NNSquad - Network Neutrality Squad
[ NNSquad ] Re: Android Is Open? That's A "Farce, " Says Facebook Developer Joe Hewitt
On 10/20/2010 08:47 PM, Lauren Weinstein wrote:
Android Is Open? That's A "Farce," Says Facebook Developer Joe Hewitt http://bit.ly/axec7P (Business Insider) - - - Android sure meets the definition of "Open" for me. Let's look at the first line of Wikipedia's definition for Open Source: Open source describes practices in production and development that promote access to the end product's source materials. Android clearly falls into this definition -- anyone can compile their own Android kernel. His claim seems pretty shallow since anyone could fork off new instances if its so important with tight iterations. I run the cyanogenmod of android btw... I find this description more to the point of open in the same wikipage: "Open source software is software whose source code is published and made available to the public, enabling anyone to copy, modify and redistribute the source code without paying royalties or fees." Fees and royalties are quite troubling for android as open source. More and more companies settle with patent holders such as MS or Acacia effectively restricting who can publish or use the code. Software patents often also claim "record on a carrier" or publishing. A patent infringement case against kernel.org could spell death for lots of open source distributions. Lets hope that "abstract ideas" at USPTO will cover publishing code. At least for me, information seems to be the most abstract thing. /jonas bosson |