Re: APSL 2.0

[Adam Warner <lists@consulting.net.nz>]

On Thu, 2003-08-07 at 22:23, Lynn Winebarger wrote:
> Adam Warner wrote:
> 
> > What was a substantial freedom as part of GNU philosophy--"the freedom
> > to make modifications and use them privately in your own work or play,
> > without even mentioning that they exist"--is now only useful to hermits
> > and leeches. Anyone contributing by providing an electronic service
> > would no longer have any expectation of being able to keep modifications
> > private.
> > 
> 
>      Of course, this all depends on what the arguer believes "private"
> means.  You don't need to attribute nefarious motives to rms - he (and
> others) may simply disagree with you about when and how an activity/use
> stops being private.

I specifically avoided speculating about Stallman's motives or even
singling him out from this overall decision by the Free Software
Foundation (apart from initially quoting Apple's thanks for his many
helpful comments in the process). I ended with a consequence. You are
free to speculate as to motives. Just please don't claim I'm the one
attributing "nefarious motives to rms."

Feel free to consider what "private" meant and now means. Feel free to
consider whether the Free Software Foundation made plain years ago that
a free software licence could enforce disclosure of source code if the
software as some part of a larger work performed in any way an
electronic communication service with another client.

[Note: client is undefined in the APSL. But the sentence where it
appears says "client other than You." Now You is "an individual or a
legal entity exercising rights". So the client is likely not another
computer program but another legal entity you provide a service to.]

> As for "hermits and leeches", why are casting aspersions?

It was a colourful flourish. Hermit is not a derogatory term (and
hermits will not be affected if they don't communicate). Leech was used
to indicate a scenario where users would en masse demand source code
merely because they used an electronic communication service.

> What do you mean by "contributing by providing ..." if the
> modifications are not released? Why isn't that being a leech?

Do websites provide an electronic communication service? Do they
privately modify code? Why is that being a leech?

> There are a lot of programs that can do interesting things without
> having anything to do with a network.

Conceded. But in a networked world how useful is a freedom that only
applies so long as you don't network with another person?

Regards,
Adam