Allchin’s Folly: Exploring Some Myths About Open Source Software

Abstract

The twists and turns in the government’s antitrust case against Microsoft – from the D.C. Circuit’s stormy questioning at the two day oral argument in late February 2001 to its affirmance of the lion’s share of the government’s case in June 2001, and then from the settlement between the United States and Microsoft to the continuing battle by nine states for tougher sanctions – have garnered their share of press attention. But the high-profile antitrust case has not been the only Microsoft-centered controversy during the past year. Another involves the open source software movement about which Microsoft has professed grave fears. The fears, however genuine, spring from wrongheaded myths about open source software. Exploding those myths is the burden of this article.

Keywords: intellectual property, Microsoft, open source, software, James Allchin, copyright law, source code, object code, public domain

JEL Classification: K20