[Noisebridge-discuss] releasing libre source code of proprietary sw

[Felipe Sanches]

ping.

Any comments?

On Sun, Jul 14, 2013 at 9:18 PM, Felipe Sanches <juca at members.fsf.org>wrote:

> I'd like to discuss in this thread the possibilities of promoting the
> liberation of the source code of software and firmware of ancient hardware
> (and maybe even hardware schematics) under free software licenses via
> crowdfunding campaigns or other means (let's brainstorm!).
>
> Which would be the best strategies to gather enough money or attention so
> that it could somehow affect the decision of the copyright holders of code
> related to hardware that is no longer benefiting from its commercial
> lifespan.
>
> I understand that offering money in order to get some proprietary code
> released as free software may not be enough. Or maybe it could be enough in
> some cases to simply demonstrate that there is enough people interested in
> looking at the source code for the sake of preserving parts of the history
> of computing.
>
> The most interesting proprietary sw I would be glad to see released as
> free software (or even better, to the public domain!) are the source code
> for oldschool video game cartridges, such as SEGA Genesis, SNES, or even
> older stuff like MSX, Magnavox Odyssey/VideoPac, etc... But the same idea
> applies to any piece of old proprietary software/firmware you can think of.
> Including firmware for PC peripherals, BIOSes, etc.
>
> We, the hacker community, for sure can see technical benefits of having
> access to these pieces of source code. For fun, and also for the sake of
> documenting the history of computers and software development.
>
> I'm glad to see releases such as the original Prince Of Persia for Apple
> ][ that have been put online by the own author. (
> https://github.com/jmechner/Prince-of-Persia-Apple-II ) But maybe we
> could figure out ways of campaigning for more of such releases. Eighter by
> putting the hands on our pockets via crowdfunding campaigns, or by publicly
> stating our interest in such source code releases.
>
> The questions I prompt in this email are not without a reason.
> I possess a copy of the original source code of an old MSDOS game, but I
> am not legally allowed to distribute it. I tried convincing the original
> authors to release it into public domain but up to now I was not able to
> convince them. They are also not the copyright holders anymore. So I am
> trying to figure out a way to proceed and maybe it involves some of the
> ideas described here. But let's not limit the discussion to a single title.
> I think the topic deserves some brainstorming in general because there's a
> whole universe of interesting unreleased source code laying untouched in
> old floppies inside cardboard boxes covered in dust.
>
> happy hacking,
> Felipe Sanches
>
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