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Re: General Resolution: Removing non-free



On Thu, Jun 08, 2000 at 11:31:07PM -0400, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
> Adam McKenna <adam-debian@flounder.net> writes:
> 
> > Trust me, I know that non-free is not "officially" part of the distribution.
> > I was responding to John's semantic argument with a semantic argument of my
> > own.  Claiming "there will be no change in the distribution" is deceptive,
> > because while it's technically correct, it's really not true.  The proposal
> > specifically eliminates the "distribution" of the non-free packages.
> 
> When the free software community was originally disturbed that Debian
> was going to be distributing non-free software, we were told it was
> OK; it wouldn't be part of Debian, it would just be distributed for
> the convenience of users.

I don't know if the "free software community" was disturbed.  Maybe RMS and
the FSF were disturbed, and I understand Debian is under significant
political pressure from them to remove non-free (and I believe that is the
reason for this proposal)

All that being said, I don't think this propsal is a good idea because it
removes usefullness from debian and smells of fanaticism.  If the free
software community is confused as to the status of non-free, then we should
take steps to clarify that.  IMHO removing non-free entirely is a much more
radical measure than is called for.

--Adam



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