Re: New DFSG-compliant emacs packages
В Sat, 28 Oct 2006 15:15:46 -0500, Manoj Srivastava написа:
> Careful what you ask for. If we stop packaging non-free
> material, your precious non-free manuals go with them.
If Debian considers GNU documentation as unethical as Sun's Java, so
be it. But don't ship non-free software while trying to convince us
that you're devoted to free software. Or, alternatively, continue
shipping it, but stop lying blatantly your users.
> We recognize some of our users have a need for non-free
> material, like non-free GNU documentation.
Please don't use the GNU manuals as an excuse to make the non-free
section more legitimate and keep it forever. I'd prefer if you don't
distribute non-free software, even if that means not distributing the
GNU manuals. Their presence in this section is already a
humiliation, anyway.
> While not a part of the free Debian OS,
Whether "non-free" and "contrib" are part of the Debian OS is
irrelevant. I understand why the Debian Project is shy and fears
openly admitting that they are. What matters is that you distribute
this software, and it is fully integrated in the infrastructure. Bugs
are being reported against these packages, and being fixed by the
maintainers, thus improving them and making them more desirable by
users.
> we try to help those users, until we have free alternatives for the
> non-free programs and documentation, by providing for their
> convenience packaged versions fo the non-free programs and
> documentation.
Calling this "help" for the free software community is very insulting,
and clearly speaks about your values. The GNU Project has never
distributed non-free components of the system when there were no free
alternatives developed. Doing so would totally undermine the goals of
the whole movement, and very likely, the free replacements that exist
today would never have been written. To fulfil its promises, I expect
Debian to do the same. Is it that hard?
> I am sorry you think we should not support our users desire to use
> non-free software like GNU documentation, but we are commited to
> all our users, including ones who still need to use non-free
> materials.
Again, calling packaging (=developing, enhancing) and distribution of
non-free software "support" is outrageous. Debian is no different
from the companies that develop and distribute non-free software --
they "support" their users too.
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