[phkahler]

To me, it says a government can not mandate the use of open source software:

"No Party shall require the transfer of, or access to, source code of software owned by a person of another Party, as a condition for the import, distribution, sale or use of such software, or of products containing such software, in its territory."

Or am I misinterpreting that? Does this preclude a government from requiring the use of open source software in some cases? IANAL, but I don't think it precludes government USE of OSS, but I think it means they can not have an open source requirement in a bidding process.

On another note, what IS the purpose of this language in TPP if not a direct attack on open source software?

[pbhjpbhj]

I've got to agree this seems like an offensive against democratic movement towards open source being required in the public sector.

With all the secrecy one has to try and determine who might have written these clauses (USA multinational corporations presumably) and what the clauses are supposed to achieve (higher profits).

Preventing countries from freely moving away from the strongest capitalist models of software production seems like something that's likely to appear in TPP & TTIP; anything socialist also seems like it's going to be a target.