Re: [Proposal] Updating the Social Contract

[Raul Miller <moth@debian.org>]

On Mon, Jan 12, 2004 at 05:16:37PM -0500, I wrote:
> On Mon, Jan 12, 2004 at 10:22:08AM +0100, Sven Luther wrote:
> > |     We acknowledge that some of our users require the use of programs
> > |     that don't conform to the Debian Free Software Guidelines.  We
> > |     support interoperability standards such as "Linux System Base", and
> > |     will accept bug reports where our system violates those standards.
> > =     To make our system more attractive to people with mild dependencies
> > =     on non-free software, we have created "contrib" and "non-free" areas
> > =     in our internet archive.  The software in these directories is not
> > =     needed by most people, and we do not guarantee all software in the
> > =     non-free area may be distributed in other ways.  Thus, although
> > =     we're working to reduce people's dependence on non-free software,
> > =     we support users who are still dependent.  Additionally, we will
> > |     work to provide free alternatives to non-free software so people who
> > |     use only free software can work with users of non-free software.
> > |
> > 
> > I second this proposal.
> > 
> > That said clarification of the last sentence would be nice, but maybe it can
> > go in some rationale or something.
> 
> I'm planning on following Andrew M.A. Cater's suggestion, and will be
> extracting the content of the lines marked above with = as a part of
> the rationale for the proposal.  [Those lines won't go into the social
> contract except for the last two words of the last "=" line.]
> 
> Are you ok with that?
> 
> Is there any additional clarification you would expect?

Hmm..  if I carry out Andrew Cater's suggetion , I would entirely get
rid of mention of our existing support for non-free.

I do want to mention non-free, because getting rid of it is Andrew's
proposal, not mine.

So I'm going to think about this a bit more.

I definitely need to update my proposal (Linux Standard Base is what LSB
stands for), but I'm less certain that pulling out the non-free section
stuff is the right thing to do.

Andrew Cater -- could you explain a bit more about why you thought
getting rid of that content was a good idea?  I mean, I understand
what you're saying in a glib sense, but not when I sit back and
think about it.

Thanks,

-- 
Raul