4 ms·

> I found these two guys who ran this little company called Unipress, it was literally two guys in a garage, and I said, "Look, this needs to be free for univer

> I found these two guys who ran this little company called Unipress, it was literally two guys in a garage, and I said, "Look, this needs to be free for universities and not ridiculous for everybody else." Gosling sold them Gosling emacs. Before that he apparently "distributed it freely with no copyright notice." Although Gosling wrote Gosling Emacs, it was based on the plans he and Richard Stallman had developed for a new, widely portable Emacs. > And, you know, I realize I'm a radical. I like to actually have a bed to sleep in and food and I will occasionally sleep in my office, but not as a regular thing. Gosling made millions at Sun Microsystems. That's a little more than needing "food on the table" and "a roof over one's head". Stallman also could have made similar money, but didn't because he thought other things were more important. That's everyone's choice to make, but putting down others because they approached something differently is just bad form. (edit: spelling name)

floren 7y ago
Gosling.
clSTophEjUdRanu 7y ago
Yeah, they were going to sell it as a small business. Gosling said that once RMS found out he freaked and ripped out any copyright headers and released as is for free. Then IBM and DEC used RMS Emacs with their machines to which the two guys sued and won but they didn't kill RMS Emacs so it was a "Pyrric victory." In court the source code for both was the same and RMS had even forgotten to replace a few of the original copyright headers.
cptskippy 7y ago
They were discussing University licenses and legal battles that lead Gosling to include a license in his source for Emacs. > Gosling: But then <pause> then there was at one point <pause> I kinda realized at one point <pause> um <pause> I was ither <pause> I was ither going to be Mr. Emacs for the rest of my life or graduate. I couldn't actually do both <pause> um <pause> so I decided I wanted to graduate. > Interviewer: So then but your display algorithm got incorporated by Richard Stallman into GNU Emacs? > Gosling: Well <pause> Actually it was more than that. He just took all the source code. > Interviewer: oh ok > Gosling: Right? It was.. It started out as all of the source code and he just edited the copyright notices. > Interviewer: Really? So he just essentially stole your program? > Gosling: Yeah <pause> so <sigh> um > Interviewer: And claimed it as his own? > Gosling: Yeah <pause> At this point Gosling reiterates his revelation about either graduating or remaining "Mr. Emacs" and the explains how he went around to "all the usual suspects" at MIT and UCLA asking if anyone wanted to take up maintenance of Emacs. Everyone turned him down, including Stallman who Gosling said responded with a "frothing hell no" and explained that Stallman's position was that Unix was the spawn of the devil. Gosling then discusses University licenses, litigation, IP, and opensource as reasons why he decided to license Emacs and ask for letters acknowledging the license from people he distributed the source code to. Gosling then explains how the license for Emacs ended up with two guys in a garage but never actually says that he sold it to them, just that Emacs should remain free for universities. He explained how when Stallman found out about the license transfer, Stallman freaked out. Gosling then expresses some remorse he felt for the two guys in a garage because Stallman proceeded to release GNU Emacs and, despite legal victories against DEC and IBM, the two guys were force to abandon Emacs because they had no legal recourse against Stallman. The interviewer then asked why no one went after Stallman and Gosling explained that Stallman was essentially homeless and you gain nothing from suing a homeless man. Gosling was trying to explain delicately and uncomfortably that Stallman had different views on economic models when the interviewer then took a jib at Stallman's hygiene. Gosling, who is already visibly uncomfortable discussing the topic, deflected by saying that they had different opinions and that Gosling preferred to have food on the table and a roof over his head.
kelnos 7y ago
A copyright notice is not required for copyright; by default in the US, everything copyrightable is copyrighted unless it comes with a public domain notice. If there's no license attached, or no agreement somewhere, then you do not have legal right to redistribute someone else's work, even if they gave it to you freely. Gosling was perfectly within his rights to sell gosemacs to Unipress (though note that Gosling never explicitly says in the interview that he sold it to them; he may have given it to them for free). RMS was not within his rights to grab Gosling's sources and change the copyright notices to suit his fancy. You are quoting Gosling in a selective manner in order to paint him in a bad light. Please don't do that. The bit about a bed to sleep in was a direct response to the conversation veering into how RMS at the time didn't have his own residence, and slept in his office, so there was little legal recourse against RMS since RMS had nothing to lose in a suit. Nor is your comment even relevant: Gosling had not yet made millions at Sun back in the 80s. He was a grad student, and, presumably, like most grad students I know, was not exactly flush with cash. I really don't get how you're coming at Gosling so hard; after listening to the interview, he's clearly uncomfortable talking about the topic, tries to avoid pointing the finger at anyone unless appropriate, and it was the interviewer who makes a quip about RMS's hygiene, not Gosling.
- strenholme 7y ago
  That only started to be true in 1988, when the US adopted the Berne Convention with its copyright law. In 1981 or 1983, anything without an explicit copyright declaration was considered public domain.
  - bbanyc 7y ago
    I'm looking at the Gosmacs source right now, and just above the skull-and-bones warning it says "Copyright (c) 1981,1980 James Gosling" If nothing else, Gosling had a valid copyright. Mind you, there were no license terms on any file and it was distributed as source code.
    - strenholme 7y ago
      Since Gosling never initiated legal proceedings against RMS, and since the statute of limitations for copyright is three to five years [1], the issue is moot today. [1] https://law.freeadvice.com/intellectual_property/copyright_law/copyright_statute_limitations.htm https://law.freeadvice.com/intellectual_property/copyright_l...
tobias3 7y ago
I found this copy of what seems to be the source code: https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/emacs-history/blob/sources/reid.org/%7Ebrian/misc/gosling-emacs-1999.tar https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/emacs-history/blob/sources/... It has copyright notices everywhere (not that this matters). And following notice in Installation: Please remember that Emacs is copyrighted. You are free to use Emacs internally, but you are not free to redistribute it. If someone is interested in obtaining a copy of Emacs, refer them to me: So you are not allowed to redistribute it without written permission from the author. I also think back then redistributing source code was the "portable" way if redistributing programs and redistributing binaries wasn't feasible.
- kragen 7y ago
  Yes, many proprietary Unix programs were distributed as source code so that you could compile them on your Unix system; this was especially important before shared libraries. It wouldn't be surprising if Gosling had at some point added copyright notices to the source code, and certainly the version Stallman was using had Gosling's copyright notices. There's a separate question of whether there was a version released without copyright notices.
kentrado 7y ago
>Gosling made millions at Sun Microsystems. That's a little more than needing "food on the table" and "a roof over one's head". Stallman also could have made similar money, but didn't because he thought other things were more important. That's everyone's choice to make, but putting down others because they approached something differently is just bad form. Look where that got him. Homeless, disgraced and without a penny to show for it. Let this be a cautionary tale about martyrdom.
- traderjane 7y ago
  One cannot say stupid things without some f u money.
- mikeeusa5 7y ago
  Stallman is not disgraced. He stands by his principals. You, enemies, attack him; but you cannot bring him down. For all your "pennies" you cannot achieve what even a dirt farmer in Afghanistan achieves: a virgin child bride. As the Prophets had. Yes, moderators, I know you will delete this: Islam will end your lines however. You have no futures.

floren 7y ago

Gosling.

clSTophEjUdRanu 7y ago

Yeah, they were going to sell it as a small business. Gosling said that once RMS found out he freaked and ripped out any copyright headers and released as is for free. Then IBM and DEC used RMS Emacs with their machines to which the two guys sued and won but they didn't kill RMS Emacs so it was a "Pyrric victory." In court the source code for both was the same and RMS had even forgotten to replace a few of the original copyright headers.

cptskippy 7y ago

They were discussing University licenses and legal battles that lead Gosling to include a license in his source for Emacs. > Gosling: But then <pause> then there was at one point <pause> I kinda realized at one point <pause> um <pause> I was ither <pause> I was ither going to be Mr. Emacs for the rest of my life or graduate. I couldn't actually do both <pause> um <pause> so I decided I wanted to graduate. > Interviewer: So then but your display algorithm got incorporated by Richard Stallman into GNU Emacs? > Gosling: Well <pause> Actually it was more than that. He just took all the source code. > Interviewer: oh ok > Gosling: Right? It was.. It started out as all of the source code and he just edited the copyright notices. > Interviewer: Really? So he just essentially stole your program? > Gosling: Yeah <pause> so <sigh> um > Interviewer: And claimed it as his own? > Gosling: Yeah <pause> At this point Gosling reiterates his revelation about either graduating or remaining "Mr. Emacs" and the explains how he went around to "all the usual suspects" at MIT and UCLA asking if anyone wanted to take up maintenance of Emacs. Everyone turned him down, including Stallman who Gosling said responded with a "frothing hell no" and explained that Stallman's position was that Unix was the spawn of the devil. Gosling then discusses University licenses, litigation, IP, and opensource as reasons why he decided to license Emacs and ask for letters acknowledging the license from people he distributed the source code to. Gosling then explains how the license for Emacs ended up with two guys in a garage but never actually says that he sold it to them, just that Emacs should remain free for universities. He explained how when Stallman found out about the license transfer, Stallman freaked out. Gosling then expresses some remorse he felt for the two guys in a garage because Stallman proceeded to release GNU Emacs and, despite legal victories against DEC and IBM, the two guys were force to abandon Emacs because they had no legal recourse against Stallman. The interviewer then asked why no one went after Stallman and Gosling explained that Stallman was essentially homeless and you gain nothing from suing a homeless man. Gosling was trying to explain delicately and uncomfortably that Stallman had different views on economic models when the interviewer then took a jib at Stallman's hygiene. Gosling, who is already visibly uncomfortable discussing the topic, deflected by saying that they had different opinions and that Gosling preferred to have food on the table and a roof over his head.

kelnos 7y ago

A copyright notice is not required for copyright; by default in the US, everything copyrightable is copyrighted unless it comes with a public domain notice. If there's no license attached, or no agreement somewhere, then you do not have legal right to redistribute someone else's work, even if they gave it to you freely. Gosling was perfectly within his rights to sell gosemacs to Unipress (though note that Gosling never explicitly says in the interview that he sold it to them; he may have given it to them for free). RMS was not within his rights to grab Gosling's sources and change the copyright notices to suit his fancy. You are quoting Gosling in a selective manner in order to paint him in a bad light. Please don't do that. The bit about a bed to sleep in was a direct response to the conversation veering into how RMS at the time didn't have his own residence, and slept in his office, so there was little legal recourse against RMS since RMS had nothing to lose in a suit. Nor is your comment even relevant: Gosling had not yet made millions at Sun back in the 80s. He was a grad student, and, presumably, like most grad students I know, was not exactly flush with cash. I really don't get how you're coming at Gosling so hard; after listening to the interview, he's clearly uncomfortable talking about the topic, tries to avoid pointing the finger at anyone unless appropriate, and it was the interviewer who makes a quip about RMS's hygiene, not Gosling.

strenholme 7y ago
That only started to be true in 1988, when the US adopted the Berne Convention with its copyright law. In 1981 or 1983, anything without an explicit copyright declaration was considered public domain.
- bbanyc 7y ago
  I'm looking at the Gosmacs source right now, and just above the skull-and-bones warning it says "Copyright (c) 1981,1980 James Gosling" If nothing else, Gosling had a valid copyright. Mind you, there were no license terms on any file and it was distributed as source code.
  - strenholme 7y ago
    Since Gosling never initiated legal proceedings against RMS, and since the statute of limitations for copyright is three to five years [1], the issue is moot today. [1] https://law.freeadvice.com/intellectual_property/copyright_law/copyright_statute_limitations.htm https://law.freeadvice.com/intellectual_property/copyright_l...

tobias3 7y ago

I found this copy of what seems to be the source code: https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/emacs-history/blob/sources/reid.org/%7Ebrian/misc/gosling-emacs-1999.tar https://github.com/larsbrinkhoff/emacs-history/blob/sources/... It has copyright notices everywhere (not that this matters). And following notice in Installation: Please remember that Emacs is copyrighted. You are free to use Emacs internally, but you are not free to redistribute it. If someone is interested in obtaining a copy of Emacs, refer them to me: So you are not allowed to redistribute it without written permission from the author. I also think back then redistributing source code was the "portable" way if redistributing programs and redistributing binaries wasn't feasible.

kragen 7y ago
Yes, many proprietary Unix programs were distributed as source code so that you could compile them on your Unix system; this was especially important before shared libraries. It wouldn't be surprising if Gosling had at some point added copyright notices to the source code, and certainly the version Stallman was using had Gosling's copyright notices. There's a separate question of whether there was a version released without copyright notices.

kentrado 7y ago

>Gosling made millions at Sun Microsystems. That's a little more than needing "food on the table" and "a roof over one's head". Stallman also could have made similar money, but didn't because he thought other things were more important. That's everyone's choice to make, but putting down others because they approached something differently is just bad form. Look where that got him. Homeless, disgraced and without a penny to show for it. Let this be a cautionary tale about martyrdom.

traderjane 7y ago
One cannot say stupid things without some f u money.
mikeeusa5 7y ago
Stallman is not disgraced. He stands by his principals. You, enemies, attack him; but you cannot bring him down. For all your "pennies" you cannot achieve what even a dirt farmer in Afghanistan achieves: a virgin child bride. As the Prophets had. Yes, moderators, I know you will delete this: Islam will end your lines however. You have no futures.