Is Apple worse for open source software than Microsoft?

How about Newton's laws?

No-one stopped him from taking those to his grave (since patents didnt exist around then). It should be up to the mathematician! Perleman solved poincare' and didn't care about the money or any of the fame that came with it, didnt want to make money of it, so he released it publicly. Would you blame him if he tried to patent it to make money of a solution only 1 person in the world could come up with?
 
No-one stopped him from taking those to his grave (since patents didnt exist around then). It should be up to the mathematician! Perleman solved poincare' and didn't care about the money or any of the fame that came with it, didnt want to make money of it, so he released it publicly. Would you blame him if he tried to patent it to make money of a solution only 1 person in the world could come up with?

Yes.
 
Apple have always controlled the hardware AND the software. Thats WAY worse than anything MS have done.

The only reason OSX is stable is because it runs on standardised hardware...because apple won't let you run it on anything else. That is scarcely an achievement. MS runs on almost any hardware.
 
Would you blame him if he tried to patent it to make money of a solution only 1 person in the world could come up with?
All the more reason the idea should be free, don't you think? How abhorrently selfish does one have to be otherwise...
 
Apple have always controlled the hardware AND the software. Thats WAY worse than anything MS have done.
Or better. Depending on your point of view. Actually, their's nothing good or bad about it. It just is the way it is. Take it or leave it.
The only reason OSX is stable is because it runs on standardised hardware...because apple won't let you run it on anything else. That is scarcely an achievement. MS runs on almost any hardware.
Not really true. Check out the hackintosh project. They have OS X running on a variety of hardware. OS X runs better on my PC than Windows does.
 


All the more reason the idea should be free, don't you think? How abhorrently selfish does one have to be otherwise...

Wow, so mathematicians must solve the worlds hardest problems and get payed fckall (really, academics earn very little) while other fckrs use that math to make millions ?? Do you not see a problem here? Is that not disgusting?? Bring on the patents, make the mathematician rich, make the guys that come up with the IDEAS RICH!!
 
Wow, so mathematicians must solve the worlds hardest problems and get payed fckall (really, academics earn very little) while other fckrs use that math to make millions ?? Do you not see a problem here? Is that not disgusting?? Bring on the patents, make the mathematician rich, make the guys that come up with the IDEAS RICH!!

What tripe. Human knowledge is derivative.

Show me a man who claims to have invented something and didn't stand on the shoulders of giants to get there and I will show you a liar.
 
What is OSX based on? There's a huge chunk of BSD code in the Mac OS X kernel! It's bizarre that Apple is happy to benefit from code based on the open BSD license but sees it fit to stifle innovation from either the Open Source or Free Software community that developed BSD.

This is a poor article and it would be funny if it wasn't untruthful.
Apple actively supports open source, see here and here.

There may be a case to be made about Apple's approach to the iPhone/iPod touch/iPad not being benign, but they created that universe and they can pretty much do as they please with it.

It is baseless to claim that Apple is worse for open source than Microsoft.
 
How is Apple stifling innovation from the OSS community? Have you looked into Apple's contributions to Open Source?

I'm not disputing their contribution to the OSS community(they have done a fair bit), but rather their attitude that seems to promote a philosophy of "biting the hand that feeds you". Have you looked at the agreements
developers have to sign in order to write code for the iPhone platform?
 
What a load of bull. This article is one of the worst articles I've read on MyBroadband. To the author, do your research properly next time.
 
This is a poor article and it would be funny if it wasn't untruthful.
Apple actively supports open source, see here and here.

I didn't say Apple does NOT contribute to OSS

It is baseless to claim that Apple is worse for open source than Microsoft.

How? Is it sufficient to make such an assertion without some real arguments? I'm interested in a counter argument that clarifies how what Apple is doing on those platforms isn't just as bad as MS.
I support the idea of renaming the title of the article to "DON'T COME HERE WITH THAT TENDENCY...THAT APPLE TENDENCY...."
:)
 
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I'm not disputing their contribution to the OSS community(they have done a fair bit), but rather their attitude that seems to promote a philosophy of "biting the hand that feeds you". Have you looked at the agreements
developers have to sign in order to write code for the iPhone platform?
Well if you don't like it ... don't develop for it. Simple as that.
 
Well if you don't like it ... don't develop for it. Simple as that.

You're drifting away from the essence of the article. The author is questioning that way of doing things ..i.e the moral standing of Apple with regards to its Open Source philosophy.
If the debate was about liking how companies chose to go open or closed, then the author would have written about every little software house out there that chooses to be "closed".
Judging by the many threads and articles on the net, it's a polarizing topic that guarantees an eternal debate... I'm out.
:)
 
I'm not disputing their contribution to the OSS community(they have done a fair bit), but rather their attitude that seems to promote a philosophy of "biting the hand that feeds you". Have you looked at the agreements
developers have to sign in order to write code for the iPhone platform?

Indeed I have. What is your biggest point of contention with it though?
 
Some excerpts from the article, with commentary:
Apple, for example, has already decided not to include support for Adobe's Flash on its iPhones and iPad devices. Adobe is not the best example of a free software company itself but even if it wanted to give you Flash software for your iPad, for free, it can't.
OK Flash can't run on any phone. It's a performance issue. I'm sure if Adobe actually had a version of Flash that ran acceptably on Android or any mobile platform, Apple might consider it.
Opera created a version of its browser for the iPhone but it was only after a prolonged campaign by Opera fans that Apple allowed the software into its applications market.
No, Opera mini submitted a version of the app which violated the rules of the App store (they used their own Java runtime), and only after a prolonged development period did they actually develop a proper Objective-C app.
The contract is filled with limitations including those that bar developers from distributing software created with the iPhone software development kit (SDK) via any avenue other than the App Store.
This is news? Apple said that the only way to get Apps onto the iPhone was via the App store, when they announced it almost 3 years ago.
There is also a clause in the contract that bans reverse engineering any of Apple's iPhone OS or SDK.
No company would allow that!
Of course users could simply stop using Apple's products and developers could stop developing for the iPhone and iPad. That would send a strong message.
Yeah. Except with it's large and wealthy user base, easy one-click App store, 70/30 profit split, it's actually the most lucrative and developer-friendly ecosystem around.
 
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