Who is (or are) the anonymous author(s) of Groklaw? I’m told there is more than one author, and that none of them is a lady with a red dress hanging in her closet or a stack of pamphlets in the back seat of her car. I know there are people who know. And I’m betting there is someone willing to spill. No reward offered; just the satisfaction of “digging for truth.” Send email. Anonymity assured.
Note to potential posters: If you’re going to write to me and say you don’t care who PJ is, or that it doesn’t matter who PJ is, save yourself the exertion of typing those words. Okay? I love you too. Mwah.
RSS
2 responses so far ↓
Terrence Zellers // November 21, 2006 at 11:44 pm
As part of the fallout from the MOG fiasco the identity of “PJ” as being much as she has represented is fairly well established. It has been disucssed in detail – including by people who view her with a fairly critical eye – and a fair amount of collateral evidence found. See http://www.ip-wars.net/story/2005/5/8/1338/44847
There have been passing allegations of funding and material assistance by the principles in the cases to her, but none have been confirmed that I am aware. From my POV, it would be meaningless even were they true; at this point it’s all in the hands of the courts. The time when “public opinion” might have had some sway over the outcome is past.
– TWZ (aka ColonelZen)
Nigel Kneale // November 22, 2006 at 5:51 am
Groklaw’s turned into an FSF propaganda site now, which for me puts the kybosh on the idea of it being an IBM front (IBM would never promote the GPL3 in its current form). More and more frequently we’re now being told “you should not code using this progrmmaing language, you should not use that technology, you should not build certain devices, you should not write certain applications.” I should have seen the writing on the wall when it started pushing the idea that user rights trump developer rights, and that developers therefore should do what users tell them to. Apparently the free lunch users get isn’t enough and that developers should do more for them, including _not_ developing things they don’t like and placing flippant restrictions on what their code can be used for.
Even the Linux kernel developers have fallen foul of Groklaw because they spoke out against the FSF’s policies, and it’s now got to the stage where Groklaw is suggesting moving away from Linux should OpenSolaris become GPL3. The website which started out unifying the Free Software and Open Source communities by defending Linux’s reputation when SCO vs IBM started up could now be in the position where it’s advocating moving away from Linux when that court case is finally decided.
Unbelievable.
Another reason why I doubt Groklaw is an IBM front is that I was reading it before SCO vs IBM kicked off. Sure, this doesn’t discount the theory that IBM saw the writing on the wall in the months running up to the SCO lawsuit and decided upon an elaborate astroturfing front, but I think the chances of that are pretty low.
Having read Groklaw since almost the very beginning, I’ve seen PJ evolve from the Linux-lover defending the reputation of Open Source, through to becoming a media “personality” off the back of that fame. I cannot say when the FSF started working on her, but you can see they had their claws into her when she eventually revealed she was working on the GPL3 with them.
PJ by that time “got religion”. Gone were the days where she was removing the FUD surrounding Linux, she now appeared to think she was a “freedom fighter” – and she still does. She’s now turned herself against the people writing the very software she started out defending and is now trying to badger and coerce programmers into using the fatally-flawed GPL3, and has used FSF FUD to do that.
Eben Moglen’s recent interview with The Register gives us a taste of things to come. Fresh from reviewing the MS/Novell agreements, what’s Moglen’s first public comment? Silence on the GPL2 and lots of words about how the GPL3 will fix things, making so many promises left, right and centre that even a seasoned politician would start to wonder whether or not he’d gone too far.
Oh, and according to Moglen, the so-called “Open Source Movement” is dead. Apparently there is only proprietary software on one side and the FSF on the other.
Reckon he’s trying to distract everyone from the real issues? How about the idea that he’ll stay silent on the GPL2, preferring to spread FUD that would bolster the GPL3? Will he give a full explaination of his reasoning behind giving the MS/Novell deal the all-clear? Or will he just say “I can’t comment due to signing an NDA, but can tell you that the GPL3 will fix everything. Trust me.”
And you can trust Groklaw to back him to the hilt no matter what he says. PJ has already started removing comments critical of the FSF, so whilst on the one hand she claims to speak for “the community”, on the other she’s silencing a large portion of that community she claims to represent.
Nigel Kneale
Like gas stations in rural Texas after 10 pm, comments are closed.