Re: plagiarism of reiserfs by Debian
On Sun, Apr 20, 2003 at 12:38:31PM +0100, Bruce Stephens wrote:
> So the information isn't thrust in anybody's face: if you don't give
> it any arguments, Emacs doesn't have anything else it might display,
> so it may as well display information about itself (how to get help,
> conditions of copying, etc.).
>
> To remove this code would be a bad technical decision---there's no
> reason to. I presume (if any code has been changed) that some of the
> reiserfs code is doing something that's less technically justifiable.
Remember, the issue here isn't whether there's good reason to remove the
Reiser message, but whether we're allowed to (apparently not) and
whether not being allowed to do so is DFSG-free. Even if we were happy
with simply putting it back in, it still can't go in main if it's not free.
> (I don't know about vim.)
Vim is similar; if you load it without opening a file, it displays a
"transparent" message onscreen that goes away once you do something.
If Emacs's message is about the GPL, then it can't be removed, and
that's accepted as Free by Debian, but that doesn't imply that this
transfers to sponsorship messages.
Vim's message can be removed, since Vim is dual-licensed under the GPL
and the message isn't covered by 2c. It'd certainly be extremely rude
to remove the message, and I've never heard of anyone doing so, but it's
not against the license.
--
Glenn Maynard
Reply to: