Licenses and open software

Photo by Binkiexxx.

Open software is based in a cooperative mode of production, based on personal reputation rather than on economic incentives. Furthermore, open source developers may have a “psychological contract” with their peers, linking them to each other’s work on grounds of trust and values of common interest (Chong, Sae & Shui). However, the sustainable existence of this cooperative form of creating software is enforced by an additional factor, licensing. Open source licenses can be seen as a mechanism that helps to give a structure to the relation among developers working on open source; in this sense, licenses become a “mechanism for social ordering” (Berry, 2008).

The major difference between free and proprietary software is their licensing model. The license is a set of regulations or conditions that an author sets for using its work. The license tells the users of any given software how they can use the software and the conditions involved in such use.

There are different types of licenses, and is possible to distinguish marked differences among proprietary and open source licenses.

Proprietary software licenses have a price: it must be purchased in order to be used. When we talk about buying a program what we actually are buying is a license. The source code remains hidden, being known only by the company that creates the software. Making copies of this kind of software is forbidden, and the number of computers where the program may be installed is restricted, we cannot install the software in as many computers we wish. And finally, any modification of the code is not permitted without authorization.

On the contrary, free software licenses are more flexible: they don’t have an economical cost, its code is public and open; the software can be modified by anyone and licenses allow installing it in unlimited number of computers.

However, what sets apart open source licenses is its generative character; taking for example GNU GPL license, we can observe a viral effect. Softwares based on this kind of license must be released with the same license, creating an unending chain of software linked directly with previous developments.

In this creative scheme, licenses applied to open source not only include conditions of use for end users, yet more important, these licenses integrate values and norms for developers reflecting the spirit of this cooperative model.

Apple vs Flash: standards, power and the end user

Photo by Ben Heine

During the last months the blogosphere has widely covered the Apple-Flash incident. Apple excluded Flash from the Iphone and the new Ipad; the company justified the decision alleging that they are seeking to use open standards-html5- over a proprietary standard such as Flash.

Leaving aside how questionable can be this decision coming from a company only rivalled by Microsoft in terms of being the most proprietary company in computer industry, this can be an interesting case study to illustrate how protocol is a form of control and at the same time, it is worthwhile to bring attention to the fact that the most affected in this dispute is the end user.

The current Apple’s Software Development Kit-SDK- only allows APIs developed according to rules previously set by the company, while the use or call of any private APIs is excluded. And this includes applications based on Flash.

Steve Jobs published an extensive letter giving all the reasons that Apple is taking into account to take this decision. To ground his arguments, claims that Flash

• is a closed standard,
• that is the main reason why Macs crash,
• that it makes too much consumption of battery
• that is not compatible with touch technology
• and most importantly “letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform.”

Galloway points out that protocol has a double nature. On one side, it allows openness and a decentralised organization of the Net due to its open-source based character. But on the other hand, protocol is an “extreme form of control” in the sense that it constrains and homogenises content; everything that is said has to be said in a standardised format, in order to be transmitted in the Net.

Apple has decided to exclude one format to favour another; html5 is the chosen format that the company approves. As end users, we don’t have a saying on this decision; somebody else has made this call for us in what can be considered an exertion of power over the net and the end users.

The point is that users are presented to platforms that have a partial access to the internet, despite arguments given by Apple to explain or Adobe to condemn it, users have no saying on the format they want their contents. This control, in this dispute, is resolved by others.

Open source as a positive externality for Internet

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In economics, a positive externality is the indirect impact of a non-directly associated actor in a given transaction. From this perspective, open source can be considered as a positive factor that has encouraged the development and popularity of internet.

"The internet is built upon a constellation of technologies that were written under free software licenses that expressly allowed the copying and reproduction of their code" (Berry, 2008).

One of the first evidences of this idea was the Mozilla community, which has offered softwares such as Firefox and Thunderbird to be freely downloaded and used by internet users. In this way, Mozilla fosters the concept of internet as a “global public resource”.

In a similar way, open source initiatives have contributed to the development of widely popular internet services, such as blogging. A good example is Wordpress, which has grown thanks to the strong community behind the software, which can be freely shared, modified and customised according to specific user needs.

The examples provided have things in common that can be considered as positive externalities for the use of internet. First, these tools are for free. The user doesn’t have to pay for using them and this is of special relevance in the case of developing countries. Second, they can be modified by users and the modifications are shared with the community. This results into the constant improvement of the user experience when using internet through this softwares. Finally, in the case of Wordpress, it has allowed the spread of blogging, one of the most notorious agents in the social web phenomena.