Re: orphaning fetchmail
On Sat, Dec 16, 2000 at 12:25:19AM -0700, John Galt wrote:
> Rewriting the damned GPL to be compatible with the rest of the world
> might be a good place to start rewriting.
If the damned GPL didn't have that "incompatibility" there would be no
Debian, BSD would probably still require you signed a license agreement
before you could look at it, and we'd probably be arguing in some AOL
chatroom about some Microsoft breakage.
> > OpenSSL is doing something approximately in that direction, but I don't
> > see that it solves all the problems.
>
> Where's the technical issue? The only problem that's been postulated is
> the license combatibility.
See the message with the header:
Message-ID: <[🔎] 976974718.2f70b09e@debian.org>
> > Non-GPL authors are perfectly free to reimplement GPLed works, if
> > they don't like the GPL license. Why shouldn't GPL authors be free to
> > reimplement non-GPL works if they don't like the non-GPL license?
>
> Are they? Show me one successful case.
See the message with the header:
Message-ID: <[🔎] 20001216021741.W4445@osiris.978.org>
> > > Would it even have more difference than the legal minimum to make it a
> > > separate work?
> >
> > If it's an independent rewrite, perhaps to a different underlying api,
> > then it would pretty much have to be an independent work.
>
> Aha! If the API is screwed, that isn't just a political issue now is it?
Screwed? More like: in spite of all that you've tried to teach me,
I still have this underlying concept that there's more than one way to
do it.
Having looked at the code, here's what I'd do different:
[1] I'd design the thing around an event loop, instead of trying
to graft one one in a backwards-compatible fashion using callbacks.
[2] I'd include API support for everything which can be done through
ssh.
> > > Would EAY recognize it as a different way to do it?
> >
> > Copyright isn't about functionality. It's about literal copying.
>
> ...which you have every right to do ATM, just so long as you don't
> plagiarize. My question still stands: if the programs are so similar that
> the author can't tell the difference, how technically oriented was the
> change?
What are you talking about?
> > > This just sounds like an Orwellian redefinition of the BSDL, not a
> > > different way to do things.
> >
> > I suppose you could describe the openssl license as an orwellian
> > redefinition... [To address the comment I think you were trying to
> > express, but did not: I don't see how you could describe someone else's
> > independent authoring of code as orwellian redefinition of the BSDL,
>
> If it were truly independent, no. But what you're proposing isn't
> independent is it? The dependency lies in WHY the program was
> authored. If it were authored because the new author has a better way
> to do it, then we have the issue of the original author having the
> beholden right to do whatever they want with their code. If it was
> rewritten just because the author disagreed with the licensing terms,
> and the terms are DFSG free, it isn't Debian's place to encourage
> it--making free variants of non-free programs is well within the SC,
> making free variants of already free programs is something that Debian
> should accept if as a _fait accompli_ but not go out of its way to
> start.
I don't have a clue what you're talking about.
Thanks,
--
Raul
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