<html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html charset=windows-1252"></head><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space;" class="">Cameron,<div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">I’ll stay away from the legal opinions of open source - this is really outside my domain!!!!</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">As to the Point Cloud Domain Working Group, we held the first official meeting of the group a few weeks ago in Nottingham. A couple of good developments:</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">1. The elected chairs come from a diversity of experience (commercial and academia) and are not limited to LiDAR expertise;</div><div class="">2. The group is starting to develop a list of potential actions to pursue.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">A public wiki exists, but is only just now beginning to get populated.</div><div class=""><a href="http://external.opengis.org/twiki_public/PointCloudDWG/WebHome" class="">http://external.opengis.org/twiki_public/PointCloudDWG/WebHome</a></div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">The group plans regular telecons - I’ll make sure to announce those to the OSGeo discussion list.</div><div class=""><br class=""></div><div class="">Best Regards,</div><div class="">Scott</div><div class="">
<br class=""><div><blockquote type="cite" class=""><div class="">On Oct 4, 2015, at 9:34 PM, Cameron Shorter <<a href="mailto:cameron.shorter@gmail.com" class="">cameron.shorter@gmail.com</a>> wrote:</div><br class="Apple-interchange-newline"><div class="">
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Hi Martin,<br class="">
Based on your description below, it appears that Lewis Graham is
using deliberate technical obfuscation under the banner of ASPRS,
which is tarnishing the technical credibility of ASPRS.<br class="">
<br class="">
Oliver's detailed rebuttal is good, but is only valuable if a number
of people of influence who read and are swayed by the rebuttal.<br class="">
<br class="">
Roland,<br class="">
I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on publishing a correction
of facts, as presented by Oliver (or similar)?<br class="">
Further, in future, you might find it helpful to consult with
experts in Open Standards prior to publishing, in order to:<br class="">
a. Correct facts before publishing, and hence provide a more
credible publication. We can put you in touch with appropriate
experts.<br class="">
b. Provide a balanced article, with different opinions.<br class="">
Would you like us to help source contacts that you could call upon
for an opinion?<br class="">
<br class="">
Martin,<br class="">
I hope we don't have to go as far as building upon our previous Open
Letter, which would effectively publicly discredit Lewis (again) and
would tarnish the reputation of Lewis/ASPRS and wouldn't look good
for publications presenting un-countered FUD.<br class="">
<br class="">
Scott,<br class="">
I suspect the OGC might be interested in helping counter the FUD
being spread. Possibly by approaching offenders behind the scene and
suggesting they desist with the FUD, or by respectfully countering
the FUD in public forums. <br class="">
<br class="">
Martin, Scott,<br class="">
I'd be interested to hear how the OGC Point Cloud working group has
been progressing.<br class="">
Is positive progress being made?<br class="">
(Feel free to point at a blog or web page or similar which might
already have such details).<br class="">
<br class="">
Warm regards,<br class="">
Cameron Shorter<br class="">
<br class="">
<br class="">
<br class="">
<div class="moz-cite-prefix">On 3/10/2015 11:46 pm, Martin Isenburg
wrote:<br class="">
</div>
<blockquote cite="mid:CABSWR-FFrpc54wSMmgJ-y+WUzRewVe5P3J5dLspo8bWYHS9eJQ@mail.gmail.com" type="cite" class="">
<div dir="ltr" class="">Hello,<br class="">
<br class="">
I was hoping that Lewis Graham would see the futility of
furthering his incorrect claims on the "dangers" of the LGPL
license for commercial projects (and his other odd statements)
but he continues to do so not just in private but also in his
role as the Chair of the ASRPS LAS Working Group This gives his
FUD non-sense a very prominent outlet in front of very
influential people, so OSGeo should probably respond to this a
bit more loudly than usual.<br class="">
<br class="">
In the "LiDAR Sidebar" at the ASPRS UAS Reno conference [1]
there was a discussion on point cloud formats that was more or
less a direct consequence of the "Open Letter" by OSGeo [2].
Lewis continued to claim that it was impossible to make LASzip
an official format because I would be unwilling to donated it
under an MIT license to the ASPRS (note: i do not even remember
being asked) and that an LGPL would be impossible and
"dangerous" for commercial companies to work with (note:
nevermind the 55+ companies that already do [3]).<br class="">
<br class="">
So I emailed the participants (my dial-in connection was shakey)
the following:<br class="">
<br class="">
"Here a detailed rebuttal of Lewis' "LGPL of Martin's LASzip
implementation is dangerous" non-sense:<br class="">
<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://odoepner.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/lidar-news-publishes-uninformed-gpl-rant/" class="">http://odoepner.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/lidar-news-publishes-uninformed-gpl-rant/</a><br class="">
And yes, the currently available open LASzip format
implementation (!!!) comes with a "static linking exception"
because some new devices do not support dynamic linking well.
Would be good to get someone to sponsor the creation of an open
LASzip format specification (!!!) so anyone can reimplement it
and give their resulting implementation whatever license they
see best fit. A license is only attached to a particular
implementation. From an open LASzip format specification anyone
could write their own implementation (closed or open with any
license they want)."<br class="">
<br class="">
To which Lewis answered (just repeating the same old FUD):<br class="">
<br class="">
"Rather than entering into an inane debate over licensing with
Martin, I suggest anyone who is concerned check with their
intellectual property attorney prior to incorporating third
party software into internal build software, regardless of the
license type of that third party software. We do a lot of
software consulting and most of our more savvy clients clearly
specify what type of licensing can be incorporated into the
composite deliverables.<br class="">
<br class="">
I also suggest that the world of software development and
deployment has become far too complex to continue to use the
undefined term “open source.” For example, some customers have
source code to the GeoCue production software under license. Is
that Open Source? I suggest instead that we use terminology
such as “binaries available under license XYZ” or “source
suitable for compilation available under license ABX.”"<br class="">
<br class="">
I can not believe that Lewis himself actually believes his own
statements but uses them tactically to spread fear, uncertainty,
and doubt. I am not sure why. Maybe in order to stall the
standardization process of LAS and LAZ because he is somehow
afraid it will loosen his grip onto the LAS format?
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Regards,</div>
<div class=""><br class="">
</div>
<div class="">Martin @rapidlasso<br class="">
<br class="">
[1] <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://uasreno.org/2015/09/09/asprs-adds-lidar-sidebar-to-reno-program/" class="">http://uasreno.org/2015/09/09/asprs-adds-lidar-sidebar-to-reno-program/</a><br class="">
[2] <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/LIDAR_Format_Letter" class="">http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/LIDAR_Format_Letter</a><br class="">
[3] <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://laszip.org/#software-with-native-laz-support" class="">http://laszip.org/#software-with-native-laz-support</a><br class="">
<br class="">
On Mon, Sep 21, 2015 at 12:00 PM, Martin Isenburg <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:martin.isenburg@gmail.com" class=""></a><a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:martin.isenburg@gmail.com">martin.isenburg@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br class="">
><br class="">
> Hello,<br class="">
><br class="">
> We (Oliver and me) had contacted the (new) editor (Roland
Mangold who is cc-ed) last week and suggested to use the
contents of this blog article<br class="">
><br class="">
> <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://odoepner.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/lidar-news-publishes-uninformed-gpl-rant/" class="">http://odoepner.wordpress.com/2015/06/16/lidar-news-publishes-uninformed-gpl-rant/</a><br class="">
><br class="">
> authored by Oliver Doepner as a factual rebuttal of Lewis
Graham's FUD rant on GPL/LGPL for publishing in the next issue
of the LiDAR Magazine (the two-month ago rebranded LiDAR News
magazine). I have no final word from the Roland yet but our
communication suggested that this would happen. Please check
Oliver's column for any errors (should you care) so he can
correct them prior to this being published.<br class="">
><br class="">
> Regards,<br class="">
><br class="">
> Martin @rapidlasso<br class="">
><br class="">
><br class="">
><br class="">
> On Mon, Sep 21, 2015 at 11:52 AM, Jo Cook <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:jocook@astuntechnology.com" class=""></a><a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="mailto:jocook@astuntechnology.com">jocook@astuntechnology.com</a>>
wrote:<br class="">
>><br class="">
>> I think this is something that we at OSGeo should
definitely respond to. Perhaps we could contact the magazine
and explain that there were some factual errors in the
article, and ask for a chance to respond?<br class="">
>><br class="">
>> Jo<br class="">
>><br class="">
>> On Mon, Sep 21, 2015 at 10:38 AM, Johan Van de Wauw
<<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:johan.vandewauw@gmail.com" class="">johan.vandewauw@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> On Fri, Sep 18, 2015 at 6:31 PM, Martin Isenburg<br class="">
>>> <<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:martin.isenburg@gmail.com" class="">martin.isenburg@gmail.com</a>>
wrote:<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> > Another curious thing is that I (and the
open source license LGPL) was<br class="">
>>> > attacked vehemently in a recent column
called "Open Source Mania" by Lewis<br class="">
>>> > Graham that was published in the LiDAR News
magazine. Viewer discretion<br class="">
>>> > advised and parental guidance suggested ...
you will not like this FUD<br class="">
>>> > attack:<br class="">
>>> ><br class="">
>>> > <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://www.lidarmag.com/PDF/LiDARNewsMagazine_Graham-OpenSourceMania_Vol5No4.pdf" class="">http://www.lidarmag.com/PDF/LiDARNewsMagazine_Graham-OpenSourceMania_Vol5No4.pdf</a><br class="">
>>> ><br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> I read the article and there are a lot of
statements there which are false.<br class="">
>>> " if you touch a piece of GPL code with the nine
foot pole of<br class="">
>>> launching it with a Python script, that script
must now be GPLed"<br class="">
>>> not true<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> "Suppose you have developed some very, very
clever algorithm on which<br class="">
>>> you and your university have applied for a
patent. If you have coded<br class="">
>>> your algorithm and used any GPL whatsoever, you
just GPLed your<br class="">
>>> patent. The patent rights effectively transfer to
the Open Software<br class="">
>>> Foundation for free distribution."<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> Completely untrue. The Open Software Foundation
does not exist. You<br class="">
>>> don't transfer patent rights at all. A well known
counter-example is<br class="">
>>> the algortihm for MP3, where the code (lame) was
released under LGPL.<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> I think as OSGeo we should reply to the
statements, this is an attack<br class="">
>>> on our community. Perhaps we can ask someone from
the Free Software<br class="">
>>> Foundation Europe to help write a response?<br class="">
>>><br class="">
>>> Kind Regards,<br class="">
>>> Johan<br class="">
>>> _______________________________________________<br class="">
>>> Discuss mailing list<br class="">
>>> <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:Discuss@lists.osgeo.org" class="">Discuss@lists.osgeo.org</a><br class="">
>>> <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss" class="">http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/discuss</a><br class="">
>><br class="">
>><br class="">
>><br class="">
>><br class="">
>> --<br class="">
>> Jo Cook<br class="">
>> Astun Technology Ltd, The Coach House, 17 West
Street, Epsom, Surrey, KT18 7RL, UK<br class="">
>> t:+44 7930 524 155<br class="">
>> iShare - Data integration and publishing platform<br class="">
>><br class="">
>> *****************************************<br class="">
>><br class="">
>> Company registration no. 5410695. Registered in
England and Wales. Registered office: 120 Manor Green Road,
Epsom, Surrey, KT19 8LN VAT no. 864201149.<br class="">
><br class="">
><br class="">
><br class="">
> _______________________________________________<br class="">
> Standards mailing list<br class="">
> <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:Standards@lists.osgeo.org" class="">Standards@lists.osgeo.org</a><br class="">
> <a moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/standards" class="">http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/standards</a></div>
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</blockquote>
<br class="">
<pre class="moz-signature" cols="72">--
Cameron Shorter,
Software and Data Solutions Manager
LISAsoft
Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009
P +61 2 9009 5000, W <a class="moz-txt-link-abbreviated" href="http://www.lisasoft.com/">www.lisasoft.com</a>, F +61 2 9009 5099</pre>
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