orbitor writes to tell us InfoWorld's Neil McAllister is calling into question some of the recent decisions by the Free Software Foundation. From the article: "All the more reason to be disappointed by the FSF's recent, regrettable spiral into misplaced neo-political activism, far removed from its own stated first principles. In particular, the FSF's moralistic opposition to DRM (digital rights management) technologies, which first manifested itself in early drafts of Version 3 of the GPL (Gnu General Public License), seems now to have been elevated to the point of evangelical dogma."

Andy Updegrove writes "Before there was Linux, before there was open source, there was of course (and still is) an operating system called Unix that was robust, stable and widely admired. It was also available under license to anyone that wanted to use it, and partly for that reason many variants grew up and lost interoperability - and the Unix wars began. Those wars helped Microsoft displace Unix with Windows NT, which steadily gained market share until Linux, a Unix clone, in turn began to supplant NT. Unfortunately, one of the very things that makes Linux powerful also makes it vulnerable to the same type of fragmentation that helped to doom Unix - the open source licenses under which Linux distributions are created and made available. Happily, there is a remedy to avoid the end that befell Unix, and that remedy is open standards - specifically, the Linux Standards Base (LSB). The LSB is now an ISO/IEC standard, and was created by the Free Standards Group. In a recent interview, the FSG's Executive Director, Jim Zemlin, and CTO, Ian Murdock, creator of Debian GNU/Linux, tell how the FSG works collaboratively with the open source community to support the continued progress of Linux and other key open source software, and ensure that end users do not suffer the same type of lock in that traps licensees of proprietary software products."

Joe Barr writes "NewsForge is carrying a story by Richard Stallman which blasts Sun's recent Java move, claiming it is deceptive and self-serving, makes Java neither free nor even open source, and leaves him wondering why it has attracted so much attention."

Enterprise OpenSource Magazine is reporting that Daniel Wallace's second Anti-GPL lawsuit has gone down in flames. From the (short) article: "The judge wrote that 'Antitrust laws are for 'the protection of competition, not competitors.' In this case, the GPL benefits consumers by allowing for the distribution of software at no cost, other than the cost of the media on which the software is distributed. 'When the plaintiff is a poor champion of consumers, a court must be especially careful not to grant relief that may undercut the proper function of antitrust.' Because he has not identified an anticompetitive effect, Wallace has failed to allege a cognizable antitrust injury.'"

twofish writes "According to a Register article Sun Microsystems' new GNU/Linux-friendly Java license does not go far enough for Red Hat. Brian Stevens, Red Hat CTO, says Sun should have open-sourced Java instead. The new license does have the support of Canonical (main Ubuntu sponsor), Gentoo and Debian." From the article: "He says the failure to open-source Java means that it can't be used on millions of $100, Linux-powered PCs envisioned under Nicholas Negroponte's One Laptop Per Child project, to bring affordable computing to children in developing nations. Negroponte wants only open source software on the machines, according to Red Hat, which is a member of the project."

illogict writes "Among with their new A1200 GNU/Linux-based mobile phone, Motorola unveiled yesterday its new community-based development platform, http://open source.motorola.com. It is primarily aimed at developers who are willing to contribute to Motorola's GNU/Linux-based mobile phones, either directly on firmware, or creating programs (native or Java) who are aimed to work on those phones. It currently features phone kernels, SD-TransFlash card reader drivers, Java MIDP3.0 draft. Such commitment on open source-development could be seen as a good step, and may show the way to other companies."

UltimaGuy writes "Sports stars, musicians, and other celebrities have been charging for autographs for years, but who would have thought Richard Stallman would be doing the same? Is this just for fun, or a clever, highly effective protest? Hackers, geeks and nerds gathered together at the 7th FISL - Internacional Free Software Forum, in Porto Alegre (Brazil) last week, were astounded when they got word that Richard Stallman, the founding father of the Free Software Foundation and creator of the GPL, was charging R$ 10 (about US$ 3) for an autograph and R$ 5 (less than US$ 2) to get his picture taken by free software enthusiasts at the event floor."

Linux.com (Also owned by VA) is taking a look at the once widely popular office suite, ApplixWare. From the article: "Passed to a subsidiary of Applix called VistaSource that later became independent, ApplixWare was repositioned as a combination of a basic office package and a developer's toolkit running from a common main menu. For a while, it was even renamed AnyWare. Now at version 6, ApplixWare is back to its original name, with versions available for AIX, GNU/Linux, and SPARC Solaris, with earlier versions still supported for Windows and FreeBSD. The trial download for GNU/Linux shows ApplixWare's age, but it also shows a trick or two that its newer rivals might learn from."

Howard writes "All about Linux has posted a Mind Map of GNU/Linux distributions. This map of GNU/Linux hopes to throw light on the current GNU/Linux distributions and their relationships with each other. Though the map doesn't show the historically significant but now redundant distros like SLS, Yggdrasil and the erstwhile Red Hat, it shows many of the more prominent GNU/Linux distributions."

bcrowell writes "The New York Times reports that textbook publishers are backing off somewhat on the level of DRM used in the electronic editions of their textbooks. They no longer become unreadable after a certain amount of time, as in RMS's famous essay The Right to Read. Even so, most students aren't interested, because the books can't be sold back; the solution, however, may be to make it impossible to return printed books either. No mention in the NYT article of the steady progress being made by free books."

An anonymous reader writes "All About Linux is running a transcript of a recent talk given by Richard Stallman at the Australian National University. Stallman discussed various issues facing GNU like the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, Digital Rights Management, about why one should not install sun's java on your computer, his views on Opensource as well as why he thinks people should address Linux distribution as GNU/Linux."

Roblimo writes "Linus Torvalds and his bosses at OSDL have finally realized that the biggest problem getting businesses to adopt GNU/Linux is that most FOSS programmers wear sandals and have ponytails. They've teamed up to offer style tips for the IT set. NewsForge Reports on comments from OSDL CEO Stuart Cohen, saying that if OSDSU works as planned, the open source community 'can be as successful at delivering new products, bug-free and on time, as Microsoft is doing with Vista.'" NewsForge is part of the OSTG family, along with Slashdot.

LNXPhreak writes "A new article on OSWeekly.com discusses secure programming in GPU/Linux systems in terms of programming talent and requirements. Quote: "A "secure program" is an application that sits on a security boundary, taking input from a source that does not have the same access rights as the program. Such programs include application programs used as viewers of remote data, web applications (including CGI scripts), network servers, and setuid/setgid programs."

Andy Updegrove writes "In the last several days there have been several stories in the news that highlight the increasing tension between ownership of intellectual property rights (IPR) and the opportunities that become available when broader, free access to those rights is made available. The three articles that struck me as best proving this point were the announcement by Sun Microsystems that it had released the design for its new UltraSPARC processor under the GNU GPL, a speech by Tim Berners-Lee to an Oxford University audience in which he challenged the British government to make Ordnance Survey mapping data available at no cost for Web use, and reports that a Dutch court had upheld the validity of the Creative Commons license. Each of these stories demonstrates a breach in traditional thinking about the balance of value to an IPR owner between licensing those rights for profit, or making those same rights freely and publicly available. They also raise the question: where - if anywhere - are the natural boundaries for 'open IPR?'."

Slashback tonight brings some corrections, clarifications, and updates to previous Slashdot stories, including a response from Mandriva's CEO, Apple responds to French DRM legislation, Microsoft possibly undermining ODF ISO approval, a more in-depth look at Fedora Core 5, more thoughts on the GPLv3, and Britannica strikes back at Wikipedia -- Read on for details.

Demonfly writes to tell us that Solar Designer, who some would argue is one of the more respected security experts on the net, took the time to answer a few questions about the future of Openwall, the security enhanced GNU/Linux distro. From the interview: "There's real demand specifically for security-enhanced Linux systems. Linux is widespread, it has good hardware support, there's a lot of software available for it (including some commercial packages), and there are system administrators with specific Linux skills. Of course, OpenBSD and other *BSDs have their user bases, too - and people are working on the security of those systems. No, Linux (the kernel) is not a better choice than *BSDs security-wise. But it is not substantially worse either."

Otter writes "Mandrake Linux founder Gael Duval has confirmed that Mandriva has let him go." A few hours later, Newsforge (owned by the same company that owns Slashdot) did an exclusive IRC interview with Gael in which he said he plans to sue his former employer for "abusive layoff." This is a sad day for Mandriva -- and for GNU/Linux in general. Gael was the founder and heart of the original Mandrake (now Mandriva) project, which was the first Linux distribution designed to be easy for non-technical users to install and administer. There is plenty of consternation in the Mandriva Club Forums about whether the company will go on supporting individual desktop users as strongly as it has in the past.

Goran Gugic writes "On a recent visit to Croatia Richard Stallman gave two speeches which are now available as podcasts: 'Dangers of Software Patents' (OGG, 80MB, 132') and 'GNU Movement, Free Software and the Future of Freedom' (OGG, 65MB, 110'). The files can be found in the podcast section (site in Croatian). A higher-bandwidth mirror is also available"

Anonymous Coward writes "eWeek is reporting that The Software Freedom Law Center has published a white paper that dismisses recent publications from embedded systems seller Wasabi Systems. Wasabi recently released statements focusing on alleged GNU General Public License violations in relation to the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002. The white paper, titled "Sarbanes-Oxley and the GPL: No Special Risk," essentially counsels users of the free software license that they have no need to worry."

nanday writes to tell us that Newsforge (Owned by VA Software, just like Slashdot) is running an interesting look at the, recently reported on, GPLv3 by the Debian team. From the article: "Initially, Branden Robinson says, he was worried about GPL3. 'The amount of secrecy around the initial draft process had me very nervous,' he says. In addition, after the Debian consensus rejected the GNU Free Documentation License, he was concerned that GPL3 might become equally contentious in Debian. 'I'm glad to say that my fears are assuaged,' Robinson says. 'I was impressed with both the large and small changes. In a nutshell, I like it.'"