Thursday, October 30, 2008

Week #4 Open Source is IT! (Pun intended)

I have been watching the Open Source Code/ Freeware/ Shareware wave for more than 10 years!

Here is acouple sites about CopyLeft rules, implementation, and use. CopyLeft seeks to KEEP open sourceware - open - and prevent anyone from locking it in.
http://www.copyleft.com/
http://www.copyleft.no/
http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/ GNU = Lesser General Public License

Open source code and "copyleft" vs. copyright is the natural solution for software. Freeware and Shareware have been around for a loooong time. I expect it to expand exponentially from here on, especially with successes such as Linux OS, "OpenOffice" by Sun Microsystems, and many other large and small programs.

With the increase in masses of information, music, movies, pictures, art work, ad infinte item, it is going to be more and more difficult to "lock down" all those forms of creativity. It is natural for all these areas to follow the the freeware/shareware/pay-per-use concept including books, and music. Witness http://www.pagebypage.com/ and http://www.gutenberg.com/ and sites that let you buy a song for 99 cents. Watch it grow!

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