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some DjVu source available under AT&T license 30

Posted by sengan from the yet-another-license dept.
This story is a week old, but I had not seen it before. Apparently, AT&T is making some source code for its DjVu image compressor available under yet another license, in a bid to improve its acceptance. They're open to discussion about it, so make your views known to them. Link from Openresources.
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some DjVu source available under AT&T license More

some DjVu source available under AT&T license

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  • The popular philosophy of "release early, release often" works almost as well for Legalese as for C++.

    An OpenLaw community...? Hrm....

  • This is the first license I have seen that requires the programmer to monitor a specific web site. It seems to be fairly close to the GPL though, it does require that source code be available for free along with any derived product.

    It's nice to see yet another company going along with the open source concept. One does have to wonder though, did this really need another new license.

  • I've tried out this technology, it does a really good job on high-resolution images combined with text, something that neither .gif nor .jpg can say right now. Maybe one day this sort of format will allow us to have the much-touted "virtual newspaper", (or in this case magazine) a cheap, networked, flatscreen display that downloads new content without killing trees.

    However... Could you really void a contract for not monitoring a website regularly? Even when they don't define what "regularly" means? If they reserve the right to take the website down, does that mean the source isn't open because we can't monitor the website?

    Silly clauses make for useless licenses. Why not just release the free stuff under an existing free license, which lets you license it simultaneously under other licenses? Hmm? GPL, BSD, even NPL?

    Why pay your lawyers any more than you have to when other people have done the job for you?
  • Is it just me, or is opening your source the new hip and in thing to do? First its making your program skinnable / themable, now its release some source..

    :p


    Stan "Myconid" Brinkerhoff
  • I just checked out the plugin. What they have so far is really impressive. Try viewing the comics. It's a great demonstration. First it loads the text, then image, then color. This is not something that can replace gifs or jpegs, and it's not meant to. What it may and should (with community support) replace is pdf files. Those of you who have problems with the license, TELL THEM ABOUT YOUR PROBLEMS. For once a company that is asking for help from the community is asking for our help in determing the terms of our service. This, in my opinion, is nothing but good news.
  • catchee monkey.

    Look, they even say on the web site that this is new for them and they're nervous about it. If you don't like the license, tell them so, civilly, rationally, and with maximum credit for trying. And if possible, tell them how they can make money (even a little), or avoid spending some, by changing it.

    Like taming any other wild creature: calm demeanor, soft voice, and regular offers of food..:-)
  • Of course it is, you silly! This is the way the world works. An idea is conceived and incubated by a few unrecognized geniuses, then its time comes and it hatches out for the world to see, then it grows explosively, and then it becomes entrenched as the dominant paradigm. We're in the first steps of the penultimate stage. Whenever something's in that stage, it becomes almost unbearably hip. Just look at the popularization of the Internet!

    Now, what I want to know is, Why would anyone complain about open source code gaining popularity?
    :P
    Beer recipe: free! #Source
    Cold pints: $2 #Product

  • Seems to have the annoyingness of the QPL combined with the annoyingness of APSL, along with other annoyances. Probably safe to call it non-free.
    Patch clause (slightly less annoying than QPL's), required notification of AT&T (worse than APSL), along with a "don't distribute for profit" clause.
    This doesn't look like free software to me. It doesn't even look like Open Source (sic).
  • i agree, if nothing else a lot of code that would otherwise never be seen is getting out there.

    i find that being able to check out other commercial grade code, not the dumb little text-book style snippets but real apps/libraries, can be very educational when it comes to making higher level architectural decisions for my own projects.

  • Quite frankly, I'm assuming that one would have to have some knowledge of the algorythm(s) involved...

    ...and the best source of that knowledge is the source. You'd *derive* (hint, hint) your solution from the source code.
  • GOODBYE PDF!!!!!!!!!

    It is FAR MORE than what you are going to get from Macromedia and their acrobat - both technically and legally. I believe this technology is superior, and I found the interface (even though beta) much easier to use.

    This is nothing but good. The license may not be perfectly "open source", but it is workable. The goal should perhaps not be a "perfect open source" license (especially when dealing with a profit oriented corporation) but rather a "perfectly equitable" license.

    Every slashdotter should send AT&T a note of thanks on this one.
  • I believe that DjVu may do to comics what MP3 did to music: you can now scan in an entire comic book in high resolution and the download will be just a few megabytes.

  • This is what I sent to AT&T using their Feedback page [att.com]. If you agree, you could let them know, I suppose they'll consider these ideas more if more people tells them about them.

    I have not read the AT&T Source Code License, but I just wanted you to know that, in my opinion, you should drop it and try to find an already existing license that suits your needs well. The hacking community does not see with good eyes the creation of new "open source" licenses other than the already existing, such as is the case with the Netscape's Public License or the Apple Public Source License.

    Besides, I suppose it probably doesn't suit your needs well, but if you had released your code under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL), developers could then incorporate any GPL'ed code distributed under to your software, greatly enhacing it (GPL'ed code includes Emacs, GCC, Guile, Linux (the kernel), WindowMaker, GNU Internet Utilities and much, *MUCH* more, particularly all GNU software).

    Azul.
  • When AT&T (my employer until last week) bought the UK-based Olivetti Research Labs (www.orl.co.uk [orl.co.uk]), they became the proud owners of several pieces of GPL software. Most notably VNC -- Virtual Network Computer software -- which is software that provides multiplatform x-like remote control of a system.

    Development continues under the GPL at these new AT&T aquisitions, so the GPL already has its foot in the door in the form of very new, very modern software. This fits very nicely with AT&T's historical code-sharing, and imho their release of new software from other parts of the company under even a semi-GPL-like license bodes well for the future of AT&T's participation in GPL efforts.

    (Check out VNC [att.com] -- I find it quite ironic that the one essential piece of utility software that makes Windows NT somewhat acceptable to run in a datacenter is developed under the GPL.)

    Jon

  • An AC responds to AT&T's license (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    What follows is the response I submitted to AT&T on the feedback page: In summary: I don't like the license at all. I wouldn't contribute code under such a licemse or distribute derivative works under any circumstancecs.

    A Plea: If you can make only one change, please change your usage of the phrase "Free Software". This is NOT free software, even if it is available at no cost.

    You might consider using "No Cost Software", or the more recently popular "Open Source Software". For a good explanation of what "Free Software" means, take a look at http://www.fsf.org/philosophy/ and do some reading.

    My more detailed comments on the license are below:

    Section 1.5 - The requirement to regularly monitor the AT&T website is painful, and it is not clear exactly what obligation is entailed... do I have to monitor it for as long as I use the software, or for as long as I distribute the software, or (if I distributed a derivative work) possibly forever? Assuming I accepted this requirement, AT&T could revoke my license to use, modify, or distribute the software and any derivative works (under section 7.3) by simply removing the web site, as allowed under section 2.5. Basicly, section 1.5 of the license alone is enough to prevent me from using any software covered by this license.

    Section 3.1 - "Patchware" sucks, and becomes very difficult to manage very quickly. I try to avoid participating in patchware projects whenever possible. Mostly this is just a convenience issue.

    This section does NOT grant a right to distribute "the AT&T binaries", but DOES grant the right to distribute binaries of derivative works... thus I could create a derivative work by making a patch which adds a comment to the AT&T source code, doing a compile of the patched sources, and distributing the result as a derivative work... you need to either remove the restriction on distributing the AT&T binaries, or add a restriction forcing derivative works to be distributed in source-only form. Giving up, and allowing re-distrobution of your binaries, seems to be the only way to keep the license fairly consistant.

    Section 3.2 - "general purpose computer" is not defined anywhere... could cause problems.

    Section 4.3 - The requirement to provide copies of all modifications to AT&T is a horrible invasion of privacy. Changes that are not redistributed should be allowed to remain private.

    Section 4.5 is disgusting.

    Section 5.1 - I have a strong feeling that this section is the primary point behind the license. AT&T wants free programming, and this is their way of getting it. Not only does it grant AT&T the right to sell contributions of others, when those contributors had no rights to sell the AT&T code, it also does something much more sneaky... in combination with section 7.1, it gives AT&T rights to use any trademarks related to contributed patches, and prevents the licensee or patch contributor from bringing a claim of trademark infringement against AT&T.

    Sections 7.2 and 7.3 make any investment in this software extremely risky. I wouldn't want to spend a few months of my time making improvements to your software, only to find that my license to do so had suddnely disapeared.

    Section 7.4 is not needed to protect AT&T, and places an un-needed restriction on users and distributers of the software outside the US.

  • With all these "open-source" code releases, it seems that companies, even those that like the idea of releasing source as a way of getting developers, are as a group uncomfortable with some aspects of current open-source/free licences. Current Free Software developers, however, are annoyed about all these confusing new licences that may or may not take away their freedom to use and develop the source code that is being released. Something needs to be done about this, from both groups' perspective.

    What I'd like to see is a clear statement from one of the corporations releasing code under their own custom licence detailing their objections to the GPL and other existing open-source licences.

    If this happened, we might be able to:

    1. Allay their fears (unlikely, but possible - their IP lawyers probably haven't dealt with something like this before).
    2. Arrange modifications to existing licences, provided such modifications don't compromise OUR priorities.
    3. Motivate the creation of a new "Open-Source Paranoid Corporation License" which would at least eliminate the profusion of licences happening lately, and would hopefully be worded in such a way that maximised our freedom but gave corporations such protections as they require to be persuaded to free their source.

    What about it, corporate types. Surely somebody in Apple or AT&T reads Slashdot?

  • PDF files seem to me to be an excellent fit for the problem they are designed to solve, and there are several independent implementations of the standard. Why do you want DjVu to replace them?

    cheers,
    --
  • First, AT&T has not sought Open Source certification, so they cannot use the Open Source mark. Second, AFAICS, the license is clearly not open source.

    I appreciate AT&T's efforts to distribute patented code in a way that preserves some value of the patents. However, unless the code is free *enough*, it's not Open Source.
    -russ
  • Well, for one, these look better. For another, they're about 1/10th the size.
  • Did anyone else notice (section 4.4) the nag clause? It requires the display of the proprietary notice, which is about 30 lines of text. Annoyingly long, in fact.

    So, if you wrote a web browser based on KDE, DjVu, and maybe some BSD-ish networking code, then you release it under the GPL, every time your program starts up, you have to display 80 lines of notices disclaiming everything 4 times. Whee fun yay.

  • So, if you wrote a web browser based on KDE, DjVu, and maybe some BSD-ish networking code, then you release it under the GPL, every time your program starts up, you have to display 80 lines of notices disclaiming everything 4 times. Whee fun yay.

    I'll respond, since you include the BSD comment in there.

    You have greatly mis-understood the BSD advertising clause (also called the claim credit clause).

    It only applies if you use a BSD related feature of your product in the advertising. For example, if your advertising boasts that your product includes "The BSD TCP/IP networking stack" then somewhere else in the advert it has to say "Includes software developed by UCB and its contributors" (not an exact quote, but close enough).

    If your advertising doesn't mention the BSD derived features then you don't need to give UCB credit.

    Make sense?

    N

  • Comparing their format to PDF is like comparing apples and oranges, the two have nothing to do with each other.

    // _Stryker
  • If you think these look better, you probably haven't seen decent PDF files. (Ditto file size, actually.)

    PDFs don't have to suck. They just do most of the time because most people don't create good ones.
  • PDF files seem to me to be an excellent fit for the problem they are designed to solve, and there are several independent implementations of the standard. Why do you want DjVu to replace them?

    Yes, PDF files are an excellent fit for the problem they are designed to solve, which is providing a compact, portable, high resolution exchange format for documents for which you have the original (Framemaker, TeX, Word, groff, PostScript, etc.) source.

    The problem is that there are far too many people trying to use PDF to solve a problem it was never designed for, namely to glom together a bunch of scanned-in JPEG or TIFF images. These PDFs tend to be huge, slow to load, and ugly.

    When you're trying to put a 16th century manuscript, or a comic book, online, DjVu seems to be a far better solution than PDF, and I'm glad to see AT&T truly interested in opening this format to us.

  • DjVu looks like it is the lossy image compression format to beat until JPEG2000 rolls out. In my tests with it, it looked good and was fast. I'm glad AT&T is trying to be open with it.
  • I felt I should share this.

    -------------------------------------------

    The AT&T Source Code Agreement is incompatible with all other free software licenses. Section 1.3 claims third party (ie. GNU Public License) licenses are not allowed. Section 1.5 unduly requires the licensee to visit AT&T's website. Section 2.14 which is the required notice to be posted with the derived product claims that the software is considered proprietary to AT&T. Section 4.1 contradicts itself by saying that distribution of the derived product may not be charged for and then says it may be charged for. Section 4.2 requires a written agreement. Section 4.3 makes a lot of uncomfortable demands and repeats past articles. Section 4.4 demands display of the proprietary notice. Section 4.5 is silly. Section 5.1 forces the licensee to give AT&T an irrevocable license of ultimate freedom which is completely contradictory to what AT&T is providing the licensee. Section 7.2 is a termination clause that causes the license's life span to become unpredictable and therefore unsatisfactory. Section 2.3 of Appendix A restates that the software covered by the license is proprietary to AT&T. Section 7.3 of the agreement and 6.1 of Appendix A of the agreement define unneccessary and unfair restrictions upon the licensee in regards to patents held by AT&T or it's affiliates relating to the product under the license. The right to file a complaint or lawsuit over a legitimate claim should not be removed from anyone, even the licensee of the product, for any reason. Section 6.2 of Appendix A again restates the termination clause.


    Sorry, nice try.

    Sincerely,
    Nelson Rush

    P.S. Make Section 5.1 the whole license and switch "AT&T" with "YOU". That's what I'd call a truly open source/free software license.

    -------------------------------------------

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