Re: Bug#181028: cdrecord: promotes non-free software
On Sat, Feb 22, 2003 at 10:44:10AM -0800, tony mancill wrote:
> On Sat, 22 Feb 2003, Ben Collins wrote:
>
> > IMO, we should not be promoting non-free software, especially when there
> > is a free alternative. Just because Joerg wants to make a buck doesn't
> > mean we have to let Debian become an advertising medium for him. He is
> > using our distribution and our users to promote a closed source product.
>
> Debian *is* an advertising medium for all kinds of things, both commercial
> and philosophical. This bug is merely an effort to espouse the
> submitter's philosophy over the interests of the person who did the real
> work, the upstream maintainer.
Debian was built on a philosophy of free software. Are you saying we
should ignore that foundation now?
I'm not arguing against the authors right to add the line to his
software. In fact, more power to him.
However, free software means we are able to modify things to suit our
purposes. We, as a free-software promoting distribution, should take
every consideration in continuing to promote the philosophy that has
been our goal and foundation.
If some piece of software output a line that said "Debian sucks, use
Mandrake", we'd probably comment out that line in the code for Debian
packaging.
Honestly, I am sick of the cdrecord's author pushing his own beliefs and
prejudices on us. If he protested this, it wouldn't be the first time we
butted heads with him. I've already had to deal with his name calling
for the sparc-linux SILO patch to mkisofs. He refuses to add a simple
patch that has been in use for years to create sparc-linux bootable
CD's. He's even gone so far as to make it more difficult to apply the
patch in newer versions, and from what I gather threatened to make it
impossible to apply. It's not his decision what Debian decides to
include in our distributed version of mkisofs. If we want the patch,
that's our choice.
So, yeah, I do have some bad vibes toward upstream on this one. I don't
like the situation where Debian bows down to upstream on points where we
should be free to make our own decisions (changing software is a right
that the license provides us). Being threatened by upstream is beyond my
tolerance.
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