments for his foundation to target) and
my distaste for his ethics in executing his business plans.

 > subtleties and temptations of TCP/IP, I'd imagine it would have been
 > much worse had they gone and used their NetBIOS guys to write their own.

God, NetBIOS *was* awful.

 > > The point being that secrecy is bad. This [point] does work in favor
 > > of a policy of discouraging proprietary extensions, to some extent.
 > 
 > I don't understand this. Perhaps you can expand on it?

Just a side effect of the "many eyes" stuff; people will write better
code if they know that people outside the immediate work group will
review it.  I think the most important influence on a commercial firm
would be knowing that your customers are looking at your code, eh?

 > > IMHO the GPL is not a great fit to either American extreme, and the
 > > GPL is way more in tune with Japanese mores than American.
 > 
 > Hm. That's an interesting thought.

Well, take it with a grain of salt.  I really am not that close to
Japanese open source people, except a few who work on Emacs.  Since
the Norteamericanos who work on Emacs are so weird, I suppose the same
probably holds for the Nihonjin, too.