Re: [Linux-aus] Goodbye AUUG, hello phoenix

[Bret Busby <bret@busby.net>]

On Thu, 21 Sep 2006, James Purser wrote:

> I remember that one. The author claimed that Linus ripped off Minix to
> build Linux. It was proved to be a shill document before it had even
> reached the presses.
> --

If my memory is correct, I understood that Linus Torvalds studied Minix, 
and then decided that it wasn't good enough, so he started to create the 
Linux kernel. In so doing, he started with his knowledge of Minix.

Now, if someone starts with a design of someone else, and says it is not 
good enough, and uses it as a starting point, varying it to suit the 
intent of the person who said that the original design was not good 
enough, where does the intellectual property, lie? Can the person who 
came up with the derivative product, claim no knowledge, and, therefore, 
no debt, to the original design that that person used as a starting 
point? And, to what degree, do we know what of Minix, was used, and, 
what was not used, by Linus Torvalds, in his work on Linux? So, what 
truth do we know, of how much he owes to Minix, in his work on Linux?

I suggest that this is not such a "clear cut case", but could end up 
being a matter for making lots of money, and, lots of work, for 
intellectual property lawyers, over many, many years, if the parties 
involved, wanted to make an issue of it.

Perhaps, the only people who really know the whole story, are the two 
people directly involved; Tenenbaum, and Torvalds; "The Two T's"

I think that, while many of us are involved with Linux to varying 
extents (me, just as a user, to others as kernel developers), for any of 
us, other than those two people, to try to make judgements, would be 
doing neither of those two men, justice.

--
Bret Busby
Armadale
West Australia
..............

"So once you do know what the question actually is,
 you'll know what the answer means."
- Deep Thought,
  Chapter 28 of Book 1 of
  "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:
  A Trilogy In Four Parts",
  written by Douglas Adams,
  published by Pan Books, 1992

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