Re: [leganii@surfree.com: Re: FWD: C-Kermit & potato]

[Ben Pfaff <pfaffben@msu.edu>]

[Why is this on debian-devel?]

Frank da Cruz <fdc@watsun.cc.columbia.edu> writes:

> Peter Makholm <peter@makholm.net> wrote:
> >
> > Problem1: I can't see any rights to modify the code, just redistribute it.
> > 
> That's a fine point.  You can modify the code all you want but since I
> have to support it now and forever, I need to get the changes.  Debian isn't
> the only place where C-Kermit is built -- there are about 800 others.  I
> can't support 800 different forked code bases.  The reason C-Kermit works
> in the broad sense of "works" is that the development is centrally coordinated
> and there is only one code base.

There are many open source projects that are built in hundreds of
locations and work fine without central control over who can
modify and redistribute them.

> C-Kermit 7.0 is free to you and all your users.  What happens after that
> is a philosophical question.  Do you care more about license purity than you
> do about providing a useful tool to your users?

Do you care more about central control over your users than
providing a useful tool to them?
-- 
"Q:      How does a hacker fix a function which
         doesn't work for all of the elements in its domain?
 A:      He changes the domain."
--Thorfinn