“In the post-UCITA world, choosing Linux isn’t just a great
idea–it’s also a way of sending these companies a message they
richly deserve. “
“In hacker culture, “user” is pronounced “loser”–after all, an
experienced programmer knows only too well how many shortcuts are
taken to deliver a working product to the poor, unsuspecting
customer. But users are about to join the ranks of big-time losers,
thanks to the provisions of UCITA, a model legislative act recently
recommended for adoption by all 50 U.S. states. Commercial software
industry lobbyists got their way with UCITA, a model for commercial
software law reform that embodies almost everything the industry
wanted. But the move may backfire. UCITA’s provisions reveal an
almost astonishing contempt for the software industry’s customers
and the broader public good.This isn’t a U.S.-only issue, either,
as you’ll learn soon enough; once the software industry gets UCITA
passed in U.S. state legislatures, the U.S. government will start
working on foreign governments to bring their law into
conformity.”
“Written by a pro-software industry panel that amounted to
little more than a voice for software industry lobbyists, UCITA
(short for Uniform Computer Information Transactions Act) shows
precisely what the computer industry has in mind for its customers.
And I think you’ll agree after reading this article that the
companies backing UCITA don’t deserve to have
customers–particularly when there’s an open-source
alternative.”