Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#1

Post by ZeroGravitas » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:01 PM UTC

Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)
blogs.fsfe.org

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#2

Post by jsz0 » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:24 PM UTC

you like Openness so much that when you use “Open Source” Software to build your Mac operating system

Only some parts of it. The bulk of OSX is closed source.

May I remind you that H.264 is not an open standard?

Jobs said H.264 is an industry standard not an open standard

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#3

Post by alec » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:24 PM UTC

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now."

That's kind of scary.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#4

Post by [deleted] » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:27 PM UTC

alec wrote: post #3

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now." That's kind of scary.

[deleted]

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#5

Post by davidw » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:28 PM UTC

alec wrote: post #3

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now." That's kind of scary.

Is it real? I am no fan of Apple or Jobs, but it almost sounds too evil.

Edit: in reply to a "tweet" of mine, he posted the headers:

http://hugoroy.eu/jobs-os.php

It's really hard to believe they'd be such arrogant jerks as to go after something open source like that.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#6

Post by nirmal » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:30 PM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #4

alec wrote: post #3

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now." That's kind of scary.

[deleted]

That's one interpretation. Another is that some other entity is gathering patents to use against Theora.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#7

Post by snth » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:31 PM UTC

[deleted] wrote: post #4

alec wrote: post #3

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now." That's kind of scary.

[deleted]

He didn't say Apple was assembling this patent pool.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#8

Post by boredguy8 » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:33 PM UTC

jsz0 wrote: post #2

you like Openness so much that when you use “Open Source” Software to build your Mac operating system Only some parts of it. The bulk of OSX is closed source. May I remind you that H.264 is not an open standard? Jobs said H.264 is an industry standard not an open standard

But the whole point in this debate is that Flash is also, for better or worse, an industry standard.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#9

Post by jamesbressi » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:34 PM UTC

Steve has been quite busy with his email lately. I don't remember him ever doing this much correspondence via email.

Very interesting.

Re: Open Letter to Steve Jobs (and a reply)

#10

Post by riferguson » Fri, Apr 30, 2010, 3:36 PM UTC

alec wrote: post #3

"A patent pool is being assembled to go after Theora and other “open source” codecs now." That's kind of scary.

Presumably it would be the holders of the putatively infringed patents that would be assembling the "pool". I don't think Apple is in the Video Codec patent-holding business. As a major licensee of H.264, you'd have to presume Apple be in a position to know if someone else was rounding up the usual suspects.