Re: GR: Removal of non-free
On Wed, 31 Dec 2003 15:53:50 -0500, Branden Robinson <branden@debian.org> said:
> On Mon, Dec 29, 2003 at 04:02:42PM -0500, Raul Miller wrote:
>> While this is better than your previous proposal, I would still
>> vote it below the default option if it were on a ballot.
> How is this information useful to anyone? Is there any form the
> proposal could take that you *wouldn't* rank below the default
> option?
Well, in most other peoples opinion I am not Raul, but let me
respond anyway. If there was a reasonable expectation that users of
software present on Debian servers that does not meet the DFSG would
continue to get a equivalent quality of support for that software
that the debian distribution servers, the debian bts, and attention
from debian developers assures them, I would rank it above the
default option.
I see non-free as an area where we put in software for which
there is not yet a free replacement, so that our usaers can use
Debian, not as a pedantically pure toy, but as a useful tool in a
world that is not yet all libre software, in the hope that, just like
netscape, free replacements shall render the software in non-free
obsolete.
I would much rather the non-free section withered away because
there was no need for it, because no developer felt the need to
populate it with stuff they needed or wantred; rather than decreeing
its abolishment by a HR dictum.
> It's well-known that there are people who are vehemently opposed to
> anything but the status quo, and some others who'd rather demolish
> the distinction between non-free and main entirely.
Ah yes. Polemics. Smear the opposition, rather than counter
any arguments. And so it starts.
>> If someone were to implement a decent alternative for that
>> infrastructure, I would be amenable to leaving that part out of the
>> social contract, but I do not like your "drop it on the floor"
>> approach to this issue.
> Please define "decent alternative for that infrastructure". What
> specifically do you expect people to be able to accomplish with a
> parallel infrastructure when the existing suffices?
I would be willing to move my non-free packages over to the
parrallel infrastructure -- and even help with some of the upkeep,
even thought that would take time away from Debian. I can't, however,
undertake to setup all the infrastructure by myself -- I do not have
the resources.
> People who raise this point often seem to be constructing a
> catch-22; if we don't have an "alternative infrastructure" in place
> before dropping Debian's support for non-free, then there is a
> "pragmatic" objection to dropping non-free; however, if the
> alternative infrastructure is expected to be in wide use, then the
> people who participate in the current infrastructure are going to
> have to migrate to it pro-actively in expectation that a GR
> elimninating will pass, which they can help defeat by refusing to
> move and citing their own stubbornness as evidence that no
> "alternative infrastructure" exists.
Aha. Yet another: I conjecture my opposition are nasty,
manipulative, non fair playing jerks, so it justifies anything I say
or do. Rather well done, Mr. Robinson, this is a nice turn of
phrase.
> I reject such callow and unprincipled[1] tactics. Hopefully you
> mean something less unsavory.
Of course, if I may point out, these tactics usually are ones
you propose that your opposition shall employ, and then denounce
the depths to which your opposition is likely to succumb.
Now, can we get back to a reasonable discussion, rather than
theorizing how low our opposition can sink?
manoj
--
To every Ph.D. there is an equal and opposite Ph.D. Duggan
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
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