Am 16.03.2004 um 23:28 schrieb ajsiegel@optonline.net:
Of course there are licensing issues as a result of all this.do you have some more insight in this? can you estimate how fast this can be resolved? is the process moving forward at all? in what direction?I guess you are mssing my point.I am having an emotional reaction to seeing debian-edu working up a concernover this issue. [...snip...]Why does debian-edu care to be involved? Why do they choose to "do business" with Mr. Kay.
I can understand your "emotional reaction", and I might even share your resentment against everything with "Disney" in its name. However, when Alan Kay and his group went to work there, they made sure that the base Squeak system would not become "infected" by Disney. You can read about Alan's intent for the Squeak license at http://minnow.cc.gatech.edu/squeak/229 . I do not see any reason why ypu should be concerned with this.
To introduce myself: I'm a long-time Squeak developer from Germany. Among my contributions is the Linux web-browser plugin (allowing Squeak projects to be accessible from the web) and the OpenGL support code for X11 (needed to accelerate 3D graphics). I am "just" a software developer, not a lawyer, so I can not really comment on hypothetical license issues, and of course I can not speak for the Squeak community as a whole. However, Squeak is free for all practical purposes - free to download, open source code, with community-based review and release process, an international community (I am not aware of a separate "U.S. Squeak community" as suggested in another message).
For those who have not yet heard of Squeak: Please have a look at http://squeakland.org/This is the Squeak site aimed at teachers, parents, and children. There you can get an idea what Squeak is all about, while squeak.org is the home for developers and mainly concerned with Squeak as a general-purpose programming environment.
It would be great if debian-edu would adopt Squeak, which for me is the most innovative media authoring environment for children in the world. After all, we're in the same boat: we want to create free software for the benefit of our children.
- Bert -