RAND LICENSING IS BAD -- will do all I can to stop it

It's hard to believe that a thing like this was developed in secret, and that I have literally one hour to write you a comment?!!!!!

Obviously you do not want any real comments from public, do you?

The web consists mostly of the infrastructure that is based on free software.  Free, as in FREEDOM and openness.  Today most web sites are served by apache, and most mail is delivered by sendmail.  GNU/Linux servers are experiencing the fasted growth ever, faster than any other kind of server.  It's obvious that Free and Open Source software have been instrumental, and ARE INSTRUMENTAL TODAY in building and maintaining the WORLD WIDE WEB as we know it!!!!

The web is a wonderfully open space where everyone stands equal!!  Don't do anything to change this.  If RAND is legitimized, many great and innovative things will never happen on the web, because you will price most of the brilliant independent developers out of the market.  And you will do so in a totally communist and anti-capitalist manner: THROUGH LAW and REGULATION!!!

The market has spoken: Free and Open Source software is IN and here to STAY.  Using laws and regulations to change this is nothing short of an assault on freedom  as we know it.

The web doesn't belong to Apple, Sun, IBM, Intel, MS, and a bunch of other rich goons!  The web belongs to the people who run it: the average web master, the small ISP, and my GNU/Linux box sitting on the web and serving anything I want to the public, FOR THE PRICE OF DSL CONNECTION!!!!

I will do everything in my power to make sure that RAND dies a fast death!  The patents must not be enforcable against ANY WORLD WIDE WEB standard, EVER!!!  It doesn't matter how "non-discriminatory" the licensing is.  It will necessarily discriminate against independent developers!  What you mean is that all the richest corps in USA will get equal access: Sun, MS, Oracle, IBM, Intel...  If this is your idea of FREEDOM, then BURN IN HELL!!!  Don't imagine you will get away with this without a major fight on all fronts.

I pledge myself to this issue.  I will educate everyone I know, and I will NOT SHUT UP until this is solved by requiring PATENT-FREE W3C standards and RAND-free W3C standards!

Shame on you for doing all this in secret!

Received on Saturday, 29 September 2001 23:25:50 UTC