Letter to Microsoft to open-source MSX Bios and MSX Basic

Paladin (933)

01-02-2011, 14:59

Well, a friend of mine worked at the MSR (http://research.microsoft.com/) and he still have a lot of contacts there. He's going back there next week and he promised me that he would deliver a formal letter (written by the MSX community (us)) to some ppl he knows at the legal area. Basically we would need to write some good arguments to (at least try) convince them that releasing MSX BIOS and BASIC would not hurt them and would make the community happy, and etc... etc... etc...

Here's his webpage: http://w3.impa.br/~diego/

Let's forget all differences for now (specially my regular trolling attitude) and use this chance. That includes you Wolf_, mainly because (in my humble opinion) your English writing skills seems really good.
Additionally to that, can someone create one of those online petitions?

Best Regards,
Muffie.

Por MsxKun

Paragon (1124)

01-02-2011, 15:06

I would say: ALL YOUR BIOS ARE BELONG TO US!

Por NYYRIKKI

Enlighted (6067)

01-02-2011, 15:19

I would like to ask also MSX-DOS & documentation! This would be really great, if this could happen, but I would not expect too much...

Por muffie

Paladin (933)

01-02-2011, 15:25

SO, someone help me with the letter. My english is just not good enough. PLUS, I'm not the best person to point out good reasons why they should do it.

Por Vampier

Prophet (2413)

01-02-2011, 16:35

Benefit a community of enthausiasts
No loss to Microsoft
Some goodwill towards a community that loves their bios
To add disk support in Cbios

The only thing I fear is that releasing these biosses will have some legal implications

Por hap

Paragon (2042)

01-02-2011, 16:50

It's a bit complicated, since the rights are owned by multiple parties, not just Microsoft. The BIOS was written by ASCII Japan.
good luck anyway =p

*edit* oh, and MSX1 BIOS is already open source (well-documented), msxbioslistingpart1.pdf / msxbioslistingpart2.pdf

Por Daemos

Prophet (2070)

01-02-2011, 16:53

I wonder if Microsoft is still one way or another making profit with that piece of code or if they even still use parts of it. If they have some patented parts in their BIOS code they will not release the code.

Then on the other side. If they release the code they can demonstrate their good will and get some positive fame allthough I don't think it will make the news. (or perhaps it will)

The no loss part will be the best argument. They propably have absolutely nothing to lose by releasing the source code presuming that this code is ONLY used on MSX and not somewhere else.

What about MSX asosciation? Do they hold rights over this code as well? Like Vampier says. What about the legal implications?

It will be just a guess in the wild so I would say lets make that letter. I have no clue though how we could write this. But we could make it an joint effort. For example, someone posts the letter and everyone contributes in getting the spelling good and add arguments etc etc.

Por Tanni

Hero (556)

01-02-2011, 18:22

Benefit a community of enthausiasts
No loss to Microsoft
Some goodwill towards a community that loves their bios
To add disk support in Cbios

The only thing I fear is that releasing these biosses will have some legal implications
Good image for Microsoft in the public
Boosting retrocomputing, especially a system Microsoft was involved in, this shows continuity.

Por Manuel

Ascended (19471)

01-02-2011, 19:14

Daemos: the BIOS is from 1983, and patents have been expired. Plus, the code was already released in source form in books, as hap already mentioned.

What we need is not having it open-sourced, but having a license that makes it easy to copy and modify it, without nasty restrictions.

Por muffie

Paladin (933)

01-02-2011, 19:27

Manuel, can you write exactly what do you need my friend to tell them in order to allow, for example, openMSX to include BIOS and Basic with the emulator?
Besides, the original MSX1-Basic source code was also released?

Por Manuel

Ascended (19471)

01-02-2011, 22:35

muffie: it should have a license that adheres to the Debian Free Software Guidelines, see http://www.debian.org/social_contract.html#guidelines

The source code of basic was not released, indeed.