Proprietary Software
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Contents |
Warning
The following interpretation of Proprietary Software is a POV. Read on at your own risk. Find out a more neutral point of view by reading what Wikipedia has to say about http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proprietary_Software.
Definition
Proprietary software has been taken into possession. Access and use of the software is restricted to terms and conditions that are not in the interest of the public. Legal enforcement ensures that everybody abides by these terms and conditions. Watch out for the patent discussion currently raging in the EU, a good place to get newest information is the Foundation for a Free Information Infrastructure.
Deprivation of Rights
Restrictions usually include the deprivation of the right to disseminate copies of the software. Additionally in most cases it is not allowed to read the source code, or to understand how the program works.
Support
Support and access to code, content, data or software which could be helpful for support are usually resticted to a tiny fraction of privileged users. Privileged users usually have to pay for the privileges which are public property in the Free Software definition.
Registered users often have to periodically pay an additional amount of money to acquire the permission to update the software.
Variety
Most proprietary software licenses have been created to maximize profit for the issuing organization (most often this will be companies or corporations). To most efficiently exploit the users of a software the context in which the software is being used has to be taken into account. Therefore every proprietary software license is different. No legal information in any proprietary license is tranferable to any other. The argument that Free Software licenses are too diverse and complicated to understand is bullshit when compared to often brilliantly complicated and sometimes contradictory proprietary licenses.
