An interesting development in the current Canadian election is that at least one party, The Green Party of Canada, seems to be paying attention to geeks this time around. The Green Party of Canada endorses open source software in the Science and Technology section of their platform. Some of their promises include:

• Require federal agencies to initiate transitions to open source operating systems and productivity software.
• Make technology that has been developed at public expense, a publicly owned resource. Software that has been developed at taxpayer expense will be released under an open source license, making it free for all Canadians to use.
• Shorten the length of software patents to seven years. The software business cycle is so fast that longer patents only stifle innovation.

Would you add, change or remove anything, make your wish list. It seems like we are making politicians wake up and smell the coffee.

An article I submitted, I find it very important

Open Source Application Under Attack by Maker of KaZaA over Reverse Engineering

A story from Zeropaid indicates that maker of KaZaA, Sharman Networks, has sent a "Cease and Desist Letter" to the maker of KCEasy because it interoperates with their FastTrack network. The creator of KCeasy says on the KCEasy website "I feel that inclusion of FastTrack access with KCeasy is not worth a legal battle between Sharman and myself". A similar issue was covered by the Slashdot story Fight On Blizzard Vs. Bnetd Case on the right to reverse engineer to create an interoperable network. Reverse engineering to be another on the list of rights that have fallen by the way side?

(C) Famatra. This article is released into the public domain.