Re: [rant] Re: Consequences of moving Emacs Manuals to non-free

[Peter S Galbraith <p.galbraith@globetrotter.net>]

David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> wrote:

> Peter S Galbraith <p.galbraith@globetrotter.net> writes:
> 
> > David Kastrup <dak@gnu.org> wrote:
> >
> >>            The Emacs documentation is far more integrated into its
> >> normal operation than with other tools.  It does not make sense to
> >> separate them.
> >
> > Right.  One wonders why they have to be under different licenses.
> 
> Because the manual is also distributed in printed form.  And the GPL
> is not really well-suited for publications in print: the obligation to
> provide the full source code at cost means additional obligations for
> a publisher, impacting the work flow and the price of the end result,
> even though no sane person would actually have a use for the source of
> that _particular_ publication instead of the one accompanying his copy
> of Emacs.

To me, the non-freeness added to developers (for a fork, for example) is
more important than the inconvenience (or possible extra costs) to
publishers.

Peter