Re: GPLv3 suggestion to solve KDE/QT problem and others
> > That's because code reuse wasn't seen as a relevant issue for
> > building a distribution. The DFSG is simply an attempt to define our
> > minimal requirements to maintain a piece of software as a part of our
> > distribution.
On Mon, Feb 21, 2000 at 11:25:53PM +0200, Adi Stav wrote:
> I thought the DFSG was written of moral reasons rather than
> practical...
I'd say that morality represents adoption of practical decisions by a
group of people.
> But in that case, why not allow any freely-distributable binaries? If
> the binaries don't conform to policy they cannot be included anyhow.
What about buggy freely-distributable binaries? What about
freely-distributable binaries which impose structure on our system which
conflicts with other software on our system?
If we don't have permission to modify the software, and distribute
changes, then it's better to leave distribution of that software to
someone who can deal with such issues.
...
> But what I meant was that I was surprised that the FSF added the QPL
> to its list of Free licenses. Maybe there are other points to consider
> that might mean the QPL is Free?
I think you're reading too much into the mere appearance of the QPL on
that page, and not reading enough into the accompanying text.
> > Also, I should point out that the FSF is not associated with Debian,
> > except as an upstream author. Talk about changing the GPL doesn't
> > really belong on debian-legal...
>
> Yes... But these issues do affect Debian a lot. There has been a lot
> of talk lately of the KDE problem, and I thought that one solution
> (changing the GPL) did not get sufficient attention.
There's been a lot of talk about the KDE issue for at least the last two
years. You see, Debian tries to get along with upstream authors, but we
do ask that they give us proper licenses before we distribute their code.
But in the case of KDE, we've been under a lot of pressure to distribute
code without proper licenses. And this is particularly troubling,
because some significant parts of KDE were written by non-KDE authors.
That, and there was serious talk on the part of Troll that they were
going to re-release the QPL under a license which fixes this issue.
But changing the GPL in a fashion which violates its rationale (which
is spelled out in the preamble of the license) just plain doesn't strike
me as a good solution.
--
Raul
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