Re: [aclug-L] Free software and warez

[John Goerzen <jgoerzen@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I've got some comments about your specific situation at the end, so
even if you don't want to wade through the philosophical analysis of
non-free software in the middle, at least read that :-)

(You'd be surprised how much we agree on)

Bob Deep <bobd@xxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:

> John Goerzen wrote:
> > 
> > My personal opinion is that copy-protected
> > software is a bad thing anyway, and that the creation of both
> > copy-protected software and non-free software is unethical.  However,
> > this doesn't mean that copying or cracking this software is
> > necessarily ethical; more on that below.
> 
> I guess the old addage "Two wrongs don't make a right" applies. 
> Although I disagree that protecting intelitctual property is always
> wrong from a moral view, I do agree that breaking the law by copying

I am not stating that I believe that all non-free intellictual
property is bad.  What I am saying is that non-free software is bad.

The reasons are many.  Software is generally an "idea", not a
manufacturing process as patent has been defined.  Imagine what would
happen if people would patent other ideas -- the theory of evolution,
Calculus, or Einstein's laws of relativity.  One would think that
attempting to patent this is silly, and this would be the correct
assumption because there is no way to prevent somebody from thinking
about an idea, and indeed we should not attempt to do so.

RMS has a lot more good articles on patents.  We've seen time and time 
again where software patents hurt people.  The LZW patent, RSA patent
are but two examples.  Today we have news that 8hz, which is making a
free software MP3 encoder, is being threatened by the German holder of 
a patent on an encoding algorithm -- even though a reference
implementation of that very algorithm is in an ISO standard!

But this is only a minor nitpick.

One of the prevelant theories on ethical behavior is the "utilitarian" 
theory.  What this says is that you ought to act in such a way that
you produce the greatest amount of happiness for the greatest number
of people.  (Sometimes, this means that you must cause the least amount 
of unhappiness.)

We can apply utilitarianism to software fairly easily.  Technological
innovation produces better automation, more accuracy, a higher
standard of living, new technologies that can be used to save or
preserve life, and expanding human knowledge.  Clearly technological
innovation causes happiness for people.  Therefore, it is ethical to
encourage innovation and unethical to discourage it.

Non-free software discourages innovation.  This is because one cannot
build upon the steps of those that have come before.  Let's consider a 
simple and obvious example: word processors.

Before Microsoft dominated the market, we had WordPerfect, Word,
WordStar, StarWriter, something from Borland (I forget its name at the 
moment), Ami Pro, and more.  That's 6 programs for DOS/Windows alone.
Each one of these projects had to invest substantial time, energy, and 
resources in writing code that others had already written.  Each one,
for instance, had to supply its own printer drivers.  They all had to
supply their own online help routines.  Each one had to deal with
graphics in the documents in the later versions.  These are just a few 
examples.

Now consider what would have been possible had all those programs been 
free.  All of the time wasted recreating that which others had already 
created could go to new features.  Instead of writing a printing
engine six times, they could add other new features.  Perhaps the
capability to use scalable vector fonts on dot-matrix printers would
have been a reality under DOS 3.3 had people not had to focus on
rewriting an online help system that had already been written by 5
others.

We can visibly see the problems that non-freeness has caused for word
processors in the PC market by comparing them to LaTeX/LyX under
Linux.  LaTeX/LyX automate things to such a great extent that MS Word
looks like a typewritter next to it.  WordPerfect doesn't fare much
better.  And yet LaTeX/LyX is being developed by people with far
smaller resources than the likes of Microsoft.

Why is this?  Because they did not have to reinvent the wheel.  LyX
did not have to write an entire text processing system -- they could
build on top of the preexisting LaTeX system and improve it.
Similarly, LaTeX people can borrow algorithms from its free
predecessors such as *roff.

> property that is protected is wrong.  The two issues are not directly
> related.

I cannot necessarily equate the law with morality.  We see many cases
where the law does not equal morality.  The punishment for slaves
escaping from oppressive conditions last century is one good example.
Repression and executions for political speech in modern China is
another.  Simply because the law is laid down does not mean that it is 
morally justifyable, and indeed, if we cease to question and analyze
the laws, then society fails to progress -- after all, lawmaking is
often the amendment of previously-enacted laws.  For instance, we have 
the much-touted tax reform this year that claims to fix previous legal 
mistakes.

That sad, one can make a convincing argument that it is wrong to copy
non-free software, not because we've violated anyone's "rights" but
because it encourages the spread of the unethical non-free paradigm.

> > Warez (or copying of commercial software) is a current hot topic in
> > the free software community.  Most free software advocates such as
> > myself view it as unethical to make proprietary software with a
> > copyright that does not give out source and prevents the end user from
> > utilizing the software fully or finding out how it works.  We can
> > discuss exactly why this is unethical if you want -- suffice it to say
> > that a very convincing argument can be made for it in most mainstream
> > ethical doctrines.  
> 
> I beleive that you can construct such an argument, but it still does not
> change the facts.  Copying commercial software in the US is illegal, and
> thus un-ethical from the start.  The "ends do NOT justifiy the means"

I cannot understand how one can make the leap from being illegal to
being unethical.  Can you elaborate please?

(Remember, at one time it was illegal for any women or men not owning
land to vote.  Was it therefore unethical for women to be able to vote 
simply because it was illegal?  I would say no -- it was unethical to
prevent women from voting.)

> and in this case could land you in court, fined and servering jail
> time.  Not that Micro$oft is going to drag you into court for copying
> that 98 CD for your buddy (But they would take notice if you started
> distributing their software from an FTP site or something, even if for
> free...)  

I am not advocating that people copy commercial software they can.
Indeed it can lead to unpleasant consequences, which certainly do not
maximize one's own happiness.  If these actions are prevelant enough,
they lead to the spread of non-free software, which minimizes MY
happiness -- so at that point, I care.

> > Given this, some free software advocates see
> > nothing unethical about violating the overly-restrictive license that
> > should not have been imposed in the first place.  
> 
> Again... Two wrongs don't make a right.  It is up to the owner of the

Note here that I said "some" and not necessarily myself.

> software to license it as they see fit and leverage their property for
> personal gain.  This is a fundamental right in the United States, milage

I have no problem with people selling software for whatever price they 
see fit.  The Free Software Foundation, for instance, does just that
-- they sell CDs of GCC for $100 or more, if I remember correctly.
People get rich off of their free software creations -- there are
numerous examples -- L. Peter Deutsch (creater of Ghostscript) is but
one good example.  This is not the problem.  

The problem is that, by threatening monetary or personal harm,
non-free licenses restrict the ability of others to expand and enhance 
pre-existing work without reinventing it.

When somebody makes an innovation that could benefit humanity -- let's 
say a new way to more highly automate the monitoring and control of
airplanes in the skies -- they do a disservice to humanity if they
restrict it from future enhancement by others.

There are several reasons for this.

1. There is a loss of the ability of peer review.  Your program may
   save or lose tens of thousands of lives.  You better be darn sure
   it works right and doesn't crash.  This means that you want as many
   people as possible to critically review it, looking for mistakes.
   Security by obscurity is no security at all -- a lesson that
   we see Microsoft failing to learn time and time again.  If there is
   one nasty bug that occurs on specific occasions, maybe one person
   may not see it.  Maybe ten people wouldn't notice it.  Maybe not
   even 50.  But if five thousand people from across the globe
   look at the software trying to find mistakes, your chances of
   finding obscure bugs are dramatically enhanced.  BUGTRAQ
   demonstrates this eloquently.

2. There is a loss of the ability for future enhancement.  We are
   at the mercy of the original authors for any possible future
   enhancements.  Imagine if we required Einstein's permission to
   analyze his Theories and make derivitaves -- this would severly
   hamper the progress of physics for decades if not centuries to
   come.  Similarly, we see in Netscape 5 that is free software how
   many new features are being added, whereas the Internet Explorer's
   feature set is languishing.  Why?  Because we have the freedom
   to improve Netscape as we see fit, but not to do the same for IE.
   The same holds true for Linux itself compared to NT.  Linux has had
   for years -- since early betas -- features that NT 5 will still not
   have, and stability that is still unmatched by any Microsoft
   offering (and will probably remain unmathed for the forseeable
   future).  The reason is that anybody can help Linux by adding
   features, creating a net benefit for Linux.

> at your house may vary should you live in another country.  Copying
> software is a violation of someone else's rights.  I may choose to

I say that restricting software is (in most cases) a violation of
EVERYONE else's rights.  There are a few cases where one could justify 
keeping software source secret, generally relating to certain
highly-sensitive national security projects, for instance.

> release my software as "open source" for free or with restrictive
> licenses for a fee, it is my choice and my responsibility to decide what
> is the best use for my software.

The crux of the issue is: what are we supposed to do when software
authorse make an unwise choice and choose to hamper technological
innovation by unwisely and unethically refusing to release source to
their products, since current law places the responsibility on them?

> If I dream up some massivly useful software tool that everybody wants
> (yea right!) then I have the right to sell it or not, allow you to use
> it, or not.  I may do the right thing and give it away, source and all,

Another good question is whether or not it is good to give arbitrary
software developers the right to make their software non-free or
obtain patents on it.  At one time, they did not do this and they
could not be granted patents.

(I better watch it or else I will open up so many cans of worms that I 
will spend hours replying to the next reply to this reply <g>)

> or sell it to Micro$oft for a few million dollars...After all, it's mine
> to start with.

Indeed it is yours, and if you want to sell it for millions, who am I
to complain?  Since it is presumably under the GPL (since you are an
ethical guy, right? <g>), it does not restrict my ability to enhance
it.

Further, it is interesting to see what Microsoft has killed by buying
up comanies and killing them off.  It is trying to do this with
RealAudio.  They've killed off DR by using dblspace/drvspace in
violation of Stac's patent (as a jury determined later).  But one can
never kill free software!  Ever!  Because GPL'd software will always
remain free by virtue of its license.

> do it) to the Linux community.  For me it's cheeper than paying the $20
> for the needed driver, and a whole lot more fun. (Yea I'm one of those
> kernel hacker types, although I'm just getting started with Linux...).  

One hint: if you hack the ext2fs code, make backups first.  I learned
the hard way -- twice.  :-)

> I have other projects brewing in the back of my mind that my have wider
> appeal and may actually be "worth something" in a corprate world.  These
> may or may not be released to the linux community for free.  I may

Also keep in mind that it is possible to release a single piece of
software that you hold the copyright to under multiple licenses
concurrently.  This is Netscape's plan.  Due to restrictive Java
licenses, they cannot release the OpenSource version with Java in it,
but they can release such a version in a more traditional Netscape
license.  L. Peter Deutsch releases a commercial GhostScript under a
commercial style of license and a GPL'd version of a slightly older
program under an older license.  There are occasionally small
grumblings, but on the whole, this sort of thing is accepted.

This is one area where the free software community is in
disagreement.  On the one side, Eric S. Raymond sees no problems with
people initially marketing something as non-free software in order to
recover corporate development costs faster than they could if released 
as free software initially -- so long as they free it as soon as
possible (even if they continue charging for the boxed version).  This 
makes sense, for instance, for games where there is a lot of
development going on beforehand and the initial wave of purchasing
frenzy could repay that quickly.  Also note that even if the source
for something is free, your average Joe Smith from Anytown, USA
shopping at the local CompUSA store will never know the difference --
it's the same price as everything else on the shelf and probably has
an attractive box, after all.

Richard M. Stallman, on the other hand, asserts that any kind of
non-free release (excepting concurrent free release) is unethical as
well.  I don't recall his exact argument at the moment, but I would
assume it would be something along the lines that slowing
technological progress is unethical as well.

> choose the triditional license/copywrite and perhaps patented approachs
> but it will be my choice.  I may decide that making things free under
> the GPL is what I want to do, but it remains my choice.  I may choose
> the wrong path in your mind, but that does not give anybody the right to
> steal my work just because they will not (or perhaps cannot) pay for it.

This is perhaps a sticky area.  When one talks about "warez", one
generally means copying the binaries of something like Windows 98.

Free software people couldn't care less about that.  Because to us,
binaries are meaningless (unless somebody writes a really nice
decompiler!)  What we need is the source in order to insure
technological innovation.  Solely stealing the binaries could well be
argued to be unethical, probably successfully.

When we are talking about source, the reality is that even if your
program is non-free, the need for technological advancement is so
great that it is realized that reinventing the wheel hampers
development so much that the very existance of a company can be called 
into question.  Consider, for instance the various lawsuits about
corporate spies, who have stolen code from one company and given it to 
another.  Companies routinely run disassemblers on other's products
even if forbidden to do so by the license.  Microsoft has been accused 
of planting bugs and stealing Stac's code.  Stac has been accused of
stealing Microsoft's code.  

So we see that the need to avoid reinventing the wheel is so great
that the major non-free players ignore the law and treat the software
as free anyway.  Therefore, one could argue that a major new
advancement, if released in a non-free fashion, could hurt you in the
long run because others will copy the technology without giving you
attribution.

GPL ensures that you retain copyright -- and there's no easier way to
assert your ownership of code than to have it pressed on hundreds of
thousands of CDs around the world.

GPL also ensures that you can build on the work of other free
software, and others can build on your free software, while you
continue to hold the copyright on your own creations.

> We can debate the pros and cons of the GPL and open source in general,
> but we cannot advocate the violation of another's rights to protect
> their property through restrictive licenses and fees.  It is a much

I am not advocating breaking the law here.

At the same time, I feel that Microsoft and the like have violated my
rights by preventing others from building on and improving their
products, for instance.  They are so paranoid that they do not, and
have not for years, release a complete API spec, so developers of
Windows emulators such as WINE have a terrible time making things work 
right.

> better solution to help in the development of a free replacement for
> that neat program you want to use than just making a copy. Why?

And indeed this is viewed as the best possible action by the free
software community.  We have multiple examples:

 * GTK replaces the non-free Motif, xforms, and Qt
 * GIMP replaces the non-free Photoshop
 * Linux replaces the non-free SCO, BSDi, Windows, etc.
 * WindowMaker, Enlightenment, and Gnome replace the non-free CDE
 * Various efforts will soon replace the non-free (commercial) OSS
 * Replacements for non-free office suites are maturing.

> 
>       1.  It's leagal
>       2.  It's Ethical
>       3.  You would be making a contribution,
>       4.  You would likely learn something in the process.
> 
> The open source community should stress "Help us build a better version
> to replace the expensive one" and activtly discurage the "It's wrong to
> restrict software, so just copy it anyway".  Free software for the

I agree 100%.  As I've said before, copying non-free software does not 
help the free software movement -- it hurts us.  Therefore, perhaps we 
arrive at the same conclusion for but radically different reasons!

> masses is a great goal, but we must advocate leagal means to obtain our
> goal.  The open source community has a great ability to produce quality
> software for free.  We must do just that and do it the *right* way or be
> tossed aside like so many punch cards.

Yes.

> In the mean time, we can (and should) advocate the use of as many free
> solutions as we can, provide access to these solutions, privide as much
> technical support for the users with questions as we can and improve
> what's available as much as we can.  I mean, why use Crisp when we have
> Xemacs?  Who wants Internet Explorer when Netscape is free? But we

Cool, more examples :-)

> should also PAY for the solutions we require but cannot find for free. 

Zealots like RMS disagree with that.  I have mixed feelings.  I own a
perfectly legal copy of Mathematica for Linux that I purchased
directly from Wolfram Research.  There is not yet an adequate free
replacement for it, and I do not have enough mathematical knowledge to 
even begin to be of assistance on such a thing.  I feel bad about
supporting a non-free paradigm, and perhaps in retrospect, I should
not have purchased it and lived without Mathematica.  I don't have the 
answer to that question right now.  I haven't thought through whether
or not it would be unethical, for instance, to purchase WordPerfect
for Linux or Mathematica for Linux.  Give me a few days to do some
research and maybe I'll have an opinion :-)

> It is the ethical, leagal and right thing to do, even if the owners of
> these tools are moraly wrong in our own eyes.

It certainly is legal.  I'm not sure if supporting the non-free
paradigm is good or not -- perhaps it depends on the company.  Corel,
for instance, has used revenues from some non-free products to produce 
a free port of Linux to the ARM processor -- a very valuable
contribution to Linux.  Companies like SCO and Microsoft do not assist 
the free software community in any [financial] way.  Should we feel as 
worse about purchasing something from them than from Corel?  My gut
feeling is "Yes", but I haven't thought this one through either.  Lots 
of new things to think about, so little time :-(

> My $.02 worth at least.

I'd say at least $.03, considering the length and depth of these
discussions :-)

Very interesting.  As you can tell, this is one of my favorite topics :-)

I think this is the first 400-line post to ACLUG-L <g>.  Good.  It's
exciting to have such thoughtful people on the list!

Somebody want to reply to this message and go for 800 lines? :-)

-- 
John Goerzen   Linux, Unix consulting & programming   jgoerzen@xxxxxxxxxxxx |
Developer, Debian GNU/Linux (Free powerful OS upgrade)       www.debian.org |
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