Law

Creative Commons plaintext licenses and using CC0 for software

Creative Commons posted two pieces to their blog today regarding their licenses, and in particular, CC0, the Creative Commons public domain notice.

Plaintext versions of Creative Commons licenses

The Creative Commons licenses are now available in plaintext form: » Read more

0 CommentsPosted 15 Apr 2011 by Ruth Suehle (Red Hat)

Patent reform bills with little reform

In my March 2 post on patent reform, I noted that many of the provisions offered in prior versions of patent reform bills were removed from the pending bill. On March 8, the Senate passed S. 23, now called the “America Invents Act” 95-5. As one might guess, any legislation passed with such unanimity must present little controversy. Such is the case here, as the bill was further stripped before passage, leaving little reform to match the hype with which it was passed. » Read more

0 CommentsPosted 11 Apr 2011 by Erick Robinson

The threat of parallel filing

The threat from software patent trolls arises not from an invisible distant origin, but actually from within open source communities. So that's the best place to eradicate it. » Read more

1 CommentPosted 16 Mar 2011 by Simon Phipps

Myths and patent reform

Yesterday a patent reform bill passed in the Senate, but the sound and fury don't seem to signify much. The legislation as it evolved has shed most of the features that could have been controversial, or could have significantly improved the current patent system. The press around this legislation, and most recently the New York Times, continues to perpetuate ancient myths of innovation. » Read more

7 CommentsPosted 9 Mar 2011 by Rob Tiller (Red Hat)

Emergency ignored: Current status of the Patent Reform Act

Congress has been considering some form of patent reform for several years now, beginning with the Patent Reform Act of 2005. Once again, patent reform in is the air, as the Patent Reform Act of 2011 (the "PRA") has been approved by the Senate Judiciary Committee and is scheduled to be debated by the full Senate this week. Although full reform of the U.S. patent system is needed for many reasons, the PRA has been watered down to a point that minimizes its usefulness. A thorough discussion of the need for patent reform is left for another day. This article provides a short overview of main provisions of the PRA and concludes by noting some potentially useful provisions in earlier versions of the bill that have been left out of the PRA. » Read more

5 CommentsPosted 2 Mar 2011 by Erick Robinson

Open source procurement: Copyrights

As I wrote previously concerning indemnity, I constantly encounter both governments and companies claiming they have policies permitting or even favouring open source software. Yet there's still a huge amount of proprietary software being procured by them. » Read more

0 CommentsPosted 21 Feb 2011 by Simon Phipps

Open source procurement: Indemnity

All over the world, I encounter both governments and companies claiming they have a policy permitting or even favouring open source software--indeed, the new President of Brazil just issued a decree on that subject. Yet when you actually look at what they are doing, you find that there's still a huge amount of proprietary software being procured.
» Read more

3 CommentsPosted 15 Feb 2011 by Simon Phipps

A possible game changer for invalidating bad software patents

A case now before the Supreme Court could lower the threat level created by bad patents in a meaningful way. The issue before the Court is whether to change the burden of proof on patent invalidity from clear-and-convincing evidence to the preponderance standard. This change would be good for free and open source software. » Read more

25 CommentsPosted 3 Feb 2011 by Rob Tiller (Red Hat)

Reflections on one year of opensource.com

A year ago today, we turned on the lights at opensource.com.

Our hope a year ago was to create a place where people could gather to learn about and contribute to the growing movement toward applying open source principles beyond the software industry.

You have shared your stories about how open source principles are changing your world and the world around us. » Read more

10 CommentsPosted 25 Jan 2011 by Jim Whitehurst (Red Hat)

Request your limited edition opensource.com anniversary t-shirt today

They're all gone! Thanks to everyone who requested a shirt. For those of you who didn't get one, you've still got a chance through our Twitter giveaway.

Tomorrow’s the first anniversary of opensource.com, and it’s been a fantastic year, thanks to you. Whether it’s by writing articles or reading them and sharing the stories, you helped us highlight nearly 550 ways open source touches our businesses, education systems, governments, laws, and lives.

In celebration of this milestone, we're giving away special edition one-year anniversary t-shirts to registered members who » Read more

67 CommentsPosted 24 Jan 2011 by opensource.com Admin (Red Hat)