Forbes on Richard Stallman.

posted by Solveig Singleton @ 3:37 PM | Free Culture Movement , Security

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On the anticommons:

Heller and Rebecca Eisenberg [postulated], chiefly with pharmaceuticals, that large numbers of patents, each covering a small fraction of the intellectual terrain, could lead to an IP anticommons. Each patent holder, they speculated, would demand a king's ransom for the use of its drugs or research tools--chemicals, genes, probles and the like--until we replicated the unhappy situation found in the former Soviet Union...

The one detailed study of the pharmaceutical industry found that business ingenuity overcame any supposed patent blockade. To avoid paralysis, researchers in industry and universities adopted strategies of "licensing, inventing around patents, going offshore, the development and use of public databases and research tools, court challenges, and simply using the technology without a license (i.e. infringement)." That result is more consistent with economic theory than the Heller-Eisenberg supposition, once we recall that Soviet bureaucrats and American entrepreneurs face radically different incentives. The bureacrat gains power and receives bribes or favors by holding up valuable private activities. But a patent is a wasting asset. Any patentee who hunkers down will watch its wealth melt away day by day. Businesses, in contrast, only make money by cutting deals that put the patent to work.

on open source licensing as a solution to the anticommons:

One ongoing question is how well open source stacks up against traditional proprietary software. Much depends on the scale of the enterprise. The decentralized methods for open source work well with small systems, but are difficult to maintain as the network expands--a problem that any proprietary system also faces in integrating backwards to existing products while introducing new products. In addition, loose cooperatives must organize to fend off outsiders claiming that the entire system incorporates their trade secrets or IP. The present SCO litigation, for example, puts the entire Linux system at risk on these grounds, prompting the formation of a litigation committee to coordinate the common defense. Right now at the heart of the movement lies a commercial joint venture spearheaded by well-established firms like IBM, Intel, and Hewlett-Packard, which develop service and proprietary programs that operate on top of an open source infrastructure. The new development gives ample testimony that no loose assemblage of voluntary contributors will be able to carry the day any longer.

Ultimately, however, the central issue is not whether this prediction proves right or wrong. Rather, it is to let the process run its course without state interference... Government should remain neutral between competing forms of ownership and competing software licensing models, by not setting up impediments or preferences either way. The first of these should be designed to allow different systems to both compete and cooperate within a common framework, and thus requires the implementation of interoperability among rival systems under some umbrella standards. [SS note: I confess I do not understand this last bit.]. The second of these should govern the procurement policies of government agencies . . . [which] need to take into account the total cost in both acquiring and maintaining a system, in light of its reliability, vendor support, ease of use, security, warranties for use, and indemnities against intellectual property claims.

posted by Solveig Singleton @ 12:32 PM | Academia , Big Tent , Liberty and IP , Security , Software

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Microsoft GC Brad Smith spoke yesterday at an Internet Caucus lunch, on Protecting Consumers and the Marketplace: The Need for Federal Privacy Legislation. Text here; video here. Press release here. Money quote:

Microsoft Corp. today announced its support for a comprehensive legislative approach at the federal level on the issue of data privacy. In a speech delivered to the Congressional Internet Caucus, Brad Smith, senior vice president and general counsel for Microsoft, told Caucus members that “the time has come” for a strong national standard for privacy protection that will benefit consumers and set clear guidelines for businesses while still allowing commerce to flourish.

posted by James DeLong @ 4:34 PM | Security

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Internet News reports Linus Torvalds' thoughts on Linux security. Some of them:

"I think kernel bugs should be fixed as soon as humanly possible, and any delay is basically just about making excuses," Torvalds continued. "And that means that as many people as possible should know about the problem as early as possible, because any closed list (or even just anybody sending a message to me personally) just increases the risk of the thing getting lost and delayed for the wrong reasons."

The bottom line on kernel security, though, is that the kernel does have bugs that will need to be exposed and then patched. The creator of Linux made no excuses for kernel security and actually noted that users should take additional precautions on their own.

"Quite frankly, nobody should ever depend on the kernel having zero holes," Torvalds wrote. "We do our best, but if you want real security, you should have other shields in place."

posted by James DeLong @ 8:59 AM | Security

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At Technology Liberation Front, Jim Harper asks "Who's Winning the Race to Control Spyware?"

posted by James DeLong @ 8:03 AM | Security

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