IT, Be Free! 133
An anonymous reader writes "The Open Group, along with IBM, has published a 500-word document that it hopes developers will endorse. The 'Developer Declaration of Independence' enjoins corporations, governments, organizations, and individuals to adopt and protect open standards in order to promote interoperability among all vendors and give IT customers freedom of choice. The Boston-based Open Group promotes the POSIX open standard and sells compliance testing to OS vendors. It has not yet organized a 'Boston IT Party,' however."
catchiness (Score:2, Interesting)
poor effort (Score:3, Interesting)
2> The declaration stinks of pointy haired people sitting in afternoon long meetings. I suppose it serves as a way to explain the value of openness to other pointy-haired people. As a Declaration of Independence, the prose soars exactly the way a bowling ball droped from a tall building might (it doesn't).
3> It still seems a little rich for IBM to be supporting a document that contradicts every aspect of IBM business practices through nearly its entire existence.
Re:catchiness (Score:1, Interesting)
Ironic (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't be fooled by their recent Linux-friendly stance. IBM are no different than Microsoft, HP, or any other big company,
Supported by IBM who supports Sen Hatch ... (Score:3, Interesting)
We tend to consider IBM as the good guys because of their fight with SCO, but they cannot fail to see that a total clampdown on access to content effectively brings a sledgehammer down on much open source development.
Awesome idea. Fix your webform. (Score:3, Interesting)
Don't be surprised if not too many people with qmail-destined email addresses sign up. (I'm using the "myname-organisation@domain.tld" format email address).
Re:"open standard" are a waste of time (Score:3, Interesting)
> implemetations if they need to exist at all, can be compared to.
Yes. But to have a reference implementation, you need to have the standard of which it's a reference.
SRW (http://www.loc.gov/srw [loc.gov]) has 3 different reference implementations, in Java, C and Python and all OSS. But without the SRW standard, could you tell what was going on? I doubt it.
--Azaroth
Re:Speaking of poor efforts... (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not IBM's long view, it's IBM's current view. When it was to their advantage to be closed, they were closed. Now that they can't benefit as much from being closed, they support open standards (although they haven't given up much of their mountain of IP).
Should they find in the future that they can make more money being closed, they will be. It's not philosophy, it's not religion, it's business.
My story and the history of the information age (Score:5, Interesting)
I remember in 95,there were allot of people who considered me absolutely foolish for wanting to drop promising career opportunities in Oracle,Microsoft,and SCO Enterprise Unix for Linux.Back then I remember hearing million dollar speakers who couldn't get the future right 18 mo's out,but none the less I hit the nail on the head 10 years out into the future.I wanted to share my thinking,because I think it will benefit other people too.
History teaches that during the 1800's there were many people who believed that the entire meaning and purpose of the industrial revolution was to leverage inventions like the cotton gin to expand their plantations for unlimited growth and profit.Ironically just the opposite was true,the industrial revolution actually demanded a mobile and skilled workforce.
It didn't matter that the plantation system was vastly powerful,it didn't matter that the plantation system had many of the most wealthy,educated,resourceful,and well connected people on the planet.More importantly it didn't matter that slavery existed for 1000s of years,that they paid allot of money for those slaves,and it was upheld by the full force of law at every level of government,and was considered a property right.What mattered was was that society needed to move into the industrial age,but simply couldn't until employers could hire labor at will and on demand without fear or concern over who "owned" them.(not to mention that slavery was just plain evil)
Today many in media circles believe that the entire meaning and purpose of the information age is to use inventions like the internet to leverage their copyright holdings to the far reaches of the earth for unlimited growth and profit.Ironically,just the opposite is true,the information age demands the unrestricted flow of information.
It doesn't matter that the media system is vastly powerful, it doesn't matter that the media system has many of the most wealthy,educated,resourceful,and well connected people on the planet.More importantly it doesn't matter that copyrights have existed for 100s of years,that they paid allot of money for them,and they are upheld by the full force of law at every level of government,and are called a property right.What matters is that society needs to move into the information age,but simply can't until companies and people can use information at their disposal at will without fear or liability in regards to who "owns" every little piece of it.
History shows that just because an institution calls something a property right, doesn't mean that it is. Just because an institution calls something an incentive doesn't mean that it is. Just because an institution looks successful on the surface, doesn't mean it is. That the future is formed by facts, and not the common beliefs of the day. Most importantly that the surest way to become irrelavent is to sit the fense, attempt to appease both sides, or to aviod taking sides at all.
It is no accident that Microsoft is under siege by Linux, Hollywood is under siege by p2p networks, and publishers are under siege by from alternate sources of content on the internet. All these forces have in common that they are forcing society to move away from the control of media, content, and information. Likewise, I also think it is in my best interest, and others best interest to do so too and hold our success accountable to it.
By pushing to rely on software like Linux and other open source software and having a bias against proprietary software, information, and content when possible (even when a little inconvenient). It will create opportunities, like it did for me, as time goes on rather than disasters every time an improvement in information technology happens along. It will lead to technology solutions that are more reliable, secure, and interoperable, while at the same time being less costly. It will create a migration of technology that tends to change for improvement make rather than the sake of obsoleting unprofitable versions. It will lead to solution
you want a declaration? (Score:4, Interesting)
That all technology which is used to transfer knowledge and information shall be made available to all people without prejudice, at no cost, that no barriers to aquisition of this technology shall be erected, and that all such existing barriers shall immediately be removed.
Let it be understood by all that we are clear in our purpose, strong in our resolve, and determined to reach our goal.
Now, quite unrealistic you say? Methinks the signers of the Declaration of Independence had little hope that the King of England would say "Oh, but of course.