“Choosing an Open Source License”

This week's online edition of the Java Developer's Journal has an editorial by Kevin Bedell, editor of LinuxWorld, on the issues being discussed on OSI's license-discuss mailing list. They're talking about what the license would look like if Sun wanted to release Java under an open source license, and yet still require compatibility with the Java VM test suite and was determined to prevent fragmentation (incompatible forking).

Can something be considered to be "open source" if some organization stays in control of the standards that the software implements? In other words, is "Open Source/Closed Standards" a good idea?

It was surprising to find that at the top of the JDJ because that's one of the specific issues Dave mentioned in yesterday's audio "Coffee Notes," regarding the source-release of Frontier's kernel (to which I linked earlier today).

On another note: isn't it ridiculous that even with the browser window open to 1091 pixels wide, the article is only 1 inch wide because of all the ads on their page? That's crazy. You'll be lucky if you can find the article at all!

It's even worse on LinuxWorld, where the article is only given about 1/2 inch. Click the thumbnails to the left to see what I'm seeing.