OStatic

We've been keeping an eye on Google's Android phone project as it progresses towards release this fall. Yesterday another key piece of the support services behind Android was announced, and this one looks like a win from the open source point of view: anyone will be able to offer Android software via a free Android Market.

Open source software use by governments has a rocky history. Some governments have opted firmly for open source (and some of those have later reconsidered); others do everything that they can to avoid it. Now a group of free software advocates in Canada is challenging a lack of open source adoption by head-on attack: a lawsuit aimed at the procurement practices in Quebec.

As reported on our parent blog GigaOM, there's a new piece of software out there trying to fill the niche recently occupied by Muxtape. Muxtape, as you may know, is a music sharing and mixing site that's apparently been shut down by the RIAA. Now there's Opentape, which bills itself as a free, open-source package that lets you make and host your own mixtapes on the web. But is it?

Intrigued by Microsoft Surface, but don't want to spend $10,000 - or deal with Microsoft? Then take a look at the TouchKit project, which can help you get together a table-sized screen with a multitouch interface, using open source components.

Have you ever heard of the Fiduciary Licence Agreement - the FLA? No, it's not an alterative to other free and open source license agreements that you're probably already familiar with, like the GPL, Mozilla License, and BSD License. Rather, it's an adjunct to any copyleft license, designed to help ensure the long-term survivability of free software projects. With the announcement last week that KDE has adopted an FLA, this notion may take on new prominence.

Social bookmark sharing site Ma.gnolia has long been shadowed by the more popular de.licio.us, even with all the issues that the latter site has had with pushing out timely updates. But at today's Gnomedex conference, the Ma.gnolia team announced a new effort that they hope will help them leap ahead: they plan to rewrite, federate, and open source their code. It's a bold step, but will it work out in the end?

We've covered the Software Freedom Law Center's GPL enforcement efforts several times in the past. But their efforts on behalf of the free software community extend far beyond trying to right wrongs in court; they also do what they can to prevent the wrongs from happening in the first place. Their latest move in this direction is an online white paper titled A Practical Guide to GPL Compliance.

When last we looked at Google's Android mobile phone OS project, there were some rumblings of discontent in the developer community. This week, though, developers have a lot less to complain about (though, perfectionists that most of us are, we can still find a few issues). That's because Google has pushed out an 0.9 beta version of the SDK, making its vision for the first Android release much clearer.

It turns out that there may be a happy (from the open point of view) ending to Dell's attempt to trademark cloud computing, which we covered two weeks ago. Whether it was all the publicity that the Patent & Trademark Office's original decision got, or whether someone there simply took a second look at things and understood the issues, it appears that they're on the way to denying the application after all.