Subject: A few questions regarding licensing
From: Jason V. Morgan (Jason.V.Morgan@m.cc.utah.edu)
Date: Fri Jun 25 1999 - 06:48:31 EEST
Dear Majik3d developers First, let me tell you what I am doing. I have no intentions of misrepresenting myself. I am considering writing an article that discusses the licensing model that Majik is using. I have not yet decided if I want to approach it as a horrible idea and a threat to the ideals of free software or if I want to approach it as a possible business model that still might encourage competition while allowing proprietary software developers to still make money. In truth, this type of model is quite common...when is that last time you saw the source to IIS? Yet you may run an open source browser to read the information. Distributed computing that allows a mix of proprietary services and open application (and server) development. Perhaps I might show both aspects...two articles maybe. Anyway, I wanted to ask you guys some questions about your opinions and about Majik. Please note that I would like to quote you and I would appreciate if anything you didn't want me to quote was indicated as such in any initial responses. Thank you. Well, here are the questions I wanted to ask: In your FAQ you say that the Majik server source code is not being released because of fears of bad Majik clones being produced. Has this been a problem in previous projects? Why else do you consider code forking to be a concern? Do you consider this development model to be a threat or possible boon to free (as in speech) software? Who actually owns the copyright on the server? If one of your members wanted to share the server source code outside of the development team would there be any legal means to prevent this? Could the Majik server be sold to any company, and if so then who would benefit due to development efforts? How well documented is the protocol used between the server and client? Are there any RFCs that will be released at some point on the client/server protocol? Is the client/server protocol a "moving target?" That is, does it change often and are many clients not backwards compatible with old server code? How would you react if another team made a server that the Majik client could use? How would you react if a commercial company made a server that the Majik client could use? Do you consider this form of licensing to be a model for commercial efforts? How would software developers benefit from the use of this licensing model? How would consumers benefit from the use of this licensing model? What are the disadvantages of this licensing model? That's all the questions I have. Sorry that the list of them is so long. I may have a few more, based on the responses I receive. However, they won't be so plentiful. Thank you very much for taking the time to go through all those...Thank you even more if you answered them. Good luck with your development efforts.
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