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Peru Weighs GNU GPL law
posted by md on Tuesday April 23, @06:04AM
from the dept.
Open Source mpawlo writes "It appears Peru is considering a law [requiring] governmental software be free software. One main consideration is security. Governmental officials are afraid that proprietary software (with closed source) may contain backdoors and security bugs. Further, the move may stimulate the IT industry in the region, hence more development will be carried out locally. Costs would of course be another issue, since Peru is poor country. Still, I think one should look at the development of free software policies in South America now. A lot is going on the region and it may or may not show us the road to the future of intellectual property.

Juan Alberto Gonzalez, Microsoft Peru executive, on the proposed legislation (in Spanish).

GNU Peru.

Wired reports."

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    Peru Weighs GNU GPL law | Login/Create an Account | Top | 1 comments | Search Discussion
    Threshold:
    The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
    Misreading the opening (Score:2, Insightful)
    by macgill (macgill@mindspring.com) on Tuesday April 23, @12:22PM (#56)
    User #8 Info | http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/
    My misreading of the opening may be useful. I thought Peru had just mandated that all software written by the gov't be licensed open source. That is not the case, the law mandates that the government use only open source software.

    However, my misreading brings up an interesting point. If the United States wanted to use free software (software under a GPL compliant license) and then distribute its modifications as free software, could it? Because the U.S. government cannot claim copyright in any of its works, it can't release its own GPLed work (the GPL depends on copyright for assent). Can it release modifications to GPLed code as GPL?

    Humanity has the stars in its future, and that future is too important to be lost under the burden of juvenile folly and ignorant superstition. - Isaac Asimov

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