Re: General Resolution: Removing non-free
>>"John" == John Goerzen <jgoerzen@complete.org> writes:
John> 2. Supporting non-free software gives nothing back to the Free
John> Software community.
>>
>> Argue this with example of angband and zangband. How does
>> preventing commercial exploitation by the community (yes, these
>> packages are bazaar developed) in any way detract from the free
>> community? Indeed, it seems to me we get wonderful rogue like games,
>> with full source code, rights to modify and diistribute -- as long as
>> the free-as-beer quality is not removed from it.
John> You are arguing against the DFSG here, not the Social Contract. If
John> you perceive a problem in the DFSG wrt this topic, the appropriate
John> place to take it up is with the DFSG and not with the Social Contract
John> or Policy.
No, I don't think so. I find the DFSG to be perfectly fine
here; the programs bgelong in non-free. And I think I am arguing for
the us to continue to have non-free hosted on our sites, and
supported in the BTS. We add value to these programs, and this value
is a useful add-on for our users.
John> The contract is supposed to be one between us and the Free Software
John> community. Supporting a non-free section in no way supports Free
John> Software or its community.
>>
>> That is a narrow minded (some would say bigotted) view. Us
>> people in the free software community use commercial software too. I
>> use word, excel, and rational rose, as well as oracle, in my
>> life. Being able to use it on a free platform enables me to use, and
>> contribute, to the free software community.
John> I don't see how this is disagreeing with what I said. In fact, it
John> bolsters my opinion. You have found those non-free programs even
John> without our help. Why should we be compelled to help you find them?
Who is being compelled? And why are you asking the work that
Debian developers put in in packaging programs they think enhance
Debian and make it better, just because you have rigid black and
white ideas about what you consider acceptable?
John> At one time, one may have argued that we needed to support a non-free
John> section in order to have a complete and coherent system. As discussed
John> in #1, this requirement does not today exist.
>>
>> Give me a replacement for festvox. Or angband. Or even xv --
>> some png images I produced show up as all black under imagemagick --
>> but show fine under xv.
John> None of these ship with Debian now. All are available frmo other
John> sources. Why should we be compelled to make non-free software
John> available from us, even though it's not part of our dist?
We package them as .debs. We provide the archive sites. We
provide the BTS. We do the work. Even though these packages are not
part of the distribution, debian developer add value. They make these
packages more useful for our users, and by extention, they make
debian more useful as well.
John> 5. The existance of the non-free section is being used as a cop-out by
John> those that seek to peddle non-free wares.
>>
>> Heh. Bigotry revealed.
John> Unfortunately, the evidence suggests that it may be you that are
John> guilty of this.
Please elucidate. What bigotry exactly am I guilty of?
>>
>> Bull shit. The right thing to do is not to renege on a promise
>> solemnly made. And this motion is letting down the users to whom we
>> said we understand that you use software that does not meet out
>> guidelines, but we shall, dear user, support you in that as well.
John> And we shall continue doing so. Read it carefully. We said that we
John> created non-free. We did not say that it was a permanent resource.
John> We said we'd support the use of that software; we still will. We did
John> not say that we would distribute it for them forever and ever.
Clintonian speech. We are removing all packages, and all BTS
support, but we are continuing to support non-DFSG software. Yeah,
right. And when we said we shal support you, we never said for how
long. We just meant. we promise to do something until we change
our minds.
manoj
--
"Cats are rather delicate creatures and they are subject to a good
many ailments, but I never heard of one who suffered from insomnia."
--Joseph Wood Krutch
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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