French Lawmakers Demand Source Code 189
Interestingly, they also propose that software developers have a "right to develop compatible software." Of course, my right to make my software compatible implies your obligation to document your software and protocols so that I can make my software compatible.
Their proposed law "protects commercial publishers of proprietary software and developer communities of free software against anticompetitive strategies by enforcing in a practical matter the interoperability principle introduced in the European software directive of 1991. Therefore, Article 3 states that 'any individual or moral person has the right to develop, publish and use an original software which is compatible with the communication standards of another software.'"
(Any Francophones want to tell us what "moral person" refers to here? Corporations? Committees? AI software that passes the Turing test?)
Re:IF I EVER (Score:1)
Money isn't everything. (Score:1)
They may not have the richest 6% of the people who have 51% of the money.
But they do have much better working conditions for most people.
Sometimes you need to just take a step back and evaluate whats actually important.
Money or people? Is it THAT hard a decision?
Re:As usual, (Score:1)
-----------------------------------------------
Vincent Vega: And you know what they call a
Jules: They don't call it a Quarter Pounder with cheese?
Vincent Vega: No man, they got the metric system. They wouldn't know what the fuck a Quarter Pounder is.
Jules: Then what do they call it?
Vincent Vega: They call it a "Royale" with cheese.
Jules: A "Royale" with cheese! What do they call a Big Mac?
Vincent Vega: A Big Mac's a Big Mac, but they call it "le Big-Mac".
Jules: "Le Big-Mac"! Ha ha ha ha! What do they call a Whopper?
Vincent Vega: I dunno, I didn't go into Burger King.
French Coders Guarding the Parapets (Score:1)
Ah fart in your general clos-ed-source direction!
Go away, or ah shall demand your source code a second time!
Backfire (Score:1)
A couple of years ago, DISA (Defense Information Systems Agency -- US DoD Agency) contacted several commercial vendors to subcontract out parts of the DII-COE (Defense Information Infrastructure -- Common Operating Environment). The COE mandate is essentially to bring all DoD software under a standard platform (note, NOT OS platform, but kind of a meta-platform of functionality). They contacted Microsoft, InstallShield, etc.. to get them to extend their products to fit nicely into the COE. Most of them laughed. Spend a lot of money and a lot more time in government red tape for a couple of million?
The result? The next versions of COE have been modified so that the standard versions of commercial products can fit in without modification. DISA's plan essentially failed so they backtracked and conceeded to the commercial parties.
The same kind of result will happen here. France is small on the global scale. With only 60 million citizens and a geographic region comparable to Texas, they are not worth the red tape for a software company.
When was the last time I bought something French (Score:1)
The last time I purchased something made in France was earlier today actually... I picked up some Moet & Chandon [moet.com] and a little Perrier-Jouet [perrierjouet.com].
----------------------------
the catch; (Score:1)
I wish I had a nickel for every time someone said "Information wants to be free".
Compiler backdoors hiding other backdoors (Score:1)
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Re:The French (Score:1)
Who else is there? Most workers in Europe are organized in unions. How else could they oppose the organized capital?
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Watch it... (Score:1)
It's quite true that the US has a lot of racism in its history. It's equally true that the American people have done some pretty damn bad things in the cause of racism. But don't forget, there are many nations out there who have done things that make what America has done look like something you'd see on an episode of Sesame Street. Sadly, since you were too scared to put a name behind your flame, we can't exactly examine the things that were done in the name of prejudice where you come from. Or did you post anonymously because you can't take the heat? If so, then I suggest you stay out of the kitchen next time.
Re:Backfire (Score:1)
A general starts using computers. He uses Windows and Office. "Wow," he says to himself, "These are so easy to use. If everyone used this, it would make my life even easier!" So, he mandates that all agencies under him move to use Office under Windows. That is how compatibility comes in the government. I've seen it happen several times.
As for software vendors not fleeing? No, they will not flee. They will laugh and threaten to not sell. If Microsoft threatens to withhold products from France, then France will probably make an exemption for them. It is a hell of a lot easier to make an exemption for one company than to switch the entire platform of the government to free software. The idea of an entire government switching is pure idealism. It doesn't make fisical sense.
Re:don't forget Sun... (Score:1)
Now now, let's not get carried away here. First of all, this is merely a proposed bill. Second, it applies only to software used by the French government - not all software used in France.
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"moral person" (answer on legalese) (Score:1)
A personne morale is a legal entity, as opposed to a personne physique (human being), that nevertheless enjoys some of the same powers and rights, such as suing in courts, opening bank accounts and owning goods or real estate. Corporations, non-profit associations and similar entities are personnes morales
Re:Good news... NOT (Score:1)
That's surely the reason why all French ministries have web sites, most of which with translations in several languages. I can't say as much of the US or British governments.
> There would be only a minor impact. Probably
> this is to reduce the number of people using
> internet in favor of minitel.
Bummer. Internet traffic is driving telcos high,
would you think they'd kill the hen that lays
golden eggs? The government has shared in France
Telecom and gets dividends!
Re:Yeah, but (FACTS, damnit) (Score:1)
More precisely, the (socialist [slashdot.org]) government issued regulations (decrees 99-199 and 99-200) superseding the former regulations. Most notably, these new regulations say that people can use freely 128-bit encryption as long as the software has been declared. The user does not need to declare the software; it is sufficient that somebody has declared the availability of the software to the authorities. For instance, IN2P3 [in2p3.fr] (a national research center on particle physics) modified SSH and made SSF [in2p3.fr] (limiting the lenght of the private key to 128 bits) and declared it. Now just anybody can download it (source code available) and use it fully legally without further hassle.
A key length of 128-bit is supposed to be sure against attacks by corporations and governments for a certain number of years. The French government was nevertheless forced to set a limit since simply removing any limit would have been... illegal. The decree setting limits is actually a supplement to a law voted by parliament; this law stipulated that a limit should be set by the executive branch. The executive branch could not legally put no limit on keylength, since this would void the law of its substance; such a decree would be open to litigation and likely to be cancelled by the judiciary.
The government said at the time that they were going to propose a law (to be voted by parliament) removing the last restrictions. However, this has not taken place; reasons may be the relative lack of interest of the public in the matter and the general overload of Parliament (greatly made worse, I must say, by the silly campaign from the right wing against the domestic partnership law).
I suggest that we lobby a bit on this issue.
Note: in France, the socialist party is more or less like the US democratic party (a bit further to the left). They have little to do with the so-called "socialist republics".
Re:Difference in attitude (Score:1)
I actually see a pattern here, too! :-) As you know, members of parliament are prohibited by the constitution (article 40) to increase the financiary burden of the state. This means that they cannot vote a law providing funding for developers.
I suggest that we lobby the government so that they provide funding for the free software projects that make software used in government administrations, universities and schools. That actually would help.
[OT] I Failed the Turing Test (Score:1)
I keep trying, but so far I can't convince anyone that I'm not a machine.
French source.. (Score:1)
Source code in French - how would anyone be able to read it? Except the French, of course, but as we all know, civilization hasn't made it that far yet. This is just another plot by the French to take over the world. First they made Bill make all those obscene sex stuff (and the cigar was probably from Havana, too).. and did I mention Bill Gates was French ? George W. Bush isn't French, but he certainly thinks in French, and that's a crime comparable to trolling.
We must be vigorous and fight this plague now. Liberate France from the French !
Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:1)
"I don't know why, but I accidently typed Europe instead of East Asia, sans china. As for the rest of your comments, your are a socialist and are of no interest or consequence to me or society." (italics added.)
Well, i think it is people like you who will finish the downfall of American society (which would be a sad thing indeed.) You obviously have not read any Marx, Durkheim, Burke, Hobbes, especially Weber (and the postmodernist Ritzer)... i have done extensive research into the major Social Theorists (cosidering Philosophy and Sociology are my fields of interest.) What you are promoting is a self defeating system.
It cannot, well i dont want to be a positivist, may not, survive for long. For you must understand that in order for there to be corporations, there would have to be people with the ability to consume! The system that you promote, ruthless capitalism, will exploit everyone until there is no one left. When there is no one left, even the companies will fall. You have to find a happy medium, Golden Mean as (IIRC) Plato put it.
There is a possibility for another revolution, i will not be in the US to witness it. The incidents which occured over the world trade org, and international monetary fund are just beginning.
Two things the press release did not mention... (Score:1)
USA Threatens Retaliation. (Score:1)
--
"Damn! And just when Piranha was starting to turn the tide of negative PR!"
As for immoral persons... (Score:1)
And since this right is restricted to moral persons, Bill G & Steve B have always been forced to write unoriginal software which is incompatible with the communication standards of other software.
--
"Damn! And just when Piranha was starting to turn the tide of negative PR!"
Re:The French (Score:1)
I go where? My point stands. The worst Scientology guys can do to you is sue you into bankrupcy. The government, OTOH, can put you in jail (and often does -- US has the largest % of population in prison as I recall).
Kaa
Re:The French (Score:1)
Care to speculate what's going to happen to your taxes in this case?
Trade unions will be overjoyed -- I find it hard to see who else would like the idea.
Kaa
Re:The French (Score:1)
It does? Consider what, say, Microsoft can do to you, personally, if it decides it doesn't like you at all. Now consider what the government can do to you if it decides it dislikes you.
The proposed law strengthens the hands of the people and checks the corps./i.
And it strengthens individuals how?
Besides, I would assume the people most interested in the source would belong to the three-letter agencies (that is, their French equivalents). I mean, assume you are NSA: wouldn't being able to find security holes in your private copy of the source of Win2K/9x/NT/whatever be a godsent to you?
Kaa
Racist? (Score:1)
-B
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:1)
Don't be surprised, however, if military systems are exempt.
"moral person" (Score:1)
(Any Francophones want to tell us what "moral person" refers to here? Corporations? Committees? AI software that passes the Turing test?)
AFAIK, (and my francophone girlfriend) the french legal term "personne morale" means a group, assiciation, corporation or whtanot, as opposed to an actual flesh and bone person (like my francophone girlfriend... ;-) )
I may be wrong -- as a french lawyer (SINAL (she is not a lawyer...).
adrien cater
boring.ch [boring.ch]
Re:Hm. Does this have a chance? (Score:1)
It has much more chance to pass in France than in the US since french politicians are much less influenced by corporate lobbyists (there is a very strict control on campaign $$). I'd say it will depend on media mostly. If i were microsoft I'd hire a few PR people for france NOW.
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Re:do you really think that would deter the NSA? (Score:1)
Yes: Thompson's Turing Award speech [acm.org].
Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:1)
Mandrake Linux. Nuff said.
Re:Are there even any programmers in France? (Score:1)
Re:Some interesting parts (Score:1)
Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:1)
That said, my pen is an American-made Sheaffer
Upshot: Red Hat should sell software to FR (Score:1)
Actually, the French are really into garden gnomes right now, so I think they'd like to buy GNOME apps.
I can see it now - an ad campaign in French with garden gnomes and penguins, all wearing snappy red hats. The penguins should wear the black and white striped shirts and red berets, of course - the gnomes should wear Red Hat style hats.
And, they could sing together while marching over Bill G tied down with stakes, like Lilliputians over Gulliver.
Wouldn't that be a hoot!
Ah prefer ma WINE Open Source, bien sur ... (Score:1)
Eet goes well wi' ma GNOME de jardin and I theenk ze penguins zeh are, how you say, ahdorahble?
Linus, he ees French, non?
Re:I'll bet they want the source code in French to (Score:2)
Hmmn. And how much of this behind-closed-doors have you read in order to get a data set to make this generalization? I'd imagine that a lot of proprietary code, for financial and military institutions, for instance, is some of the finest in the art.
First, we make the incorrect generalization that all Open Source code is innately better than all proprietary code; now we're leaping off of that shaky premise to the conclusion that all proprietary code is, in fact, shoddy and embarassing?
Not sure I'm going to buy into this line of thought.
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Microsoft will bother! (Score:2)
Also, remember how big part of the economy the government is in Europe, and how influent France is in EU. If the France government doesn't use Microsoft products, there will be a big pressure for the private sector as well as EU to use compatible software.
The law makes a lot of sense, it is basically what any big company would require from their supliers, if they were smart enough to avoid being dependend on a single source.
Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:2)
If France is a country with severe economic problems, I only wish the rest of the world was so badly off.
Not so (Score:2)
Corporate incomes have been generally up in France, but it will take a while for me to find statistics.
Re:The French (Score:2)
US has the largest % of population in prison as I recall).
Indeed, they have; so maybe the problem with the US government is not the 'government' part, but the 'US' part?
Re:The French (Score:2)
It does? Consider what, say, Microsoft can do to you, personally, if it decides it doesn't like you at all. Now consider what the government can do to you if it decides it dislikes you.
s/Microsoft/Scientology/, and there you go. Microsoft is NOT *that* powerful ... what most microsoft-haters fail to take into account is that it's *not* the biggest or most powerful corporation around ... and by far. Their market valuation is enormous, but as far as revenues go, and employees and political influence, typically Oil companies or pharmaceutical companies are much, much more powerful and probably much more crooked in general.
But they could be that big in no time, that being said.
Re:Backfire (Score:2)
Moral person (Score:2)
Thus, a company, a corporation, anything that is not made of blood and flesh is a moral person.
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Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:2)
No wonder you sign "Soldier": you cannot create by yourself, but have to plunder...
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Please restrict yourself to facts (Score:2)
What you are talking of would be really interesting to discuss if you had some hard, real facts to rely on. No, I do not think that your site [altern.org] is informative. It is a mixture of ramblings on elections results, quotes from legal texts whose status (proposed? voted? pending to be signed into law by the President) is not even clearly stated, and comments whose pertinence is not proved. In short, this site is very much akin to fringe political propaganda (say, communist leaflets): it surely alludes to something true, but is not convincing.
As far as I know, theoretically, nowadays Web sites are considered by law as akin to the written press. A paper publication (say, a magazine or daily newspaper) has to have a "director of publication" and to be declared to the authorities. The basic idea is to have a clear liability trace in case of libel or other publications prohibited by law (such as a call to murder or similar things).
However, in the case of WWW sites, this becomes very unwieldy and is not enforced: people that open a WWW page do not declare themselves as a proper publication. Therefore, some people in parliament found it a good idea to replace these requirements by something more modern. Of course, this attempt was a bit misguided, and surely the law will be repealed and/or amended a lot.
Apparently, they wish users to register with their real name to their ISP. That way, if a user posts, say, a public call to murder black people on his or her WWW site, the judiciary has a clearly defined person to prosecute. Of course, the lawmakers forgot that anyway users could simply ftp such contents to off-shore sites; perhaps showing them how the WWW actually works could make them a little more in touch with what is technically possible.
Members of parliament propose dozens of ill-designed laws each year. I think you overreacted. Posting a comment such as your on a site like Slashdot, where most of the audience is not too knowledgeable about European issues and is prone to knee-jerk libertarian comments, was irresponsible and useless. You had better collect actual facts and make a WWW site that reminds less of the anarchist propaganda leaflets dirty young men give to passers-by outside of universities! :-)
DVD in France (Score:2)
> compatible software." Of course, my right to make my software compatible implies
> your obligation to document your software and protocols so that I can make my
> software compatible.
The MPAA isn't going to like this concept. It would mean open source DVD players in France would be a "right" rather than an illegal reverse engineered hack that can turn children who program into criminals.
Re:Good news... NOT (Score:2)
I will move to france the 1st of june to work for MandrakeSoft. Hm. I'm a bit scared of all these strange laws about crypto and now perheaps web publishing...
Anyway, if I use any other protocol (Say ftp) instaed of http, or any other format than html, am I still a webmaster?
--The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
Re:do you really think that would deter the NSA? (Score:2)
It's pretty simple to tell if the binary matches the source. You compile the source and compare the binaries. If you are unable to produce the same binaries as you were given, then you don't have the source code.
Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:2)
-henrik
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:2)
Whoop dee do (Score:2)
As for the former -- I've never quite seen the point. The idea is that if the company making the software tanks you're not stuck with software you can't fix. But really, what are you gonna do? It would take an army of developers to figure out the code and find a fix. Unless you also get all the internal development docs and hire the (presumably out-of-work) programmers from the company, you're still stuck with lame-duck code.
Re:The French (Score:2)
This is the perfect answer. Use capitalism means to control the capitalist market. If you don't like what someone does, refuse to deal with them.
The US Military doesn't want to end up with a situation where a $25 million dollar jet is grounded because the only supplier of a $5 part is suddenly charging $500,000 for it. That's why they refuse to buy anything that they can't replace from at least two independant sources.
The French government doesn't want to be trapped, forced to buy new copies of MS Office for every public employee just because their copies of Win2k expired and Win2003 broke old Office packages. (Not an unprecedented thing.)
And then there's the security issue. Closed source software can contain any number of evil features. And even if you went through it with a debugger you could never be sure you didn't miss something. That'd be like the Russians (during the cold war) licensing an encryption package from the NSA. By using only open source software, the government ensures that its software is open to wide scrutiny.
Re:The French (Score:2)
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:2)
>>western European nuclear soverign power who is a member of NATO
>By western I meant as far as ideologies go, as opposed to eastern russia/asia ideologies.
Right, and my whole point is that while France may have as much influence as the UK, it does not have as much influence as the USA.
>>I don't think anyone outside France thinks that France is as important as the USA in terms of international clout.
>So what, you just take this time to toot your own capitalist horn?
What makes you think I'm a capitalist? Tooting [Bec] or not, I stand by my comment. You are obviously an exception to my generalization. Surprising to find you on
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:2)
I don't think anyone outside France thinks that France is as important as the USA in terms of international clout.
Paris meridian my arse (pardon my French).
Yeah, but (Score:2)
This is quite similar to an older proposal made in the French Senate: there was already an article [slashdot.org] in /. about this previous proposal (where, strangely enough, it was considered much more favorably). However, it was turned down (I do not remember whether it was turned down by the Senate or whether it made its way to the National Assembly and was turned down there). At any rate, I am happy to learn that this proposal (or a similar one) is back on the table (and this time proposed by members of the majority in power, so there are more changes of it getting voted in).
Incidentally, someone was mentioning the bizarre French laws on encryption. These laws have been repealed a year or so ago: by that same (socialist) government which is now proposing this bill.
Re:Hm. Does this have a chance? (Score:2)
I think it does have a chance. First, the MPs who are proposing the bill are members of the majority parliamentary group (and party discipline is, in French politics, much more effective than it is in US politics). Second, the French Government has been making some important efforts among similar lines, and I think they will support the bill.
Difference in attitude (Score:2)
It's interesting to see the difference in attitude between Germany and France as concerns the question of open standards and open source. Germany has been giving substantial amounts of money to various open source projects (notably GPG). France will vote laws. Now which is best?
Re:sounds interesting (Score:2)
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:2)
They think they have as much clout as any other western nuclear soverign power who is a member of NATO, and they'd be right.
-- iCEBaLM
Re:The French (Score:2)
The French tradition of tolerating brutal, oppressive governments until they burgeon to the point of requiring bloody rebellion, then instituting some new government that gleefully tries to outdo its predecessor in gruesome abuse of power, is well known. ...Even if it is a much shorter tradition than the "Anglo-Saxon" one cited above. Many people are also familiar with the much longer Continental tradition of government veneration and cheerful lock-step obedience to officialdom. (This is not to say that Americans don't sometimes need to be slapped away from emulating this tradition themselves, despite your apparent conviction that the anglo-american legal tradition is one of anarchy.)
Post-Revolution France, with a history of violence, colonialism, nationalistic aggression, and oppression that makes the U.S.A.'s bloody history look positively angelic in comparison, really doesn't strike me as great proof for the claim that the French system "promptly" tosses out bad governments. As for checks and balances, they may frustrate people attempting to totally rework the system of government or enforce their pet wishes of broad social change...but that's the point.
In a pleasant fairy-land, the State acts solely to benefit the people, and not mostly to meet goals of higher-ups and enrich bureaucrats and officials. France doesn't count as a pleasant fairy-land. The French government merely tries to offer the most desirable jobs by using taxpayer money to make the positions particularly enticing.
No, taxpayers deserve the very best use of their tax money, which they are forcibly deprived of. Having "the absolute very best people" on government payrolls doesn't necessarily mean the taxpayers benefit at all - all francophobic joking aside, the French people don't deserve exquisitely talented and well-trained censors, commissars, secret police, assassins, and propagandists any more than the rest of us. Even assuming that all those government workers can be said to be honest (because, of course, dishonest people don't try to get attractive jobs) and none of them work in government functions that serve to oppress or impede the people (because France apparently doesn't have a government like any other in human history), it doesn't strike me as obviously just that taxpayers are forced to provide the copious funds necessary to make every government position more desirable than private-sector jobs where the funds come from people choosing to pay...
I have to wonder what system you're trying to contrast this with. The US government has many programs for subsidizing the advanced education of people willing to work for it. Further, it's terribly easy to get a college education in this country. Bone-average students willing to pony up wages from a menial job can get into community colleges in most of this country. If you want to get into a better school, you have to have money or show talent, yes (as said by someone who didn't know anyone to brown-nose, but managed to get scholarships and grants to go to college).
You really just missed the point, there. It's not an issue of wanting the state to go away (personally, I wish I could believe that anarcho-capitalism would work, but I'll have to settle for minarchism), but about people realizing that the State has big (often overriding) priorities and goals that have nothing to do with fulfilling its duties to the people and contradict the freedoms and rights of the people.
Ah, yes, the "freedom and limited government are the tools of the corporate bastards keeping us down" theory. So much stronger and more plausible than the "government can be and has been damned dangerous before in the past, so let's keep it under control" theory, because, of course, proponents of limited government, who also oppose such things as corporate subsidies and government-instituted monopolies and sweetheart deals, are just the mindless tools of Big Money.
If the corporation has such total power over me, it IS a State. :) I don't, and few people do, reject the idea that some government is necessary. Malicious corporations, groups, churches, families, and individuals do need to be restrained from infringing upon the rights of others. However, governments, being usually the repositories of the most weapons and the people willing to use them on other people on command, are inherently more difficult to restrain once they get too dangerous. (Which makes me wonder how you reconcile your love of bloody revolution with the desire to glorify and empower the state so that it can't be rebelled against.) Hence the desire to keep them limited.
(Incidentally, the only way a corporation can take my house against my will here is if the government wants it to do so and forecloses on my house. It's called "Eminent Domain" and happens too damn often. And before you protest that the corporation somehow bullies the government into this evil behavior, governments do the same thing all the time, here, when they want your land for something and you don't like the price they initially offer.)
Re:Not just MS (Score:2)
How would that make your application free? If you're worried about free-as-in-beer, the government leaking your binary would have the same effect. If you're worried about free-as-in-speech, copyright law prevents it from becoming so.
Re:Not just MS (Score:2)
MS France reply now on WIRED (Score:2)
MS seems to interpret the law as requiring that they open source Windows. He almost threatens to stop selling to the French government if the law through.
He says, 'If it was passed as it looks today it might make doing business with public authorities very difficult.'
Though they may be trying to exagerate the impact to build support against the bill.
Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:2)
A) release the secret to an intimate group of 30,000 beaurocrats in order to secure the French account
B) say "screw France" and refuse to comply
France has historically been a hassle to computer companies. First their bizarre (read: non-conformant with European norms) encryption laws, now this. Just how much clout do they think they have here, exactly?
-konstant
Yes! We are all individuals! I'm not!
I'll bet they want the source code in French too.. (Score:2)
Seriously, though, I'm not sure how well this will really work in practice. Just because you have access to source code does not necessarily means that you would ever want to use it. Code written behind closed doors tends to stay that way for a reason (it is usually pretty embarassing.)
It is also interesting to note that in the US any code developed through a federal grant must be released into the public domain.
-p.
do you really think that would deter the NSA? (Score:2)
Consider the NSA "relationship" with Crypto AG, a Swiss company. Just look it up on Google if you're not familiar.
Best regards,
SEAL
Re:sounds interesting (Score:2)
> documentation of all the Windows/Office/IE/VB
> APIs.
Lets not forget Kerberos. Foir Win2k it would mean
that M$ Kerberos (which as we all know only
differs from real kerberos by a tiny bit) would
have to be documented...so non-MS servers could
serve Kerberos Tickets, even to Win2K machines.
Re:Racist? (Score:2)
French Culture is fairly differnt from american
culture. They are related, they have alot in
common, but they are certainly also very differnt.
Tho....the flame was stupid in other ways...
certainly the french DO have McDonnalds (hell
their McDonnalds sells beer even)
Re:Never mind France, what about US? (Score:2)
No software should EVER be considered a security
problem if its released. If they are relying on
the fact that noone knows how the program works
to keep things secure....then they deserve what
they get.
All software they write should be released as
source to the world. They should be relying on
solid math and hardware to be keeping security,
not the obscurity of their algorithms.
By forcing them to release the code, you force
them to not even consider writting code that
relies on its own secrecy.
Besides...with the small exception of immediate
military secrets (like orders to tell troops where
to move) the government shouldn't be allowed to
keep ANY secrets AT ALL. (with the exception of
private data like SSNs, Census data, and of
course their own encryption keys).
Re:The French (Score:2)
> source disclosure) as a good thing. I am highly
> distrustful of governments and giving more power
> to them -- and this is a power grab by the
> government,
Well I am one of those weirdos who thinks
government was one of the "Top 10 worst ideas that
anyone ever had". I think they don't deserve any
trust at all...however...I see this very
differntly.
This is simply a sensible internal policy. They
are not saying "You have to give us the source".
They are simply setting an INTERNAL policy for
their own offices that "We wont use it, if it
doesn't come with source".
I think that governments SHOULD do things like
this, if they want to exist. They should require
even more strict things. They should require
things like "No government agency is allowed to
buy product from a company that makes the product
overseas and gives the workers less wages and
benefits than they could give local workers"
(ie, no sweat shops).
This is simply saying "This is the kind of thing
we want to suport". They are not saying you can't
make closed software, just that "We wont buy it".
I think its one of the few good things I have
ever seen a government do.
Re:When will we stand up for the same? (Score:2)
Practically you've got a long way to go.
I live in a typical .gov installation where there are email attachments rife with .doc, .xls, .ppt extensions that the senders expect to be understood as if they are Standard Formats. Web pages, too, constantly refer to such binary proprietary formats, with the occassional helpful tag that clicking on the link
Not if you don't pay all of your taxes to MS it won't launch Word.
When I try to explain that I can't read their attachment I usually get blank stares, mystified befuddlement, confused silence (they're thinking "Oh! You're computer must be broken just now. It happens to me and My Computer all the time, too!") and attempts to resend the exact same document as if it would be OK after my computer was fixed and rebooted like happens so often to theirs!
Any attempt to explain the difference between formats dictated and hidden by a profit-making corporation and those that are documented in a publicly accessible RFC are usually met with polite impatience.
StarOffice has been some practical help, but it doesn't solve the fundamental problem -- that virtually all of the business of the U. S. Government would cease if their MS licences were to suddenly expire.
Hmmmm... that might not be such a bad idea!.
Government and Open Source Software (Score:2)
Those of us who maintain and administer servers in the IT dept want as much open source as possible because we can go find more accurate answers, more quickly, than we've ever gotten from a private company's tech support, and it works better - (more efficient server processes). The management wants a product with a support contract to feel safe. Also, once they have funding for a development project, it's use it or lose it so if an off-the-shelf product will produce results and time and resources are tight, then that's what is used. So there's kind of a tug-of-war and the fact that people like me come in and get things working and then leave for a better job with less bureaucratic nonsense, doesn't help things.
Then there's the problem of alot of development projects being out-sourced to vendors who are nothing more than 3rd-party proprietary product pimps, (say that 10X fast), although management has recently begun to listen to those of us who support the servers, after much persistence, and are being more stringent about rejecting proposals that do not comply with our current Oracle/Apache/Solaris shop.
So the branch of state government I work for does try to use open source whenever it can and has a tacit understanding that everything is to be developed in such a manner that it can be ported to a different platform if needed so that moving to open source is an option if the time and resources ever become available, but it's not always possible right off the bat.
- tokengeekgrrl
"The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions
Re:Never mind France, what about US? (Score:2)
Re:Never mind France, what about US? (Score:2)
Never mind France, what about US? (Score:2)
As far as US government software is concerned, I think aside from all the classified and confidential software written for the government which would be something akin to 'classified open source' (meaning, the source is completely available within the government to all those with the proper security clearance), all other software such as office productivity applications and OSes that are general purpose and do not contain top-secret algorithms/code should be Open Source. That was a long sentence. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that all government software that is not security-sensitive should be open source. Why? Because I think the government, more than anyone else, would want to know that the software that they use do not have security holes. I'm sure all the software that they use that ARE security sensitive would follow the same open source approach, except that the source is not 'open' to the public.
Does anyone know how the government ensure that the software they use do not have security problems? Or are they so tight on physical and network security that they are not worried about it?
I know that there are many problems with my suggestions above, not the least of which is that Open Source software is often not end-product oriented, but re-packaged with additional software developed by companies to provide the final end-user product. And this is why I thought it would make sense for the government to create its own distro. If they were to develop their own software based on open-source, they'd have to do less work, have more control over what they use, etc.
Does this make sense?
Re:The French (Score:2)
It is not entirely true that the French do not care about government influence in economic affairs. The French government installed shorter work weeks, I believe 35 hours a week instead of 40, and many companies protested saying it would only make it harder for them to make a profit when they have to send people home an hour early.
Personally I would take offense at the government telling me when I had to go home, deep in hack, hitting a Zen state of programming, oh damn it's 2pm, time to go home...pfft!
Almost the Right thing to do (Score:2)
French Lawmakers (Score:2)
France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolish (Score:2)
Essentially, they are starting to treat software manufacturers like equity owners (shareholders).
In France, the rights of a shareholder are minimal. Unlike in the US, where shareholder interests are supreme and codified into the law, France gives very few rights to shareholders - decisions to improve a companies financial health and the wealth of the shareholders take a back seat to worker "rights" to employment, etc.
The result? France attracks little foreign investment, and investors in France do not invest domestically. The capital flows to countries where their property rights are protected (US, UK, Europe).
Thus France suffers from high unemployment and a lack of capital for new business start ups. When is the last time you bought anything that said "Made in France."
Now, they are extending this philosophy - a disregard for property rights - to the area of intellectual property.
The same results will follow with software in France.
It isn't that there is a problem with open source-like schemes. The problem is when the government compels is, no matter how well-intentioned.
Soldier(R)
Re:Never mind France, what about US? (Score:2)
Allow me to muddy the waters again....
At least one government agency has it's own custom distro of RedHat. NIST(Nat. Institute of Standards and Technology). So, it is happening in some corners. Of course, with Clinton running off half-cocked to 'secure' the government with NT machines, anything could happen.
Socialism and Standardization (Score:2)
Standardization is good. Easy and open, sanctioned sharing of information is good. I even believe that socialism can be a better government system than ours if it's executed properly. It's nice to see that France is using its powers for good instead of evil. This will make learning and competing (as much as is possible under socialism) much easier. Maybe this experiment in policy will set a good precedent for other nations.
Instant Crisis
Re:I'll bet they want the source code in French to (Score:3)
Love to.
>I really feel that Open Source code is at least as good as propriety, if not better. It isn't
>allways better, of course, but nearly allways it is.
See, that's the thing. "I really feel." Show me the numbers.
For every buggy proprietary program you want to show as evidence, I can dig up some splinter version of identd or MAME launcher or desktop environment that's as Open Source as the day is long, but still is horribly broken and terribly coded.
Being Open Source doesn't INHERENTLY create quality. It provides the _mechanism_, the _opportunity_ for better code, for all of the reasons we all know and love.
But opening the source to a program doesn't automatically mean it will suddenly get an interested multitude of good developers with excellent coding and communications skills to wrangle out all of the bugs and comment all of the files. That CAN happen, but there's no guarantees that it will.
Being Open Source is good for many things, finding and fixing bugs more easily, keeping programs from being orphanned, creating public libraries of known-good code. But it's still software development like any other software development, and without a dedicated core team of talented engineers, you're not going to make another Apache or Linux kernel just because of your license choice.
Or, to sum up, saying Open Source code is at least as good as proprietary code makes no sense. Open Source code ranges from idiotic to sublime, just like proprietary code. Neither one is 'nearly always' better than the other in any measure that's not purely philosophical.
Sense?
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Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:3)
If I was Helixcode and RedHat I would be taking a long hard look at this and seeing if I could use it to my advantage.
Hey you might be able to talk them into paying for the development of a few chunks of gnome office.
The Cure of the ills of Democracy is more Democracy.
Re:When will we stand up for the same? (Score:3)
Suffice to say, not soon.
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Re:The French (Score:3)
The current situation provide WAY to much power to the corps. The proposed law strengthens the hands of the people and checks the corps. Yes the government is also strengthened, but does it matter in this case? Is it a power grab, or aid to the losing side? I tend toward the latter and say let's take our wins where we can.
The gov may be strengthen in this instance, but it is at the expense of the corps. As individuals, we are fighting a two front war also. If we let either the corps or gov get to strong we lose.
Re:Upshot: don't sell software to FR (Score:3)
By western I meant as far as ideologies go, as opposed to eastern russia/asia ideologies.
I don't think anyone outside France thinks that France is as important as the USA in terms of international clout.
So what, you just take this time to toot your own capitalist horn? That wasn't part of the question, and it's irrelevant.
Not to mention it really stops being a factor once you become a nuclear power. A nuke is a nuke is a nuke. If France really wanted to push for something on the world stage, they could do it. Hell, little shit countries like Korea bully the US constantly for money, why? Because they've got nukes, and enjoy firing test ICBM's over Japan and the US is deathly afraid of the threat of nuclear war.
-- iCEBaLM
This isn't a new idea in the big iron world (Score:3)
Interesting to see this coming down to the micro level.
Nice troll ... (Score:4)
Re:The French (Score:4)
In a french society, there is no inherent visceral distrust of the government nor of the State. In France, there was no magna-carta to inflate the heads of power-hungry people to the point of totally subverting the State to the needs of the few powerful people who have enough wealth to run things as they whish.
In France, whenever the State or the Government thinks it can pull a fast one on the people, the people rebel and promptly overthows the culprit. This does a far more effective job than the labyrinth of byzantine anglo-saxon "checks and balances" that merely insure that only seasoned special interest group lobbyists will be able to steer things their ways in the ensuing political quagmire.
The french people therefore puts a lot of trust in the State, and the State has a therefore much larger role than in anglo-saxon societies. It is also an active economic partner; french people think nothing of having the State running profitable businesses (for one thing, 100% of their profits go back to the State, so that's so much more money that the people will have less to pay in taxes).
Even better, for the french, working for the State is not viewed as a bad thing; in fact, the State skims the best of the best in the schools, and offers free schooling in special schools that turn-out civil servants of exceptionnal ability, competence and talent. Recent French historry is peppered with thousands of such people of very humble extraction that rose to very influential positions, thanks to those State schools, and returned the favour with exceptionnal service to the State, for the benefit of the whole population, not just a few lucky shareholders.
And that's only legitimate: the taxpayers deserve the absolute very best people to work with their tax money.
This systems insure that anybody that has the potential for exceptional service receives the training for it, not just the very few whose fathers can afford college, or those who are lucky enough to brownnose themselves a scholarship.
The State is an emanation of the WHOLE NATION, and therefore it HAS TO WORK FOR THE WHOLE NATION. If it doesn't, that state is overthrown, either forcefully (1789, 1848), or peacefully (1959).
Of course the State has to stay in power!!! There is only one State, and it's disappearance means anarchy. But only something that is legitinate can assume statehood, and it is certainly not the unaccountable private corporations that are so aggressively vying for statehood can be legitimate.
You are incredibly blindfolded by the biggest anglo-saxon collective neurosis: the fear and distrust of the State. You are a perfect example of people being brainwashed by the continuous anti-State propaganda whose only purpose is to shrink the State so much that it will no longer stand in the way of big corporations who want to make the biggest amount of profit at the expense of everyone else.
Now, if there is no more State to make laws that protects you against greedy corporations, what will you do when some corporation decides that it wants your own house?
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Re:France - Well Intentioned, but Typically Foolis (Score:4)
In France, the Government carefully caters to the needs of the people who elect it: the population.
And it is a good thing! This prevents the social structure of the society from crumbling to a state where nobody can expect help from other people, and cannot trust anybody else, including the State (like it currently is in the United States).
French society is a much more balanced society than anglo-saxon societies. The "Economy" may be important, but is is NOT THE ONLY GAME IN TOWN, as one may think by looking at an anglo-saxon society.
So, it is therefore a good thing that shareholders rights are not paramount before the rights of the majority of the population.
After all, that majority of the population are not entrepreneurs nor investors, and they elect a government that has to ensure that the State looks after their best interests.
Last time I checked, France *IS* *IN* *Europe*. And property rights are very well protected in France, as well as human rights are.
Now, what is more important, property rights, or human rights???
But the employers have, by law, to insure better working conditions than in anglo-saxon countries. Workers can work efficiently without having to worry about getting the boot tomorrow, even if they work satisfactorly. Good engineers can stay working as good engineers, without having to think about bailing out and starting their own upstart company, thus wasting the talent of a good engineer turned into a not-so-good administrator. It's not for nothing that Airbus is eating a whole chunk of american aerospace industry!!!! Ever flew in a Caravelle??? Rode in a Citroën DS??? Both (made 40 years ago) STILL run circles around the best american industry can produce TODAY.
The continuous refusal of britain to follow european social and human-right standards when it comes to human/property rights is quite indicative of the primitive state of anglo-saxon societies, where only the most powerful can thrive (at the expense of others), just like in the stone age.
A true display of blatant ignorance, and typical anglo-saxon ethnocentrism; a stauch refusal to consider viewpoints different from one's. France is a country that has been built as much upon intellectual property as "physical" property. It is not for nothing that french Culture is one of the richest in the west; for each Shakespeare, France will boast hundreds of Racine, Montesquieu, Molière, Beaumarchais, Rabelais, Voltaire and whatnot.
How many litterature nobel prizes???
How many science nobel prizes???
Surely such a country cannot blatantly disregard TRUE intellectual property!!!
In the 1960s, France was at the forefront of software developpment. Then the 1970's came along with american computer companies strong-arm tactics. French informaticiens never forgot how they lost their prominence to snake-oil. They had their lesson, and will never be caught at it again.
How about when private concerns compel close-source? Is that better? Will you have the balls to say that it is "well intentioned" towards the public good???
--
Some interesting parts (Score:4)
Q: Does this Law allow the use of Free Software?
A: Yes, all Free Software is compatible with this Law by nature since Free Software source code is public and since all communication standards can be derived from the knowledge of the source code.
Note the use of the words "Free Software" instead of "Open Source Software". They clearly are using "Free" to mean libre, rather than gratis.
Q: Isn't is sufficient to require access to the source code?
A: No, because on the one hand, access to the source granted only to public organisations is not sufficient to guarantee that communication standards used to exchange information with citizens are open communication standards. Moreover, on the other hand, it would be incompatible with private property and competityion [sic] Law to force all software publishers to give public access to the source code.
That's the real kicker. Revealing source code to a third party (as opposed to "Open Source") is not good enough--you need to make your standards open. Also, they don't force anyone to try to totally open their source. RMS is probably cringing here, but this point will go a long way toward making this more acceptable to developers.
France - Filthy Lucre Non, Free Code Oui (Score:4)
Not true. They have a nice 35 hour work week, their productivity is up dramatically due to enforcing it, and they use Linux for all the DSL access to their schools. If you're a Bill G type who wants to get rich on the backs of the people, you won't like them, but most Open Source coders don't have megabucks and aren't in search of them.
In France, the rights of a shareholder are minimal. Unlike in the US, where shareholder interests are supreme and codified into the law, France gives very few rights to shareholders - decisions to improve a companies financial health and the wealth of the shareholders take a back seat to worker "rights" to employment, etc.
And this is bad? I've owned French ADRs and I don't have a problem with the French way of doing things.
The result? France attracks little foreign investment, and investors in France do not invest domestically. The capital flows to countries where their property rights are protected (US, UK, Europe).
That was last century, ma vielle, massive inflows of capital to France are the hallmark of late 1999 and all of 2000. Wake up and smell the cafe au lait!
Thus France suffers from high unemployment and a lack of capital for new business start ups. When is the last time you bought anything that said "Made in France."
Last week, I did. And unemployment is dropping there as capital flows in. Try keeping up if you're going to invest worldwide, ok?
Now, they are extending this philosophy - a disregard for property rights - to the area of intellectual property.
If you mean a requirement that Privacy Rights of Citizens are higher than Property Rights of Companies, of course. And that's a good thing. Why should the EU follow the disasterous example of US Privacy Rights, which give away everything to corporations, including intellectual property that should belong to the people?
The same results will follow with software in France. It isn't that there is a problem with open source-like schemes. The problem is when the government compels is, no matter how well-intentioned.
I doubt it. I'm betting a lot of money that it's not so. And so are a lot of other worldwide investors, who think you're out to lunch on this subject. So, we have to accept a little bureaucracy, so what? At least we have an ordered and equal financial market with educated consumers. Not like Italy or Russia, where bribery is the way of the world.
I can understand why (Score:4)
Good news... NOT (Score:5)
The 17 may 2000, the french will vote for the creation of a "Conseil Supérieur de l'Internet" : Where all french Webmasters need and ID and administrativ authorisation to publish any information on Internet (web, ftp, irc, ...)
French Risk to pay 1200$ and/or 6 month of prison. If they are not autorised to publish information on internet.
More info (in french) at
http://www.article11.net/ [article11.net]
and http://altern.org/defense/vote/ [altern.org]
Re:Viva la France (Score:5)
Actually... (Score:5)
*ducks*
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pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [152.7.41.11].
The French (Score:5)
In the French political tradition the government (== the state) is much more powerful and subject to less checks and balances than in the Anglo-American tradition. I see this as the continuation of the trend: the government is (slyly) trying to increase its power in the Information Age.
One, often useful, view on what's happening treats economic and political life as a huge power game, played by three kinds of players: governments, corporations, and individuals. Recently (second half of the XX century) the governments have been on the losing side -- their power vis-a-vis other players have somewhat declined. Since the first goal of any government is to stay in power, and the second is to grab as much power as it can get away with, this makes government unhappy. Add to this the (yet) unfettered freedom of the 'net and the governments start to look positively worried.
I don't see this (the French government claim to source disclosure) as a good thing. I am highly distrustful of governments and giving more power to them -- and this is a power grab by the government, make no mistake about it -- does not strike me as something to be applauded. I recognize that corporations are not all benevolent either, but I still think that governments are more dangerous.
Kaa
sounds interesting (Score:5)
, Olivier Ezratty, VP of marketing and communication for Microsoft France said that Microsoft was eventually ready to grant some independent technical authority full access to the source code of Microsoft software within government control. Also, Microsoft often makes custom versions of their products for large consulting companies in order to comply with their needs. Eventually, Microsoft is also free to publish a detailed and consistent documentation on its comunication standards so that they become open standards.
Glad to know that Microsoft will not be prohibited from publishing consistent and complete documentation.
But seriously, this sounds like a very good use of government power. I'd hate to see the government get into the business of dictating development techniques (much as I love open source), and this seems like a good way of encouraging open standards without deliberately antagonizing powerful companies like MS.