Week 7 - Lecture summary

Free culture, free society

"Our current culture is one in which creators get to create only with permission
of the powerful, or of creators from the past"

- Lawrence Lessig





Creative Commons is a non-profit organisation dedicating to promoting reasonable copyright. They help creators make their work available in more flexible ways by developing standard licences and tools. This way they enable "some rights reserved" instead of "all rights reserved".

Once upon a time all software was free, and everybody could alter it and make improvements to it, reuse it and share it. About the same as an open air market or sharing your favourite food recipes with friends. Almost 20 years ago, Richard M Stallman started the Free Software Foundation. Like "the good old days", his aim was to create an operating system based solely on free software. His creation became GNU (GNU's-Not-Unix). This later became a part of the GNU/Linux Operating System, a highly successful alternative to MacOS and Microsoft Windows, that can be ran on almost any computer. During early 1990s, Finnish programmer Linus Thorvalds developed the experimental Linux and after inviting people to contribute this ended up as the GNU/Linux. Today this is used world wide and have a 30 % marked share.


So let's look at how software works. Instructions that are written in Programming Languages are called Source Code and tells a computer how to operate certain functions. The Source Code is then translated into files that can run on specific computers. However, most users are not aware that search engines and different apps run on FOSS. The basic principles of free software is a freedom scale from 0 to 3; from running the program to improving and releasing those improvements - giving the society the benefits of your work. To enforce these principles, Stallman created GNU Public Licence (GPL). This legal document con trolls what can and cannot be done with FOSS. Any attempts of stealing and selling software protected by GLP will end with lawsuit. It was this concept that inspired Lawrence Lessig to start Creative Commons.


Regarding proprietary software (Windows Vista, Office, Photoshop, MacOS), the Source Code is confidential, with legal protection and non-disclosure agreements. The software is created by paid staff employed by companies and then sold to the public. This way we don't actually own it, we just have a licence to use it. When we buy it, we sign an agreement and it is illegal to copy the software for your friends regardless of how much better the computer will work. If you experience problems with the software, you simply have to wait for the upgraded version and pay again!

In the free software (Mozilla Thunderbird/Firefox, Open Office, amsn) world, on the other hand, the Source Code is available. Under the GLP anyone can see/edit/use it and it is developed by volunteers in the society. Previous mentioned business model is providing services supporting this free software.





Our community can collaborate towards creating good things and how you use your computer is totally up to YOU not Apple or Microsoft. You have a choice - use it wisely!

TuteSpark


This week we were told to try out different open source software and compare this to proprietary software. I have MS Vista on my laptop, but have never liked the functionality of Internet Explorer. I have used Moxilla Firefox for a long time, and really enjoy it. I like the simple structure of this browser and think it's very easy to navigate. I'm sure the differences isn't that severe, but I guess it's a matter of what you are used to. Another plus for Mozilla Firefox is that I experience less downloading errors compared to Internet Explorer and it seems that Firefox is less likely to crash while you're on the web.

Another open source software I frequently use, is the VLC media player. In my experience, this player has hardly no errors, is very user friendly and you can pretty much play all the files you want on it. It also has a portable version, so you can watch movies on the go. Compared to the MS Windows Media Player I find VLC superior.

Finally, I downloaded Pidgin. After trying it out for a few days, I found that I like MS Trillian slightly better. For me, the design as well as the functionality is important, and Pidgin compared to Trillian was boring and didn't have as many functions.