MIT Media Lab Changes Software Default to FLOSS

[Joshua Judson Rosen]

On 03/27/2016 10:08 AM, Greg Rundlett (freephile) wrote:
> "Previously, software releases using free and open source licenses
> were approved by an internal committee. But since we’ve always
> allowed our developers to open-source their work, we’re eliminating
> the unnecessary hurdle: from now on any open source request will be
> viewed as the default and automatically approved."
>
> https://medium.com/mit-media-lab/mit-media-lab-changes-software-default-to-floss-4305e478e40#.j69sibke0 

I guess this is the big announcement that Joi was doing his best
not to make at the `DRM vs. web standards' session after LibrePlanet....

There is a burning irony here, for me: just a few years ago, I had to quit
my job working at one of MIT's other labs because their lawyer
effectively told me that I wasn't going to be allowed to continue
working there if I continued working on any open-source projects
(or vice versa; the specific words were more like "your continued employment
 is contingent on signing an agreement that says that you're not
 permitted to release or even develop anything whatsoever yourself,
 and we get ownership of everything you've already done regardless of
 release status, and that does mean no continued open-source work
 without explicit written permission from the person in charge
 to work on specific things, and yes the person in charge is me,
 and no I will not sign off on anything, but I'll give you
 explicit permission to ask").

I don't know how things resolved _there_ after I left; I suspect
that some number of additional people also quit over it, but that
the separate MIT labs are sufficiently insulated from each other
that any amount of ruckus there couldn't have fed into the Media Lab decision.
There was actually a sufficient firewall between us and `mainline MIT'
that I doubt that word ever even got back there. Regrettably, I was probably
in a pretty good--and possibly unique--position to be able to inform
the mainline MIT management once I got myself into a position such that
I had no reason to care about retaliatory firing..., but I was too busy
trying to save my own soul to worry about theirs :(

And, given that the MIT lab I left is also probably one of the parties
that the federal `open-source the stuff the American public is paying for'
program forces to open-source at least some of their stuff...,
I'm not sure I can handle this much irony all at once.

-- 
"Don't be afraid to ask (λf.((λx.xx) (λr.f(rr))))."