Free as in Marketable? 45
An anonymous reader asks: "I work in IT at a research university. A few of my co-workers and I are in the process of planning a piece of software that we would like to release to the public under the GPL license, but we're running into issues with our "intellectual property" office which thinks we have a potentially marketable product. We would rather give the product away for free and see our university get some credit for the product. How have others dealt with this problem? It's a shame that money is more important to a research school than sharing research with others."
Non-Commercial Use (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Non-Commercial Use (Score:2)
It's bad enough that people (well.. me) wouldn't contribute to the project, but good enough that it might not be rewritten by someone who would of if it was closed-source..
Yeah, it sucks... (Score:5, Insightful)
It seems like shitty thing, especially when you're youngue and impressionable- an undergrad or master's student with her head full of ideas about Freedom and Information Equality. I wish it was that way, but most people aren't willing to fund science for its own sake- they want a return on that investment.
*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:5, Insightful)
This is not Bell Labs or Xerox Parc, folks. *Those* are places that can whine about a return on investment.
And now my and my ancestor's investments in an educated society full of opportunity are being hijacked by lawyers and weak, cowardly, and greedy administration. The trustees and administrators of most universities in the US these days are a craven mafia eager to claim the public's infrastructure for themselves and set up a toll gate. These are the people who didn't make it on to the board of Enron and WorldCom because they were too untrustworthy.
Quit now. And LIGHT THE PLACE ON FIRE WHEN YOU LEAVE.
Re:*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:1)
This is not Bell Labs or Xerox Parc, folks. *Those* are places that can whine about a return on inves
Re:*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:2)
However, what the tax payers want isn't so much of a concern. If you think it is, you are dreaming. Most big research Universities want some of their projects to be profitable, and run the place accordingly. Yup, it sucks and leaves what the tax payer wants completely out of the equation.
Re:*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:3, Insightful)
Or maybe you think we just spend too much? Do students really need access to computers? Do teachers really deserve thier pay? Why don't we cut back on things like new equiptmen
Re:*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:2)
Whiner.
Re:*I* want a return on *my* investment (Score:2)
Your choice.
not necessarily opposed (Score:4, Insightful)
Make money?! (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Make money?! (Score:2, Informative)
That's pretty ignorant so I assume you've got to be kidding. This is so much more software getting sold "out there" than you know about. Just becasue it doesn't come in a box at "best buy" doesn't mean that there isn't someone making copious amounts of money off of it. Plus a "potentially marketable" product could be anything. Maybe this dude wrote some s
Sean is right (Score:3, Informative)
The large company method (Oracle, Borland, of course MS, etc) is probably out. These people will not buy that software from you. From the point of view of the MBA's who make the decision, anything writ
Re:Make money?! (Score:1)
I think what he means is that if you don't tell other people that the software exists (i.e., marketing), no one can purchase it.
My approach to starting a business has always been:
1. Find a group of potential customers I can reach.
2. Decide what product I can sell them.
3
Add a few librarys (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:Add a few librarys (Score:3, Insightful)
The GPL DOES NOT FORCE YOU TO RELEASE ANYTHING!!!! It forces you to release the source code if you distribute the program. Get that in your head.
Trying to force the code to be GPL is probably worse than anything. It took a long time to locate what libBFD is. It is used to read/write elf and coff for
Re:Add a few librarys (Score:3, Insightful)
The project is a university project and the first principle of such is to educate and explore. It is not there to make money nor to create copyright or patents for the university.
If you are studying or researching you can write any code you like to help with the research but it does belong to the University. The University is not going to say "You are no longer allowed to code" or "never use GPL'd librarys again". Students job isn't to code for the university and resear
Re:Add a few librarys (Score:3)
Using the GPL library to make your job easier is perfectly fine. But trying to
Getting your project out into the world.... (Score:5, Informative)
Since the internet boom, universities have been looking at software with an eye towards making money from about anything they could. I avoid that office until I absolutely can't.
Anyway....
First, is this something related to what you're doing at work? Did you come up with it, and work on it at work? If you didn't, they shouldn't be able to touch it. (insert standard "I'm not a lawyer, check with one of you're worried" disclaimer here).
If you did work on it at work, I seriously doubt this is something you can win, since you did use their resources to create it. I was never able to. The best I came up with was copyright by the university, free for non-commercial use. If someone uses it commercially, they have to obtain a license from the university.
A couple of tips:
1) First, hound the lawyers. I don't mean daily, but I do mean at least once every couple of weeks. If you don't, your release form will go to the bottom of the pile and you'll wait months and months. That's because there are many other people trying to get their patents, licenses, etc. approved. Be nice, friendly, but persistent. You'll need a good contact there in case someone actually does ask for the commerical license.
2) Don't expect to actually sell a commerical license. I've had many requests for commercial licenses, and none of them panned out. We charge about $3000 for the code (which is very cheap, if you compare it to the commerical world), and no further fees, but no one touched it.
3) If you accept changes from the outside to the code base you're maintaining, make it clear that it's under this license. The license should probably state something like that. This will make the lawyers feel better.
4) If at ALL possible, see if you can get a general license approved, that you can use to send out stuff that you'll come up with later. You'll still have to run it by the lawyers, but it'll take much less time.
5) If you're aware of any other software project that's gone through this before, find those folks, and ask them about all this. They might have something you can use to make the lawyers feel better. You might end up being this person if you're the one blazing the trail at your University. I know our license ended up being used by other projects after people consulted with me.
6) If you have no idea what to put in a license like this, look around at other universities that have released code like this, run it by the lawyers and see what they say.
7) This isn't really related to the license, but worth doing. Set up something to count the number of downloads you get on your software. Set up a mailing list too. If someone tries to axe the project because "no one uses it", you'll have ammo for that argument.
Good luck with all this. It's a real pain, but if you get a community behind your project to support you, it's worth it.
do a form of semi GPL (Score:1)
Re:Just GPL it and release it (Score:4, Insightful)
Am I missing something? (Score:2, Offtopic)
The GPL is a GOOD idea for commercial software (Score:4, Insightful)
Nothing prevents you from selling closed-source versions of the same code you release GPL. You can provide official support or installation or manuals (no reason to release the good manuals with the GPL code). Or you can also add a few extensions of your own to the closed-source version so it has more value other than just official support.
The GPL version may be extremely useful for advertising your program. If it does anything useful you will find awareness of your program very high.
You can also copyright the name of the program in such a way that anybody forking a version is forced to change the name significantly so there is no way to confuse the two. If your name is considered "official" then that other version will have a hard time competing.
The problem is your IP department has been brainwashed into believing the GPL is bad for them. In some cases they are so stupid that they think it is worse than releasing the code public-domain. In fact unless you have millions of dollars in marketing budget, the GPL is the only method you have to make your product commercially viable. Microsoft is scared to death of this competition appearing which is why they are fighting it in every way they can, including posting some misleading letters here.
Re:The GPL is a GOOD idea for commercial software (Score:3, Interesting)
Of course outright copying would be illegal, but how are you going to prove it? Are you going to have to constantly throw money at lawyers to get subpoenas to look at your (closed-source) competitors' code? Will the legal system even allow you to do that?
Plus a competitor could "contaminate" their code with yours without really taking it line-by-line; a patent may be helpful a
Re:The GPL is a GOOD idea for commercial software (Score:2)
Dual-Licensing Scheme (Score:2, Insightful)
They need you as much as you need them (Score:1, Interesting)
Point them to the kermit project at Columbia university. You need to talk to your bo
have you read the FSF doc about this? (Score:3, Informative)
I haven't seen it mentioned anywhere:
(Releasing Free Software if you work at a University)
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/univer
Hope this helps.
Ciaran O'Riordan
Time for some common sense (Score:2)
Like it or not, giving away software doesn't usually fall under research. If they're paying your salary, suck it up and deal with it.
Re:Time for some common sense (Score:1)
Oxford University (Score:3, Informative)
In short, if this is research, it's quite likely that the university will allow you to distribute it regardless of the official policies; but if you were hired for the purpose of writing a piece of software... well, it belongs to the university and they can do whatever they like with it.
Get the sponsor to request it (Score:2)
We've come to a similar conclusion at the research institution I work for, however it requires more advanced planning. If we're doing something that we want to release as open source, we get the sponsors to write a letter saying that they want such and such software that we're working on released as open source because it will help advance research in that area, makes it easier for us to collaborate with our peers at other institutions, etc.
Repeat after me: The person holding the purse strings is always ri
Guerilla Tactics (Score:2)
Re:Guerilla Tactics (Score:2)
Btw, this is a reason why the GNU project ask for your copyright. So if you want to give them code under the GPL, you must first show that you do indeed have the copyright for the code, the right to make it GPL. Last thing you want is for a bit of software to become very popular, and then the university turns round and tells everyone they want their program back, because the person who gave it away didn't have the right to.
How about the LGPL (Score:1)
Use GPL code in your code (Score:1)
Forcing the hand of the "intellectual property" office sounds somewhat mo
Re:maybe you should read the GPL (Score:1)
Open Source release can have benefits. (Score:2)
So you need to put something in the other pan of the scales - something which will advantage the University from an OS release.
Presumably this software is (a) useful for your research, or you wouldn't have written it, (b) usef
Similar experience (Score:2)
The arguments that convinced them to allow me to go forward were about the business aspects of trying to market the software. When would the company make a firm decision to move f