Doug> First, some background. Microsoft developed its own version
Doug> of Kerberos, a security system that authenticates users'
Doug> identities, for inclusion in Windows 2000. Nodding to
Doug> Kerberos' open-source roots, Microsoft posted its Kerberos
Doug> code on the Web a few weeks ago. But this wasn't a
Doug> classically open-source move; users had to run a licensing
Doug> agreement that included some non-disclosure rules. Slashdot
Doug> users picked up on the license and the proprietary nature of
Doug> some parts of Microsoft's Kerberos and posted links to the
Doug> code, along with information on how to bypass the licensing
Doug> agreement.
Free software is such an *ideal* way to make the 'technology transfer, Pentagon-system ,socialize costs, privatize profits' point. The Standard is a bit sloppy though; it's not that an NDA isn't a "classical open source move" it's just *not* open source (ick, the real term is 'free software') move *at all*. It's antithetical, not non-routine.
MS's Kerberos implementation -- remember, Kerberos is an MIT thing, public funds and all that -- is *classic MS* in one respect: it's very much embrace-and-extend by being *almost* but *not quite* compliant with the Kerberos specs. And, to boot, it's really broken in some wonky, only-MS-would-do-this ways.
MS has been working with the Kerberos/MIT folks, but they shafted them; it's the details of their "unique" implementation that are covered by the NDA that is referred to above. It's those docs that someone posted on /., hence provoking the wrath of MS. MS still hasn't learned the most basic rule of computer security: security by obscurity *isn't*.
The challenging thing is deciding what in this case is most deserving of scorn: MS or the DMCA.
Classic Linux/free software joke: How many MS programmers does it take to write really good software? More.
Doug> ...so that you can see
Doug> what news and community Web sites like Slashdot are up
Doug> against, now that the DMCA has become law." The calm was
Doug> impressive, but not exactly shared by most Slashdot users.
This is disingenuous: the Slashdot boys like to pretend that it's still a *community* site, but it hasn't been that since the day Andover.net bought Slashdot -- making 2 of the hundreds of people who built it filthy rich -- and since VA Linux gobbled up Andover.net. It's a commercial, corporate-owned Web site like so many others; the only difference may be that it's not actively contributing to the corporatization/shopping-mallification of the Web.
Doug> In the midst of the thousand-post scuffle, according to a
Doug> Wired News scoop e-mailed by Slashdot founder Rob Malda,
Doug> Slashdot got hit by a distributed denial of service
Doug> attack. How's that for timing?
Hah! /. goes down *all the time* and also just moved to a new server, so the chances that this is true are slim. (In fact /.'s lack of reliability is so legendary among Linux insiders, that we often blanch at hearing people use it to warrant (the otherwise quite warrantable claim) that Linux is a robust Web site platform. It is, but you wouldn't guess it from reading /. daily.)
Doug> ... The Linux-friendly Brits at The
Doug> Register grudgingly admitted, for perhaps the first time,
Doug> that Microsoft had a point. Microsoft's proprietary Kerberos
Doug> extensions are subject to copyright rules, "and the
Doug> draconian DMCA makes the distributor liable for the
Doug> copyright violation, and its resultant harm to the copyright
Doug> holder," wrote Annie Kermath. "No matter how ugly it looks,
Doug> Microsoft is within its legal rights to make the request."
This is *probably* true, so I guess the who-to-loath-most contest is won, for the first time ever, by something other than MS: the DMCA.
Doug> It's all irrelevant if a certain DOJ request gets accepted
Doug> by Judge Jackson, added The Register. That particular remedy
Doug> would force Microsoft to give third parties access to its
Doug> source code. We bet Judge Jackson will give that measure a
Doug> little more thought in the wake of the Slashdot
Doug> uproar. Microsoft might wind up wishing it had kept its
Doug> source open - or its mouth shut. - Jen Muehlbauer
Hmm, actually, I don't know a single free software hacker who really gives a damn about the MS source code. Sure, if it's ever available, we'll look and laugh and point and guffaw. But I don't know anyone who wants to *work* on it. <shudder/>
Best, Kendall Clark, Founder & President North Texas Linux Users Group, Inc.