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European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

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Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#361

Post by palata »

rdm_blackhole wrote: post #357
palata wrote: post #354

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I am a European business owner Exactly. This sentence on its own is enough to explain your opinion, there is no need to explain anything else. Those who are against regulations are the ones who benefit from the lack of regulations. And those who are in a dominant position generally think that they are there because they deserve it, because they are superior.

> And those who are in a dominant position generally think that they are there because they deserve it, because they are superior. And this sentence explains your opinion. Business owner = superior = bad You haven't responded to anything anyone has said despite the fact that a few of us seem to agree on these issues. You basically brush aside anything that does not conform to your narrative and you also dismiss the e…

> Business owner = superior = bad

Nope. I said that business owners are generally in a dominant position, and those who are in a dominant position generally think that they deserve it because they are superior. I didn't say "bad", I explained the bias. Everyone is biased.

> you also dismiss the entire report of Mario Draghi on European competitiveness

Maybe we can do that: I will look into Mario Draghi's report, and on your end you could have a look at what Cory Doctorow has to say about the US monopolies and antitrust policies?

So that at least we would get some amount of open-mindness out of this not-so-constructive discussion :-).

> In conclusion, you are arguing in bad faith

Yeah, I too think that you can go ** yourself :-). But I will read about Mario Draghi's opinion, maybe you can get some perspective from Doctorow. Bye!

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#362

Post by palata »

rdm_blackhole wrote: post #358
palata wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you end up with people who think you are simply attacking the EU That's not what I think. But you obviously lack the level of empathy you would need to accept that I may think differently. I accept that you think the way you think: you benefit from it as a business owner. > Instead of using this opportunity to ask the questions Yeah, because you are so superior to everybody else that people should ask you question,…

> you benefit from it as a business owner. When one has no response it's easier to blame the messenger. A nice cop out if I may say so. > Yeah, because you are so superior to everybody else that people should ask you question, and their opinions are not worth your time You are putting words in my mouth and arguing in bad faith but that's easier than making a compelling case with facts and figures. > "I am the best, I…

> Unfortunately instead of engaging in a healthy debate

Take it from my point of view: I said that I don't believe that Europe has no software industry at all. And I said that I don't believe that regulations are the reason Europe's software industry stuggles against the US monopolies.

What the US monopolies have been doing to maintain their position is very well documented, and has nothing to do with regulations.

You claim that it's possible to compete with a monopoly if you are not regulated, and you call it a fact. I disagree. I believe that we as a society should prevent monopolies, and the way to do that is regulations. And of course, if you prevent monopolies in Europe but play against monopolies who are allowed in other countries, it's hard.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#363

Post by u8080 »

supermatt wrote: post #360
u8080 wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is not laughable, Linux directly complies with SDN list[1] and US sanction policy(i.e. removing of russian developers by Linus). Thus, US does have and execute control over Linux kernel currently. [1] https://www.linuxfoundation.org/blog/navigating-global-regul...

I think you have some confusion about the role of the Linux Foundation in relation to the kernel. They provide financial, organisational, and infrastructural support and neither own nor control its development. Linus is the BDFL and lead maintainer and if he wanted to move the kernel development anywhere else he could do so, but Linus Torvalds has stated that he personally agrees with them. That is not the US control…

Why should Linus renounce US citizenship, not finnish? He is living with family in Oregon for 20+ years.

This is my main point here - not much things connecting Linus and Linux to EU. In question of US and EU tensions I am not really sure US citizen BDFL will party with EU, also because companies who spend money and contribute to kernel are located in US mainly.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#364

Post by 1dontnkow_ »

rdm_blackhole wrote: post #173
NoboruWataya wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By the way, don't come lazily asking for input. Go out proactively and find the answers yourself. The EU very regularly asks for input on new policy initiatives, it's one of the better aspects of the legislative/policy-making process. They are asking citizens' opinions on a policy that will potentially affect them, if you tell them to f off and do it themselves then don't be surprised when you hate the policy that…

> The EU very regularly asks for input on new policy initiatives, it's one of the better aspects of the legislative/policy-making process. And then it basically ignores all the input and moves forward with policies like chat control that are widely unpopular anyway. So much for consulting the people and asking for feedback.

Yes but we gotta understand that sometimes some things the citizens suggest end up on the law. So we should just continuously fight to keep that happening.

Additionally, the EU and its administration, is a big group of people. There are probably different people or teams pushing for this idea, which all in all, is a very good one, maybe even fellow (ex) open source contributors, and the ChatControl thing, surely comes from other groups with entirely different interests.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#365

Post by supermatt »

u8080 wrote: post #363
supermatt wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you have some confusion about the role of the Linux Foundation in relation to the kernel. They provide financial, organisational, and infrastructural support and neither own nor control its development. Linus is the BDFL and lead maintainer and if he wanted to move the kernel development anywhere else he could do so, but Linus Torvalds has stated that he personally agrees with them. That is not the US control…

Why should Linus renounce US citizenship, not finnish? He is living with family in Oregon for 20+ years. This is my main point here - not much things connecting Linus and Linux to EU. In question of US and EU tensions I am not really sure US citizen BDFL will party with EU, also because companies who spend money and contribute to kernel are located in US mainly.

In the very post where he discussed the removal of Russian maintainers https://lore.kernel.org/all/CAHk-=whNGNVnYHHSXUAsWds_MoZ-iEg... he identifies as Finnish - not American or Finnish-American.

That you are trying to strip him of his own identity speaks volumes.

Anyway, clearly you have some misguided patriotic agenda here. You can thump your chest if it makes you feel better, but theres little point in continuing this discussion.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#366

Post by wtarreau »

iso1631 wrote: post #60
fh973 wrote: post #18

Europe does not need more open source, it needs its own healthy and competitive software industry. It doesn't matter if the email platform a government uses is open source, but it should be able to pick a local alternative. It does not matter if the e-ID or payments app is running on an open source mobile OS, but it should be possible to run it on a non-US one. Policy may help the European software industry, at least…

We've seen that some open source licenses make way for American money to steal the monetisation -- Elasticsearch found this to their peril when Amazon swooped in and offered it as a service The other problem is the ability for American companies and funds to just buy European companies. If Europe wants to stop this is needs to be very aware of the licensing agreements, and to pass laws to limit foreign investment - l…

No, it needs first to encourage local investment. Companies who seek investors or who get sold do not do it by pleasure, but as a last resort before dying. And in the EU you don't get any offer to save a company that has a limited commercial activity. Many companies die every day by lack of money. It turns our that US etc are willing to take much more risk and invest sufficient money to transform such fragile companies into durable ones. And in the case of software it's great, because software is sold all over the world, and the income serves to hire more local people, so in the end it's a way to really develop EU sales to the rest of the world. It would clearly be better if the investors were EU-based, but at least it's better than nothing that some investors are willing to risk their money on such companies.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#367

Post by wtarreau »

jszymborski wrote: post #276
fh973 wrote: post #18

Europe does not need more open source, it needs its own healthy and competitive software industry. It doesn't matter if the email platform a government uses is open source, but it should be able to pick a local alternative. It does not matter if the e-ID or payments app is running on an open source mobile OS, but it should be possible to run it on a non-US one. Policy may help the European software industry, at least…

They say "open source" but they are looking for "no-profit motive" IMO. Which is fine, but they should be opening a generous fund for democratically-run non-profits whose primary activity is developing open software which is useful for the EU and is an alternative to US corp-controlled software. EU has plenty of these orgs it can generously fund, and scoping funding like this would create more. Some existing examples…

In my opinion it's the opposite. This type of associations is welcome, and they are fine to promote free software and help people, but they are exactly like neighborhood associations: they're mostly local, relying on volunteers with limited time who become a new dependency for people who were not using these services. That's fine for limited use case but it doesn't scale at all, and causes a huge duplication of efforts (organization, software creation -- several of them reinvented stuff that already exists, advertising etc). And associations rarely if ever merge, because most often association creators have a very clear view of what they're seeking (often idealist) and are rarely willing to compromise it and accept to adopt another association's mostly similar but not exactly identical goals (it often works very similarly to political parties). GAFAMs would never exist under this model.

The problem is that such services which proudly run on low budget, volunteers and recycled hardware, cannot be relied on by companies without risking to enter legal trouble in case of major incident, so it means that a higher-grade service is still needed, with a dedicate funding, and we're facing fragmentation. We must not reproduce the scheme of cloudwatt either. Too much money injected into a wet dream that was only used to spend lots of money in consultants coming here just to confirm their presence and get their check.

What is needed instead is to sponsor the development of such activities by a few (2-3) well-established competing companies, so as to avoid the regular risk of monoculture that diverges from what users expect, and help them reach the point where their offerings can compete with GAFAM's for both end users and enterprise. The contract should be clear that services must rely on open formats, make it possible for leaving users to retrieve all their data, that software developed under such funding must be opensource, though technology acquisition is fine, and that these offerings must become self-sustaining at one point (i.e. a mix of free+paid services). The EU funders should have enough shares of these activities so that their permission is required for business acquisition and that they can restrict it to EU-based companies, so that such companies can still grow and seek public funding.

What we need is a few durable big players, not 10000 incompatible associations each with their own software suite, that no enterprise can trust over the long term and that cannot resist a trivial DDoS by lack of a robust infrastructure, and who are not organized enough to run full-stack security audits to make sure that user data are properly protected. These ones are only fine for friends and family but that's not what we're missing the most (the proof is that they already exist).

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#368

Post by menaerus »

mariusor wrote: post #347
menaerus wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From https://nlnet.nl/fediversity > We are seeking project proposals between 5.000 and 50.000 euro's — which should get you on your way. Am I the only one to think this is completely ridiculous amount of money? So, you want me to leave my very well paid job to innovate for the sake of EU competitiveness but you don't to invest more than 50k EUR (max grant). And as an individual you don't even stand a chance so this 5…

I'm currently a participant under a NLNet grant. I'm unemployed at the moment so getting a trickle of 1-2K of donation money per month working on my passion project is a pretty decent proposition. You can also be a participant alongside your well paid job, because once the memorandum of understanding is signed you have a year to work through the proposal at your own pace, during weekends or moonlighting.

I don't doubt that at all and I'm glad for anyone who is managing to make some money from their open-source contributions, even more so in today's age where market is so volatile. I am being empathetic for that cause. But the point I am rather trying to convey is that this is not the strategy that will converge to something substantial that will make EU more competitive on global landscape.

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#369

Post by mariusor »

menaerus wrote: post #368
mariusor wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm currently a participant under a NLNet grant. I'm unemployed at the moment so getting a trickle of 1-2K of donation money per month working on my passion project is a pretty decent proposition. You can also be a participant alongside your well paid job, because once the memorandum of understanding is signed you have a year to work through the proposal at your own pace, during weekends or moonlighting.

I don't doubt that at all and I'm glad for anyone who is managing to make some money from their open-source contributions, even more so in today's age where market is so volatile. I am being empathetic for that cause. But the point I am rather trying to convey is that this is not the strategy that will converge to something substantial that will make EU more competitive on global landscape.

I don't know how I could convince you, or anyone that's educated under the American capitalist system, that working for a commons is better in aggregate than relying on companies to pay for innovation and then keeping it a secret. "Competitive" is a slur in my opinion, I'd rather my work be "useful".

Re: European Commission issues call for evidence on open source

#370

Post by menaerus »

mariusor wrote: post #369
menaerus wrote: post #368

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't doubt that at all and I'm glad for anyone who is managing to make some money from their open-source contributions, even more so in today's age where market is so volatile. I am being empathetic for that cause. But the point I am rather trying to convey is that this is not the strategy that will converge to something substantial that will make EU more competitive on global landscape.

I don't know how I could convince you, or anyone that's educated under the American capitalist system, that working for a commons is better in aggregate than relying on companies to pay for innovation and then keeping it a secret. "Competitive" is a slur in my opinion, I'd rather my work be "useful".

Dystopian. You're missing some fundamental understanding how economics work but to each his own. Respectfully.
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