Point well taken. You should, however, expect R users to bring up concerns. This isn't a win-win situation as you sound...and you want to keep s-news in the dark too.
Frankly, you didn't address the real issue. How would Insightful reacts for example if they find R users repackaging your products named "Infact" or "Insightful Miner"? or as you said R users (instead of Splus users) "need access to the cutting-edge, quality statistical software available>> in Splus (instead of other way round). Insightful wants to take any "cutting-edge, quality statistical software" from R, but they patent any "cutting-edge, quality statistical software" they create. Hence my call to people to use any loopholes to make these available or rewrite them. That would be win-win. ps. This is my last email on this issue. --- David Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > eugene dalt [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes: > > It seems to me that Insightful is very good at > > protecting whatever they "create" and the same > time > > feels very comfortable taking R stuff to keep they > > clients happy. In essence they are selling free > stuff. > > I must defend Insightful on this point. As an > employee of Insightful, that's > to be expected, but I've also been an author of free > software since the > earliest days when the term "free software" was in > use ... but more on that, > later. > > In no sense are we "taking R stuff" with these > improvements in S-PLUS 8. > Packages written for R will remain free, as they > must. This isn't just > because the license says so, but because we believe > that an open-source > community around packages that will run with both > S-PLUS and R is a good > thing. It's good for S-PLUS users, certainly: we've > heard loud and clear > from our users that they need a better way to > package user-contributed > libraries for S-PLUS, and they need access to the > cutting-edge, quality > statistical software available in the open-source > world. But it's also good > for the statistical computing community generally. > In the open source spirit > of "many eyes", the more people using and improving > open source software, > from both the S-PLUS and R communities (or, > generally, the S community), the > better. > > You say, "In essence they are selling free stuff." > I say, au contraire. > First of all, the distinction between > "free-as-in-speech" and > "free-as-in-beer" is important here, and it's the > former context that is > generally meant in reference to "free software". > (For further background on > this, see > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_as_in_beer and > http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Libre_software.) > > As it happens, the free-as-in-speech packages we're > porting to S-PLUS will > also be available free-as-in-beer from an > Insightful-hosted site. In fact, > as part of the S-PLUS 8 project we've put > significant investment into making > free software available to a wider community. We > put packages though the > same test that CRAN does, and as we find and fix > bugs in the porting process, > we're contributing those back to the community as > open-source. We're also > planning to provide an new package for both S-PLUS > and R, as a further > contribution to the community. > > Personally, I'm very excited about this new role for > Insightful as a member > of the open-source community. Ultimately, it's only > through our actions that > our sincerity will be judged. All I ask is that > those actions are be > characterized faithfully. > > # David > > -- > David M Smith <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > Senior Product Manager, Insightful Corp, Seattle WA > Tel: +1 (206) 802 2360 > Fax: +1 (206) 283 6310 > > Insightful Corporation (www.insightful.com) provides > analytical solutions for > text and data using S-PLUS, Insightful Miner, InFact > and consulting services. > > ______________________________________________ [email protected] mailing list https://stat.ethz.ch/mailman/listinfo/r-help PLEASE do read the posting guide! http://www.R-project.org/posting-guide.html
