Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

Ubuntu Software Center is Mixing Proprietary and Free Software in a Dangerous Way

posted by n1 on Monday June 08 2015, @03:16AM   Printer-friendly
from the mix-and-match dept.

tonymercmobily writes:

I have been watching the evolution of the Ubuntu Software Center for quite a while now. I had doubts about its interface and its speed, but I liked the fact that it offered an easy, down-to-earth interface that allowed users to install software easily. However, I have to say that the way the Ubuntu Software Center has evolved is worrying me -- a lot. I am not against the idea of selling software. What I am against, is confusing proprietary software with non-proprietary software, The Ubuntu Software Center seems to be doing just that.

[ Editor's Note: The submission appears to have come directly from the author of the original article. ]
Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Ubuntu Software Center is Mixing Proprietary and Free Software in a Dangerous Way | Log In/Create an Account | Top | 49 comments | Search Discussion
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.

  • (Score: 3, Informative) by turgid on Monday June 08 2015, @07:40PM

    by turgid (4318) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 08 2015, @07:40PM (#193781) Journal

    Sorry I couldn't reply earlier, so I modded it flamebait, because I believe that's what it truly is. It's an impertinent question and disingenuous. In recent months and years these discussion forums seem to have been over-run by anti-GPL FUD and pro-BSD platitudes. Call it a conspiracy theory, but it might be that Apple, Microsoft, Google, Oracle and friends and having a paid troll/astroturfing campaign. Heck, I wouldn't be surprised if the Putinbots were in on it too.

    This sort of question smacks of willful ignorance, and it was discussed to death 20 years ago when Linux became very popular all of a sudden. You'd think with the popularity of FOSS these days most people would have a basic understanding.

    The FSF's web site, wikipedia and the OSI explain this clearly, at length and unambiguously.

    Looking further up this discussion there are all sorts of idiotic questions about licenses that are just plain insulting, like, "If I make modifications to a project under the GPL and redistribute it, can I redistribute it under a different licence?" Hell no, it's right there in the GPL, and you are supposed to state that in a comment block at the top of your source files.

    Let me give you an example (of the LGPL, the one that lets you write a Free library to be used by Closed applications by dynamic linking) from one of my own sources (the name has been changed to prevent embarrassment):

    /* frobnicator.h
      * This file is part of frobnicator
      *
      *  frobnicator is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it
      *  under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published
      *  by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
      *  (at your option) any later version.
      *
      *  frobnicator is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT
      *  ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or
      *  FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU Lesser General Public
      *  License for more details.
      *
      *  You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public
      *  License along with frobnicator; if not, write to the Free Software
      *  Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111-1307
      *  USA
      */

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +1  
       Informative=1, Total=1
    Extra 'Informative' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  
    Total Score:   3  

  • (Score: 2) by jasassin on Monday June 08 2015, @10:16PM

    by jasassin (3566) <jasassin@gmail.com> on Monday June 08 2015, @10:16PM (#193839) Homepage Journal

    I'm sorry also. Sorry I asked the question and got treated like an asshole. No I'm not sorry. Fuck you.

    --
    jasassin@gmail.com GPG Key ID: 0xE6462C68A9A3DB5A

  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 09 2015, @09:02AM

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 09 2015, @09:02AM (#194017)
    were you looking for the "so stupid it hurts" mod option instead? It's sometimes very hard to tell the difference between a slightly annoying naivete and acting dumb for kicks (= either troll or flamebait).