Forward from RMS, at his request AGL -- Never underestimate the power of a small tactical nuclear weapon.
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- To: agl@linuxpower.org
- Subject: Re: Xpdf and the GPL
- From: Richard Stallman <rms@gnu.org>
- Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 20:14:30 -0700 (MST)
- Message-id: <200103130314.UAA12623@wijiji.santafe.edu>
- Reply-to: rms@gnu.org
- In-reply-to: <20010312211058.A3569@linuxpower.org> (message from Adam Langley on Mon, 12 Mar 2001 21:10:59 +0000)
- References: <20010312211058.A3569@linuxpower.org>
The author of XPDF is mistaken, both ethically and legally. Legally, the GNU GPL is not just a request--it is enforcible based on copyright law. By contrast, the PDF permissions are not legally enforcible, at least in most countries. This is because they restrict activities which legally are fair use. Copying small quotations is fair use; everyone has a legal right to do this, regardless of what the author may say. I think that printing a copy for one's personal reading is also fair use. Ethically, the GNU GPL is legitimate because it respects the freedom of others. Its requirements are designed specifically to defend the freedom to do everything except mislead or subjugate others. By contrast, to stop others from printing out a document, or from copying passages to quote them, is imposing an obnoxious restriction on others, not defending their rights. That is not ethically legitimate. The XPDF author's arguments reflect an assumption that all licenses are equally legitimate--that they are justified, regardless of what they say, as the exercise of the author or publisher's power. This assumes that an author or publisher is entitled to power over others but has no responsibilities towards others; its wishes are beyond criticism and simply must be obeyed. Ethically we must reject this assumption, and arguments that rest on it. I think XPDF should be changed to permit these activities *by default*. To require restarting XPDF with a special option to do printing or copying is an unnecessary inconvenience. Perhaps a print request when the no-print flag is set should pop up a dialog box saying, "The publisher has expressed a preference that people not print this file. Do it anyway?" That way, people can consider whether the publisher's wishes ought to be catered to. (It should say "publisher" because "author" would be misleading; only sometimes was it the human author who made the decision to set the flag.) For selecting and copying a passage, if that requires clicking on a specific "copy" box, maybe that too can pop up a dialog box. If, however, the interface is such that the unexpected dialog box would be error-prone, then copying should be allowed unconditionally. Would you please forward this message to the list where people are discussing the issue?
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