Topics for this podcast:
*Open source in consumer devices
*VMware-Zimbra deal highlights open source, cloud
*A capitalist’s guide to open source licensing
*Latest on Oracle-Sun-MySQL, M&A implications
iTunes or direct download (24:48, 5.7 MB)
Having been a free software user and supporter for many years, I am disheartened by some of the comments made in the MySQL/Oracle debate regarding the GNU Public License (GPL) and other licenses. There is much throwing around of misconceptions and untruths about licenses and their differences. In this blog, I shall take on some of the bigger misconceptions.
While Linux is indeed distributed under the GPL, as is MySQL, Linux has an exception that allows anyone to run any kind of applications (including closed source applications) on top of Linux.
There is nothing in the GPL that forbids running closed source applications on top of GPL-licensed software. The only thing that GPL has in this regard is that if you make changes to GPL-licensed software and re-distribute it as a binary, then you must make the modified source code available. This is the reason why commercial Linux distributions make available their source code, either online (as Red Hat does) or on the demand of those who purchase copies (à la SUSE). It is also the reason why there are many commercial software products running on Linux, such as the Oracle Database Server, MATLAB, etc., etc.
I think that GPL is a great open source license, in many cases the best license. The GPL license ensures freedom of the code and at the same time gives the copyright holder a very strong control on the code and it’s ecosystem, especially it’s closed source customers.1
This is another contradiction. How does the GPL give the copyright owner strong control over its closed source customers? In fact, the rules of GPL mandate that any closed source customer is able to obtain a copy of the source code for their closed source version. Furthermore, that customer is then able to release the source code to anyone, and if they want to, sell their own version. So in fact, with the GPL there is no way to control their closed source customers.
Currently, anyone can take the MySQL source code and make changes to it, as Percona and Monty AB currently do. If, however, they decide to sell a closed source copy, they must also provide the source if asked to do so–as the GPL enforces.
Oracle should change the license of MySQL to a more permissive Open Source license that would ensure that if Oracle would try to kill MySQL, the community would be able to take over and rescue MySQL and develop it as a product that can be freely used by everyone.
The fact that it is GPL-licensed means that anyone fork it and create their own version, as Percona and Monty AB have done, regardless of whether Oracle kills it or does not. So what would releasing MySQL under a more permissive Open Source license (such as the Apache Software License or the BSD license) give the community?
Nothing, I believe. It would give anyone the freedom to take MySQL, make changes to it, and sell it as a closed source product, without having to share the source. And that sounds to me like a much better way to control one’s closed source customers than the GPL.
So, a change of license would benefit only those who want to produce and sell a modified version of MySQL and sell it without the obligation to give away the source code.
1. I understand “closed source customer” to be mean one that has purchased a binary copy. back
Topics for this podcast:
*2009 review and 2010 preview
*New CAOS survey and report – Climate Change
*Ups and downs in new round of GPL lawsuits
*Oracle-Sun-MySQL saga continues
iTunes or direct download (30:00, 6.9 MB)
The attendees were not satisfied with the first answer RMS gave to Brian, that Harish Pillay (Chief Technical Architect, Red Hat Singapore), chose to ask RMS what more he had to say, with regards to the letter he’d written. He answered quite candidly in this video, which Brian chimed in for as well.
The back channel for all this was Twitter… Don’t hesitate to follow @harishpillay, @brianaker, @piawaugh or even @webmink (Simon Phipps, while not at the event, was available on Twitter). Some interesting reading, naturally.
At foss.my 2009, Brian Aker asked Richard Stallman at his keynote, about the Oracle/Sun acquisition (with a focus on MySQL), with regards to the parallel licensing approach used by MySQL. Brian was referring to:
As only the original rights holder can sell commercial licenses, no new forked version of the code will have the ability to practice the parallel licensing approach, and will not easily generate the resources to support continued development of the MySQL platform.
from Richard’s Letter to the EC opposing Oracle’s acquisition of MySQL. Listen to the discussion between Brian and Richard.
Topics for this podcast:
*Microsoft founds CodePlex Foundation, losing Sam Ramji
*Software patents at the center of MS, OIN maneuvering
*Eucalyptus Systems releases hybrid cloud product
*Oracle-Sun Microsystems and the potential fate of MySQL
iTunes or direct download (26:40, 6.1 MB)
Topics for this podcast:
*EC pauses Oracle-Sun over MySQL
* Open source licenses debated
* Red Hat growth opportunities and Summit roundup
* Reductive Labs seeking cloud role for Puppet software
* VMware-SpringSource analyzed
iTunes or direct download (26:04, 5.9 MB)
By now you are probably aware that the European Commission has decided to launch an extended investigation into Oracle’s acquisition of Sun based on concerns over MySQL.
The new has prompted a lot of criticism of the EC, much of it suggesting that the delay will do considerable harm to Sun (and therefore Oracle). This argument is valid - Sun’s already declining revenue has been in freefall since the deal was announced and one wonders how far it will fall in another 90 days of stasis.
Other criticism, (such as this from Matt Asay) focuses on the suggestion that the delay will do little to help MySQL or its users, and that the EC fails to understand open source.
This also has some validity. The EC talks about “Oracle’s incentive to further develop MySQL as an open source database” but as Matt points out “even Oracle can’t put the open-source genie back in the bottle once it has been released, as MySQL has, under the GNU General Public License.”
This is true. although I would argue, that Oracle’s potential control over MySQL is not about licensing, but copyright. The FT states that Oracle “doesn’t control the IP, since the software is available under the GPL”. That is not entirely true. The existing code will always be under the GPL but as the copyright for that code would be fully-owned by Oracle it is under no obligation to release future developments under the GPL.
I do not expect that to happen, but copyright ownership does not just impact the ability to license code, it also provides control over potential commercial uses of that code. This is where it could be argued that the EC could be right to have anti-competitive concerns over Oracle’s future ownership of MySQL (even if it doesn’t understand why, or hasn’t articulated that it does).
Criticism of the EC has also suggested that it is disproportionately focusing on a products with a tiny market share. There are various suggestions as to quite how small MySQL’s market share is, with the WSJ citing 0.2%, but also 1.5%, AHN 0.04%, the FT “around half a percentage point”.
What all these reports overlook is that MySQL’s influence is much greater than its market share, not only in terms of more widespread unpaid usage, but also in terms of the ecosystem of vendors that are building products based on MySQL to tap into its widespread adoption.
Examples include Kickfire, Infobright and Calpont in data warehousing, ScaleDB in shared-disk clustering, Tokutek in Web-application querying, and Schooner Information Technology and Virident Systems in caching appliances.
All of these products enable mySQL to better compete with Oracle’s database products, and many of these have commercial relationships with Sun that enable them to use MySQL in proprietary products (while Infobright is itself open source, it also has a relationship with Sun).
Calpont also plans to offer an open source data warehouse based on MySQL but has put is plans on hold while it waits to see what Oracle will do with the MySQL database. Calpont’s concern is that Oracle will choose not to promote commercial relationships that use MySQL to compete more directly with Oracle’s Database business.
The MariaDB fork provides a potential alternative for these vendors, but as we previously discussed on this blog there are questions as to whether closed-source MySQL storage engines are compatible with MariaDB.
As noted in that post, ScaleDB’s Mike Hogan has argued that it can be done via an open source intermediary layer (and given that ScaleDB does not have a commercial arrangement with Sun, the company will be hoping that its analysis is correct), but MariaDB and MySQL creator Monty Widenius is not convinced: “This can only be done by buying MySQL licenses from Sun for each copy of MariaDB that is distributed.”
If Monty is correct then Oracle’s impending ownership of MySQL could theoretically have a significant impact on the emerging market for commercial products based on MySQL and their ability to compete with the Oracle Database.
As we noted in a report on the wider implications of Oracle’s impending ownership of MySQL (451 subscribers only) “For the commercial arrangements between these vendors and Oracle to survive, they will have to show that they can provide value to MySQL without impacting Oracle.”
Is that anti-competitive? Perhaps. I would argue that it certainly warrants further investigation.
It appears that little MySQL has just become a disproportionally big player in the Oracle-Sun takeover deal…. article by Associated Press: EU probes Oracle’s bid to buy Sun notes:
EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said Thursday that regulators needed to examine the effect of a deal “when the world’s biggest proprietary database company proposes to take over the world’s leading open-source database company.”
Ah, Neelie Kroes. Dutch lady from the liberal (that’s seriously right-wing in NL, my American friends 
party, formerly minister for infrastructure in NL, long time ago.
So what can happen now? The EU can (and I’m skipping a few steps for brevity here) force the MySQL part of Sun to be auctioned separately, to allow the remainder of the detail to go through. One thing is fairly predictable, the price is probably not going to be $1 bln. As far as it wasn’t overpriced back then, a fair amount of talent and activity is not actually inside Sun any more. Less predictable, who might buy what is now there?
And on a side note, where will Drizzle fit… would be regarded as part of the MySQL bundle as it uses its IP for its foundation? If MySQL goes, and Drizzle stays, then Sun(/Oracle) will have a project for which it does not own the core IP. That can be perfectly fine, but that’s not what it’s been aiming for: Drizzle accepts contributions under BSD license, which means that the core IP owner (currently Sun) is actually able to dual-license it just like MySQL. Not saying that’s what it intends with Drizzle, but the arrangement currently makes Drizzle a potential net asset rather than merely a cool/useful project.
I think that both MySQL and Drizzle can survive without anyone in particular owning the core IP, just like no particular core IP owner would be able to kill the projects. There’s too much independent interest (not just intellectual but business/money) and activity, so it really doesn’t matter from that respect. But it’s just a whole lot of unheaval that, perhaps, we might be better off without.
In any case… who would have thought, that little database originally written by Monty in Helsinki, causing so much trouble