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Re: cdrtools



On Fri, Jul 07, 2006 at 08:57:54AM +0200, Daniel Baumann wrote:
> Kevin Bube wrote:
> > What about switching to dvdrtools? I think this project was
> > started to solve the frequently recurring arguments about the
> > licensing and the device adressing scheme cdrtools use.
> 
> dvdrtools are currently in non-free (so not part of Debian at all)
> and therefore not a solution/replacement

I completely fail to see any logic here:
* cdrtools, obviously completely non-free, is in main
* dvdrtools, a fork of the last GPLed version, is in non-free

The only reason why dvdrtools would sit in non-free is a controversy
whether a "clarification" can be retroactive.  If it can be, it is
quite a hit to the GPL in general.

Freeness of dvdrtools is >= freeness of cdrtools, at least.

> The people in charge (CTTE and the maintainers) are working on an
> optimal solution. They will communicate it as soon as they are
> ready.

And of course, this particular case is already in good hands.  What I
am interested in is whether GPL can be withdrawn.  Of course, the
copyright holder can relicense new versions to his heart's content,
but can he take away people's rights from older releases?  The whole
point of the GPL is to prevent _anyone_ from imposing further
restrictions that could limit the freeness of covered software, so I
would say that this would be a bad precedent.

Cheers,
-- 
1KB		// Microsoft corollary to Hanlon's razor:
		//	Never attribute to stupidity what can be
		//	adequately explained by malice.



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