User:David gv ray/User Rights (software)

"User's Rights" redirects here. For other uses, see User's Rights (disambiguation).

The term "user rights" refers to an individuals personal digital rights or personal freedoms that they are entitled to as an extension of their existing human rights in their capacity as the end-users of a given piece of software. If these rights are lost, even where no dollar price or private cost is involved, then a hidden external cost occurs. Human rights refer to the "basic rights and freedoms to which all humans are entitled.". Any loss of rights is a cost to the entity that looses those rights. The total costs of something is considered to made up of a number of components i.e. the private, external and psychic costs. Individuals often consider only the private cost (i.e. monetary price) of a transaction and tend to ignore its external and psychic costs. It is possible for an item to have no private cost (i.e. price) yet still have an enormous external, and/or psychic costs e.g. such as a loss of human rights.

With regard to any software that a person purchases comes the right to:

• study how that software works without permission from anyone e.g. via direct access to that programs logic (i.e. source code),
• adapt it to their own specific situation,
• improve it ,
• release your improvements to others or not ,
• run it on any hardware or software system combination they like and
• redistribute it to anyone else anywhere in the world, with or without a price

The user's rights are only fully protected where a piece of software or hardware, and specifically computer components, has been endorsed by the Free Software Foundation. The other software movements remove user rights to varying degrees.

The attempt to restrict or control "users" right come in many forms e.g.

• restrictive licensing and
• "Digital rights management" or "DRM" technologies attempt to control the "users" use of digital media on behalf of those providing the media by preventing access, copying or conversion to other formats by end users.

Overview

There are three(3) main movements that deal with the rights of people (i.e. "users") who use software. These are the:

• Free Software(FS) movement
• Open Source(OS) movement and the
• proprietary software(PS) movement

The big difference between them is that the first attempts to protects all of the rights of those that "use" software (i.e. see above). In contrast, to the other two movements seek to promote the interests of "non users" e.g. those who either "develop" or "invest" in software i.e. ("open source" and "proprietary" software).

All three (3) movements encourage the charging of a price for their:

• services
• software and
• any associated products or services.

However, although all of the movements can charge a price for all of these items, the first two movements typically don't charge a price for their software but do charge a price for their services. Only the "proprietary software" movement typically charges for everything that they offer.

The reason for different "offers" typically associated with each movement is that the individuals making up the organizations within each movement feel that their "offer":

• reflects their own personal moral beliefs and
• will optimize their income.

Both the "free software" and the "open source" software supporting organizations appear to believe that they can optimize their income from clients in the long run if they allow:

• the client to "try before they buy" and
• to get direct feedback and involvement in the software development process from a wide range of "users"

The FS & OS movements therefore offer "a" version of their particular software product at no price. If the client finds the product appropriate then they are simply charged for their services (i.e. "value additivity"). This contrasts strongly with the "proprietary" software movement who charge for both their software and their services.

The typical offer from organizations supporting one of the three movements is as follows:

Free Software supporters:

• • protect all user rights,
  • charge no price for the software
  • supply a version of the human readable program logic(i.e. source code) & its corresponding computable readable (binary copy) and
  • charge a price for their services to:
    • install,
    • improve,
    • train and/or
    • manage that software

n.b. The version of the source code that they offer doesn't have to include "all" their improvements or fixes.

Open Software supporters:

• • protect many "user rights" but not all user rights
  • charge no price for the software
  • supply a version of the human readable program logic(i.e. source code) & its corresponding computable readable (binary copy) and
  • charge a price for their services to:
    • install,
    • improve,
    • train and/or
    • manage that software

n.b. The version of the source code that they offer doesn't have to include "all" their improvements or fixes.

Proprietary Software supporters:

• • protect "investors" rights (which by its nature protects nearly none of the user rights),
  • charge a price for the software
  • supply none of the human readable program logic(i.e. source code) & only the computable readable (binary copy) and
  • charge a price for their services to:
    • install,
    • improve,
    • train and/or
    • manage that software

There is a growing awareness amongst users of their rights generally, software users included e.g. , , , .It's not unusual, however, for individual software users to be unaware of their digital rights. Further, they may also be unaware that their digital rights may have been removed or abused by others e.g. Princeton University Software Users Draft Bill of Rights. The majority of software users are engaged in non-IT activities. Those involved in the IT industry, such as software development firms, specialize in the production of software and expend a significant proportion of their resources identifying and managing individuals digital user rights with a view to optimizing their own goals (e.g. profit optimization).

Subscribers to the Free Software movement believe that users of software are entitled to specific rights that protect a particular individuals digital freedom (i.e. hence the name "Free Software"). Any software that is not endorsed by the Free Software movement (i.e. via the Free Software Foundation) is considered to remove digital rights from users in some way.

These digital rights are based on the belief that individuals have their own inherent human rights as people (i.e. in a global sense) and are not limited to the rights allocated to them by a particular legal system within a given geographical area e.g. a union, country, state, etc.

The Free Software movement believes that "Free software is a matter of freedom: people should be free to use software in all the ways that are socially useful." and as such seeks to protect all of a "users" digital rights' regardless of their geographical location, particularly those associated with software.

In contrast, Non-Free Software movement participants attempt to protect the rights of non-users i.e. "developers", "investors" and others involved in the production of software. Participants in this movement include the Open Source Software and proprietary software movements. Each are separate movements in their own right, however, both attempt to remove rights from users. Licenses issues under the Non-Free Software movement are considered to be "permissive" in nature.

The degree to which they attempts to do so is as follows:

• The Open Source movement attempts to take fewer rights away from the users. However, user rights are still lost.
• The proprietary software movement typically attempts to take the most rights away from users.

It is also possible for a combination of the any of the above to exist e.g. for a group of individuals to create a project team based on open source principles that then creates a piece of software using a Free Software licence.

Open Source is not Free Software

The comparison analysis shows that Open Source Software movement may not charge any private cost (i.e. monetary price) for its software but it does have a number of external costs for users e.g. the loss of user rights, particularly users digital rights.

Open Source Software is often associated with Free Software because both offer the following at no private cost (i.e. monetary price):

• access to the software's core source and
• a copy of the corresponding core programs binary code (i.e. the actual software itself)

In addition, they may both also offer the following at a private cost (i.e. monetary price):

• human services associated with implementation, development or use of the software or improvements to its source code.

However, the Open Source movements goal is still to remove at least some of the individual users rights to the benefit on non-user groups such as developers and private companies offering software or associated services.

Open Source Software remains as part of the Non-Free Software movement because it attempts:

• to remove user rights (see below) and
• does not always offer users access to program services used by the core program i.e. parts of the software can still act as a form of privately owned proprietary software
• in addition, there is a tendency for the Open Source movement to be used as a low cost strategic software development option by private investors who:
  • initiate an Open Source community based on the development of a specific piece of software which then
  • makes substantial improvements to the product at a relatively low cost over time,
  • not release or significantly delay the release of those improvements as source or binary code to the public at large and then
  • those same investors establish private companies that:
    • take a copy of the Open Source source code developed by their respective development communities
    • market the previously Open Source Software as their own
    • continue to develop the software in their own right and then
    • withdraw financial and other support from the original Open Source community that they initially founded i.e. the community often dies out over time.
    • e.g. the Compiere example. In this case, however, the community members managed to regroup and continue on under a new name i.e. Adempiere. Whether another "privatisation" attempt will happen again over time as initiated by Compiere or other private investors is open to question.

What are Your Rights as a User?

Summary

An individual users digital rights apply to anything that that user records, creates or stores on any type of machine, with any form of software or a combination of the two.

A quote from the Free Software Foundations website may helps to clarify exactly what a software users rights are:

""Free software" is a matter of liberty, not price. To understand the concept, you should think of "free" as in "free speech," not as in "free beer."

Free software is a matter of the users' freedom to run, copy, distribute, study, change and improve the software. More precisely, it refers to four kinds of freedom , for the users of the software:

• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
• The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor (freedom 2).
• The freedom to improve the program, and release your improvements (and modified versions in general) to the public, so that the whole community benefits (freedom 3). Access to the source code is a precondition for this."

In Detail

A detailed summary of specific user rights based on the broad rights identified by the Free Software movement (above) can be seen in the following table (n.b. that the table is based on the information provided by the Free Software Foundation at website). It identifies:

• how these broad users broad rights translate into specific user rights and
• how such rights are lost to the Non-Free Software movements i.e.
  • the Open Source movement and
  • the Proprietary Software movement

The lost rights can be seen in the two "Differences" columns in the table. These columns show:

• 1st "Differences" Column
  • the specific user rights defended by the Free Software Movement and
  • the rights lost under the Open Source Software movement

• 2nd "Differences" Column
  • the further rights lost to the Proprietary Software movement after the influence of the Open Source Software movement

As a PDF File

See the table Software User Rights - Identification & Loss to Non-Free Movements

As as Table

Please note this table is currently being upgraded and will soon be added.

Who Protects User Rights?

• The Free Software Movement

Which User Rights are Lost Exactly? (A Comparison)

• See the table Software User Rights - Identification & Loss to Non-Free Movements

Who Takes User Rights Away?

Non-Free Software Movements

• Proprietary Software movements (e.g. Microsoft, SAP, IBM, etc.)

The greatest number of user rights are taken away by organizations that create or provide services to proprietary software firms.

• the Open Source Software movement (e.g. Red Hat, etc.)

Far less user rights are taken away by the Open Source movement, however, user rights are still lost.

How to Stop Losing User Rights

Users

Individual users can lobby against the non-free lobbyists in their respective countries to stop others from taking their rights e.g. within the Europe Union (EU):

Petition government: [Sign the petition against the loss of your software rights.[13]

Businesses & Developers

Individual developers and businesses in each of their respective countries can take action to stop others from taking users' digital software rights by:

• using Free Software systems (i.e. hardware and software, yep, it applies to hardware as well)
• lobbying against the non-free software movement through their respective governments e.g. within the European Union (EU):

Petition government: Sign the petition against the loss of your software rights.

Notable People

Individuals

Movement Founders:

• Free Software
  • Richard Stallman

• Open Source Software
  • Linus Torvalds
  • Eric Raymond
  • Michael Tiemann

• Proprietary Software
  • Bill Gates

Movement Supporters:

• Free Software
  • Stephen Fry

• Open Source Software

• Proprietary Software

External links

• Free Software Foundation
• Open Source Initiative