On 14 February 2014 14:37, Valer Mischenko <[email protected]> wrote: > Hi the OpenBSD team, > > Ken Westerback advised me to appeal to you as a collective.
Well, my exact word were "You can try appealing to [email protected], but I'd rate the chances of a previously secret organization controlling OpenBSD patents surfacing in response to such a plea as low." Which I thought would be discouraging. :-) > > My name is Valer and I am writing to you on behalf of the Open Invention > Network (OIN). Our mission is to support projects developing or using Open > Source and Linux-related technology by deterring patent aggression. We do > this through a community that pledges not to assert patents against each > other over this technology. This pledge covers over 2,100 Open Source > packages. It is structured to reduce risk on core operating system and > middleware technologies. Almost 750 projects and companies from all areas > of technology creation, deployment and use have joined our community so far > (see not very up to date list: > http://www.openinventionnetwork.com/licensees.php) > > We wanted to invite OpenBSD Foundation to our community. And you did so invite us. But I explained we could not meet the bar you set for membership, to wit, "Our community is free to join. The only thing we want is a pledge that OpenBSD would never use patents aggressively against the broader Linux System." since the Foundation has no powers to make such promises. .... Ken > > We understand that there is no organization that owns or controls OpenBSD, > but that is valid for lots of projects / distress who joined the > non-aggression pact. Most of them are also autonomous collectives of > individual contributors, each of various degrees of current influence over > the source code. Mostly the team decides by consensus who may sign the > pledge (can be done digitally). > > You may be interested in our community credentials and to get some more > context about our work. Here is an endorsement from Eben Moglen, Chairman > of the Software Freedom Law Center: > http://emoglen.law.columbia.edu/now/organizations/OIN > > Here is an endorsement from Jim Zemlin, Executive Director of the Linux > Foundation: > http://www.linux-foundation.org/weblogs/jzemlin/2009/09/09/protecting-linux-from-microsoft-yesmicrosoft-got-caught/ > > Our community is free to join. The only thing we want is a pledge that > OpenBSD would never use patents aggressively against the broader Linux > System. Of course it never will, and that's a symbolic gesture, but it > remains very important for our work. When we bind bigger companies with > this pledge we are sure they will not attack the users of OpenBSD for > example. But their participation in OIN is also very important in various > other aspects. > > And these companies are numerous. For example Valve Software and Dropbox > are on of the latest bigger companies joined in. UnitedStack from China > joined just a weeks hours before. Pretty much everyone else is in there > too, from Red Hat to GNOME, Fujitsu to CentOS, Google to KDE to OpenStack > Foundation. This is the largest community to address software patent > challenges in the world. The idea is: when everybody pledges freedom, there > will be no wars. > > We are passionate supporters of open innovation and the Linux System in a > very broad sense. I hope we can work together by welcoming OpenBSD as a > project to our non-aggression community. (And may be also OpenSSH, > OpenBGPD, OpenNTPD, and OpenCVS as separate projects.) Yes, we need mass to > shift the current state of affairs to the better. Every single voice helps > us face current market challenges while investing in a more collaborative > future. > > Attached is a very short overview of OIN + FAQs, but I am happy to answer > any questions and to explain in more detail why the pledge of patent > non-aggression is so important for open innovation. > > May you decide positively there is a possibility to sign online: > http://licenses.openinventionnetwork.com > > Please let me know what you think guys. > > > Faithfully, > Valer Mischenko, > Open Invention Network > > www.openinventionnetwork.com
