Why does it worth sun to give java sdk away for free?

[levilista]

Why does it worth sun to give java sdk away for free? Is there any
catch? If I'm developing commercial java applications, do I have to
pay a royalty? (As far as I know, not, but I'd like to be sure of
that. )

 

[Daniel Pitts]

Why does it worth sun to give java sdk away for free? Is there any
catch? If I'm developing commercial java applications, do I have to
pay a royalty? (As far as I know, not, but I'd like to be sure of
that. )

There is no royalty involved, AFAIK. I believe sun makes most Java
related money by selling high end servers.

There was a post here a while ago about this...
<http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.java.programmer/browse_frm/
thread/23d3585db0deb2d3/8b15612af337f75c?lnk=st&q=sun+money+java
+&rnum=1#8b15612af337f75c>

This might help answer your question.

 

[Eric Sosman]

Why does it worth sun to give java sdk away for free? Is there any
catch? If I'm developing commercial java applications, do I have to
pay a royalty? (As far as I know, not, but I'd like to be sure of
that. )

It is a nefarious plot. If you use Sun's "free" JDK,
you will discover too late that Sun owns all the rights to
everything you develop with it, and to your first-born male
child.

I do not offer a free JDK: I charge money for it. But
I don't attach weird conditions to the bargain; once you pay
me the money, you get the JDK to use as you please, no strings
attached. You get to keep what you develop with the JDK you
purchase from me, and you get to keep your first-born male
child. A perfectly wholesome and above-board commercial
transaction.

The choice is yours: Spend no money at all and get Sun's
JDK but give up all your rights to the products of your labor
and your loins, or spend a perfectly reasonable fee and get a
JDK free and clear of all encumbrances.

How much is the "reasonable fee?" Well, levlista, how
much have you got?

;-)

 

[Daniel Pitts]

It is a nefarious plot. If you use Sun's "free" JDK,
you will discover too late that Sun owns all the rights to
everything you develop with it, and to your first-born male
child.

I do not offer a free JDK: I charge money for it. But
I don't attach weird conditions to the bargain; once you pay
me the money, you get the JDK to use as you please, no strings
attached. You get to keep what you develop with the JDK you
purchase from me, and you get to keep your first-born male
child. A perfectly wholesome and above-board commercial
transaction.

The choice is yours: Spend no money at all and get Sun's
JDK but give up all your rights to the products of your labor
and your loins, or spend a perfectly reasonable fee and get a
JDK free and clear of all encumbrances.

How much is the "reasonable fee?" Well, levlista, how
much have you got?

;-)

Careful, someone might not recognize the satire.

 

[John W. Kennedy]

Why does it worth sun to give java sdk away for free? Is there any
catch? If I'm developing commercial java applications, do I have to
pay a royalty? (As far as I know, not, but I'd like to be sure of
that. )

Sun is a minority vendor. People who write their Windows software in
Java can switch to Sun systems with relatively little effort. It's for
the same reason that Sun sponsors OpenOffice.org.

--
John W. Kennedy
"Give up vows and dogmas, and fixed things, and you may grow like That.
....you may come to think a blow bad, because it hurts, and not because
it humiliates. You may come to think murder wrong, because it is
violent, and not because it is unjust."
-- G. K. Chesterton. "The Ball and the Cross"
* TagZilla 0.066 * http://tagzilla.mozdev.org

 

[pkriens]

Careful, someone might not recognize the satire.

What satire???

 

[Christian]

What satire???

They can have my soul but not the right on my code!

 

[levilista]

Could you quote the proper parts of the license agreement? I read it
(though a bit superficially), but I didn't find those parts you're
referencing.

Daniel Pitts írta:

 

[RedGrittyBrick]

What satire???

It sarubber ring that goes on a wheel.

 

[Daniel Pitts]

Daniel Pitts írta:



Could you quote the proper parts of the license agreement? I read it
(though a bit superficially), but I didn't find those parts you're
referencing.

First, don't top post please.
Second, I didn't reference the license agreement at all. I pointed you
to a different thread on this group which was about the same question.

I suggest reading the thread, and thoroughly reading the license
agreement if you have any concerns. There are a large number of
commercial applications written in Java. As far as I know, they aren't
paying royalties to Sun, and the source code remains the intellectual
property of the entity that produced it.

 

[Lew]

First, don't top post please.
Second, I didn't reference the license agreement at all. I pointed you
to a different thread on this group which was about the same question.

I suggest reading the thread, and thoroughly reading the license
agreement if you have any concerns. There are a large number of
commercial applications written in Java. As far as I know, they aren't
paying royalties to Sun, and the source code remains the intellectual
property of the entity that produced it.

Disclaimer: Legal advice obtained from Usenet is worth every penny you paid
for it.

While it's true that Sun has /never/ pulled anyone's rights to their Java code
away, in fact they have started to make Java open source, any legal question
to which you need a reliable answer is best referred to your legal team.

I assess that major corporations like IBM and CareFirst, and government
agencies like most of the U.S. Federal government would not use Java unless
they felt secure in their ownership of the results.

-- Lew

 

[Lew]

It sarubber ring that goes on a wheel.

RedGrittyBrick, you are a caution! I nearly woke my wife up from her nap
laughing at that.

To pkriens - the satire in question was Eric Sosman's piece in this thread
that began:

It is a nefarious plot. If you use Sun's "free" JDK,
you will discover too late that Sun owns all the rights to
everything you develop with it, and to your first-born male
child.

You do realize that Sun does not engage in slavery, right?

-- Lew

 

[levilista]

I just asked, because Richard Stallman wrote something about the java
trap years ago. But it might not be actual, because as far as I know
Java became opensource last year.

John W. Kennedy írta:

 

[Lew]

I just asked, because Richard Stallman wrote something about the java [sic]
trap years ago. But it might not be actual, because as far as I know
Java became opensource last year.

Please do not top-post.

Richard Stallman is a fanatic with an axe to grind. Just because he said
there was a "trap" doesn't mean that there ever was one. Always exercise
critical thinking.

Windows isn't open source and people are still using it just fine. I wouldn't
fear being fired for choosing Windows either.

"Open source" doesn't have to equal "perfect" and "closed source" doesn't have
to equal "demonic spawn of the minions of Hades designed to corrupt the world,
impregnate our teenagers, destroy the environment and the economy, and give
you hemorrhoids".

 

[Bent C Dalager]

Richard Stallman is a fanatic with an axe to grind. Just because he said
there was a "trap" doesn't mean that there ever was one. Always exercise
critical thinking.

Stallman would be speaking from the standpoint of the F/OSS community,
and from this point of view the trap was very real. It's not a trap
that is unique to Java, of course, it's equally real for _any_ product
you create that depends upon proprietary (non-free) tools for future
maintenance and development. (So you could speak of the MS Word trap
for writing free documentation etc.)

(The word "free" here being used in the GNU sense of free.)

Cheers
Bent D

 

[levilista]

First, don't top post please.
Second, I didn't reference the license agreement at all. I pointed you
to a different thread on this group which was about the same question.

I wanted to answer to Eric Sosman's post.

 

[Oliver Wong]

I just asked, because Richard Stallman wrote something about the java
trap years ago. But it might not be actual, because as far as I know
Java became opensource last year.

Stallman has revised his essay to say that Java is no longer a trap,
having been open sourced.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/java-trap.html
<quote>
As of December 2006, Sun is in the middle of rereleasing its Java platform
under the GNU GPL. When this license change is completed, we expect that
Java will be no longer be a trap.
</quote>

- Oliver