[Date Prev][Date Next] [Thread Prev][Thread Next] [Date Index] [Thread Index]

Re: General Resolution: Removing non-free



On Wed, Jun 07, 2000 at 03:37:34AM -0500, Manoj Srivastava wrote:
> >>"John" == John Goerzen <jgoerzen@complete.org> writes:
> 
>  >> I think I disagree. I have not found Mozilla to be as yet an
>  >> adequatre replacement for netscape; nor can I find something for the
>  >> festvox packages, and I certainly would hate to lose angband and
>  >> zangband (which are only in non free since they prevent commercial
>  >> use; the sources are freely available for modification).
> 
>  John> I don't think that games justify the continued support of non-free
>  John> software.
> 
>  	Please read up on festvox before you start labelling it. I
>  think this reinforces my impression; you have not looked at the
>  packages in non-free, and have not a clue about what you are
>  advocating throwing away.

There are four possible pieces of software to which John could have been
referring:

mozilla - An Open Source WWW browser for X and GTK+
festvox - Package `festvox' is not available.  (hmm, dunno)
angband - A single-player, text-based, dungeon simulation
zangband - A single-player, text-based, roguelike game

How creative of you to deliberately misinterpret his words thus.
Furthermore:

Package: angband
Maintainer: Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org>

I think you know good and well which one(s) of the above packages was a
game.  Do you think John DIDN'T know what Mozilla is, especially since you
likened its function to an even MORE well-known piece of software?  It is
reasonable to assume ignorance of Mozilla by many Debian developers as all?
If not, then isn't it perfectly reasonable to conclude that John's remarks
about games applied to a subset of the packages you listed?

Based upon reasonable premises, it follows deductively that John was
referring to a non-specific subset of the four packages you identified.
One cannot logically deduce that festvox was in that subset.  One cannot
deduce that John was referring specifically to the one or two packages of
the four that AREN'T games without engaging in self-serving speculation.

Please try to constrain yourself to reasonable arguments and not
manufactured offense to positions you know your opponents don't even hold.

> 	You know, removing those packages would go a long way towards
>  diminishing Debians credibility as a modern Linux. I have had people
>  ask me if Debian could do java? Could it do ecommerce? did we have
>  netscape? Could they move their servers off solaris, and have all the
>  java survive the move? And I could say, hey, we have the same apache,
>  and mysql; you can get the the same jdk -- but remove the non-free
>  stuff, and even my ability tohandle pdf diminishes since gs-aladdin
>  would go away too.

Hmm.  So removing these packages from non-free will make it impossible for
Debian to be used as a platform for Java, E-commerce, or web browsing with
Netscape?

What exactly is it that Debian users absolutely will not be able to do with
a Debian system if the General Resolution is passed?

-- 
G. Branden Robinson            |    Experience should teach us to be most on
Debian GNU/Linux               |    our guard to protect liberty when the
branden@ecn.purdue.edu         |    government's purposes are beneficent.
roger.ecn.purdue.edu/~branden/ |    -- Louis Brandeis

Attachment: pgpQYDW7vRUJz.pgp
Description: PGP signature


Reply to: