Re: Future code ownership

[Jonathan Larmour <jifl@jifvik.org>]

Hi all,

I would like to bring the issue in this thread to a conclusion without 
much further delay. However I agree with the sentiments that we should 
seek an official position from Red Hat to consider before we make an 
irrevocable step.

To that end I am CC'ing this to two people in Red Hat I believe should be 
able to inform us, and I hope they (or some more appropriate person) will 
be able to give us an idea of Red Hat's official position. Alas, I think I 
will have to put a two week limit on this (Sun Jan 26th) - if nothing is 
received in that time, we will have to reach a conclusion without Red Hat. 
That is more than enough time for Red Hat to discuss this internally.

To Tony and Mark: in summary, the issue is the continuation of copyright 
assignments to Red Hat which a significant number of contributors now 
object to, mostly due to Red Hat no longer having any significant role in 
eCos's development and therefore little interest in its success. Some 
people also feel aggrieved by Red Hat for reasons of their own. Some feel 
that, even given assurances, Red Hat can no longer be trusted. Whatever 
the reason (and we aren't responsible for those opinions!), it is 
something that needs to be addressed in the interests of the eCos open 
source community.

To that end, a number of options were presented as per 
http://sources.redhat.com/ml/ecos-maintainers/2002-12/msg00001.html and 
followed up to in subsequent messages. Although no conclusion has yet been 
reached, the two options being considered most appear to be dropping the 
requirement for copyright assignments completely, or assigning to a 
not-for-profit entity. In the latter case, SPI (Software in the Public 
Interest) who represent many other Open Source groups (even owning the 
Open Source brand) such as Debian Linux, GNOME, etc. have been approached 
and have stated their willingness to do so.

Also in the latter case, we see some possibility of permitting exemptions 
from the usual GPL licence obligations for large companies who are too 
dumb to embrace Free Software, but at a price. That price would be put 
exclusively towards the benefit of eCos, the Open Source project. 
Restrictions would be put in place to prevent maintainer's benefitting 
from decisions about how that money would be spent in which they took part.

It is this more than anything that we seek Red Hat's opinion of. Would 
they in principle be willing to work with the maintainers and SPI to 
arrange such licensing exemptions? Would they be willing to outline what 
the likely terms in principle would be? I should probably point out that 
if we cannot come to some mutual agreement then Red Hat will not be able 
to benefit at all. I should also add that this cannot be the subject of 
long negotiation. There is a 2.0 beta release coming up, with a 2.0 final 
soon after. We will not delay the releases to have this resolved, and will 
need to reach a decision with or without Red Hat.

If you wish, you may reply in private to me and I will gladly forward to 
all maintainers, although purely for transparency it would be preferred if 
this was in the open on the ecos-maintainers mailing list (which has 
public archives) if it is commercially possible. Alternatively, you can 
phone me, and I will act as intermediary as best I can, although the final 
decision will be collective. Contact phone number available if you e-mail 
me off list.

I should add for the absence of doubt to Tony and Mark, that this is 
purely in the context of an eCos maintainer, and nothing to do with 
eCosCentric or any other commercial organisation. In this discussion, we 
the maintainers (made up of people from eCosCentric, Mind, Ascom as well 
as Red Hat) are acting purely for the benefit of the open source project, 
even if this is contrary to our employer's preferences; as with other open 
source projects.

Thanks in advance,

Jifl
// Nominal eCos chief maintainer
-- 
--[ "You can complain because roses have thorns, or you ]--
--[  can rejoice because thorns have roses." -Lincoln   ]-- Opinions==mine