i hate oracle and java. today i needed java 6 to run an application written a couple years ago (btw it's the only good java application i ever saw apart from a couple of j2me progs (opera mini, virca etc) which don't count), because it crashed with java 7 (fucking incompatible java releases), i went to their site, found it, read a lot of crap how it's dangerous for me to install it, clicked the link and was promoted to log in -_- like you don't need log in for getting java 7 but you need it for java 6. well, i clicked registration and there was a dozen of mandatory red fields including my company name, my job phone, my job position etc. how about that i wanted to download java 6 for personal reasons? >< i wrote them that i was somebody named dasfs from dfasfgas company from aphganistan (they forced me to choose from what exactly aphganistan region i was) and finally download java 6. then i decided i wanted to write them and say that they are morons but i didn't find a support e-mail and their support needed me to register again, at that point i gave up and closed the tab
The series of Sun licenses for Java hints at a long-term plan. It appears that Sun is determined not to make the Sun Java implementation free software; instead, Sun is trying one way after another to offer us something that falls short -- hoping that eventually we will accept less than freedom. Each new Java license is another probe of the community's will.
Sooner or later, Sun's management must think, we will be caught off guard; perhaps we will get tired of saying 'no'; some of us may develop an urge to reward Sun for having "tried" so long and hard.
But there's a better alternative: forget Sun, and use free Java implementations such as Kaffe and Japhar. GNU volunteers are developing a thorough and powerful replacement for Java Core API, called GNU Classpath. (Free but less-powerful Java Core API replacements are already available.) We're now looking for volunteers to begin developing a replacement for JFC.
Promoting the use of alternative implementations has the side benefit of paving the way for the Java language standard to be decided by a standards committee, the way it is done for C and C++, rather than by any one company.
By sticking to free implementations of Java, by making freedom the criterion, we may eventually convince Sun to release free software. Or we may not. But either way, Java users will have freedom, and that's what really matters.