Open source code...

Many people have heard of open source code and some will have heard of the licensing regime that follows much of that code - the essence of the regime is that if you use the open source code (ie. code that is freely distributed) you have to share your product with the rest of the coding community.

The unfortunate part is that, when you hire someone to do a job for you, it is difficult to tell if that someone has used open source code, and when you discover it, the horse has already been let out of the proverbial barn.

Under the category "misery loves company", take solace in the fact that even the biggest companies can fall victim to this problem (I call it a problem because companies often pay for some software product in the belief it will be proprietary).

The Motion Picture Association of America created a piece of software for distribution to universities to enable them to monitor their network traffic. Unfortunately for them, the programme contains open source code and a coder in the open source community has demanded the MPAA release the code. So far they have refused.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out. Stay tuned!