Re: Debian FreeBSD
On 27 Apr 1999, John Goerzen wrote:
# Elie Rosenblum <fnord@jurai.net> writes:
#
# > And thus spake John Goerzen, on Tue, Apr 27, 1999 at 08:33:38AM -0500:
# > > The same as for using FreeBSD itself: it's got a nasty BSD license.
# >
# > Er, the BSD license is still DFSG free, last I checked. And many of
# > the BSD zealots have a somewhat good argument that the BSD license
# > is less restrictive and more open than GPL.
#
# No, that argument holds no water. GPL preserves greater net freedom.
# BSD gives people the freedom to take freedom away. I don't like that,
# and it results in less net freedom. Witness BSDI, SunOS, etc, etc.
And look what that got them. BSDI is not floushering like they
had hoped. They are finally coming to realize that many thousands
of programmers can do a better job at doing something they choose
to do than a much smaller number (inside BSDI) that are doing
things they might not really have a passion for. This is the same
reason that Linux is more featureful than Win* nowadays. To us it is
a passion and to many commercial software developers it is more like
a job. Who do you think will turn out better code, someone that does
it because they choose to, or someone that does it only because they
need the money?
SunOS is no longer. Solaris is SysV which is not BSD. Sure they have
a BSD compatibility layer but that's about it.
Another good example might be Apple. They took BSD sources, never
once to my knowledge displayed the BSD advertising clause (I hate
that clause BTW :), and just recently released their source under
the APSL.
<my_theory>
If a company takes BSD-licensed code and decides to call it their
own, they most often do it in broad daylight because they really have
nothing to hide and the license allows it. This makes it easier for
us to see them and boycott their products if they refuse to give their
changes back. OTOH if a company decides to take GPL-licensed code,
call it their own, and keep the changes they make, they will invariably
do it behind closed doors in the middle of the night, making them very
difficult to catch. Mind you if they get caught they'll most likely
pay dearly for it, but whose to say every one of them will get caught.
</my_theory>
Bottom line, just because the GPL says someone can't take the code
and make it non-free, doesn't mean they won't. Laws are broken and
copyrights are infringed upon every day. Yes, the GPL is a deterrent
in many respects, but it won't keep the master theives from robbing
us blind if we become complacent and think the GPL is going to solve
all of our problems.
-steve
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