Re: Manifesto for the Debian Project leadership election - Ian Jackson
Hi,
>>"Bruce" == Bruce Perens <bruce@debian.org> writes:
Bruce> Manoj:
>> I wish that bruce had actually presented us with another yes/no
>> option in that case too, since I really like the xearth proposal.
Bruce> Run the proposal by me again, please.
Ok. Here's what I think happened.
a) Susan started collecting data and created an xearth file, which
recieved general approval; but there was concern about loss of
privacy for people. There was also a proposal by (I think) Jim
Pick about having a generic maintainer database, of which the
xearth file would be a part.
b) A few months later, there was an effort to revive this, with
initially just the xearth file, to get started. We went forth with
a lot of enthusiasm, but had not really thought about licencing
issues (bad move). Initially, two options were offered for the
location data. i) private to debian maintainers only, and ii) GPL
(in hindsight, this last was possibly ill chosen ;-)
c) Some people objected to the mutability of the data implied by the
GPL, and I created a licence based on the GPL but forbidding
changes to the data (I tried to make it possible to reformat or
translate the data, but prevent modification and use in spam mail)
d) People who had agreed to the GPL felt cheated, and objected to the
GPL based non-mutability licence, since this would be non
DFSG. Debate raged for eons ;-)
e) You suggested distributing the data under the same licence the GPL
is distributed under. This again raises the spectre of the report
not being translatable, and not being reformatted for use with
other programs than xearth, etc. etc.
f) People pointed out thet the GPL was not valid for this kind of
data, and that full sources could not be distributed in the
preferred form (most suited for modifying) since there was private
data in the database, etc etc.
g) People came up and said that this data was not copyrightable in
the forst place, and licences, GPL or otherwise, were
irrelevant. We need a lawyer to tell us if that indeed is the
case.
This is where matters rest.
manoj
--
Recognising a fault as a fault, and what is not a fault as not one,
by holding to right views people go to a good rebirth. 319
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@acm.org> <http://www.datasync.com/%7Esrivasta/>
Key C7261095 fingerprint = CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
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