مدونة يوسف رفــه شخصية فوتوغرافية إجتماعية و تقنية

Have you ever read the Micro$oft End User License Agreement (EULA)? Have you ever wondered what is written there? Or you just click on "Accept" without even scrolling down during the installation? Personally, I guess most, if not all, WinBlows (Window$) users just do the "Click". Well, beleive it or not, you are "missing" a LOT! I found very nice and interesting limitations or restrictions for using WinBlows. I guess a lot of people are violating the license already without even knowing it!

Copied from the original article:

"Have you read Microsoft's End User Licensing Agreement? I didn't think so, not many people have. It's the software agreement you have to accept in order to use Microsoft's products but most people just click the "I ACCEPT" button and move on. The EULA limits your rights to use your software and your system in any manner that you wish. In fact, you don't own the copy of Windows on your system - Microsoft is merely granting you use of Windows: "The Software is licensed, not sold."

Some of Microsoft's EULA limitations that you must agree to include: "[you] may not without Microsoft's prior written approval disclose to any third party the results of any benchmark test"

Do you own a dual core or multiprocessor system? You are in violation of Windows XP Home's EULA: "The Software may not be used by more than one processor at any one time on any single Workstation Computer"

Want to sell your computer to someone else? The new owner can't sell it again: "The initial user of the Software may make a one-time permanent transfer of this EULA and Software to another end user, provided the initial user retains no copies of the Software."

Now take a look at the software license that governs Linux systems: " The licenses for most software are designed to take away your freedom to share and change it. By contrast, the GNU General Public License is intended to guarantee your freedom to share and change free software--to make sure the software is free for all its users. This General Public License applies to most of the Free Software Foundation's software and to any other program whose authors commit to using it. (Some other Free Software Foundation software is covered by the GNU Lesser General Public License instead.) You can apply it to your programs, too.

When we speak of free software, we are referring to freedom, not price. Our General Public Licenses are designed to make sure that you have the freedom to distribute copies of free software (and charge for this service if you wish), that you receive source code or can get it if you want it, that you can change the software or use pieces of it in new free programs; and that you know you can do these things.

To protect your rights, we need to make restrictions that forbid anyone to deny you these rights or to ask you to surrender the rights. These restrictions translate to certain responsibilities for you if you distribute copies of the software, or if you modify it.

For example, if you distribute copies of such a program, whether gratis or for a fee, you must give the recipients all the rights that you have. You must make sure that they, too, receive or can get the source code. And you must show them these terms so they know their rights.

We protect your rights with two steps: (1) copyright the software, and (2) offer you this license which gives you legal permission to copy, distribute and/or modify the software.

Also, for each author's protection and ours, we want to make certain that everyone understands that there is no warranty for this free software. If the software is modified by someone else and passed on, we want its recipients to know that what they have is not the original, so that any problems introduced by others will not reflect on the original authors' reputations.

Finally, any free program is threatened constantly by software patents. We wish to avoid the danger that redistributors of a free program will individually obtain patent licenses, in effect making the program proprietary. To prevent this, we have made it clear that any patent must be licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at all."

Upon reading the software license for both Windows and Linux you can see the philosophical standpoint of both software systems. Windows wants to limit you and treat you like a criminal. Linux wants to give you the freedom to use your system how you want to use it, give it away and copy it as often as you'd like. This is the bottom line: Linux offers freedom."