On Saturday, Sep 20, 2003, at 17:26 US/Eastern, Richard Stallman wrote:
The Social contract uses the "that which is not hardware"
definition of
software.
The words of the social contract clearly equate software to programs.
I encourage you to look closer. The only part of the social contract which even contains the word programs is #5, a part both of us would like removed.
The explanations of the guidelines are specific to programs, however. That is most unfortunate, but Social Contract 1 says we have to apply those guidelines to everything in Debian. So we do our best.
In that sense, there is nothing but software in Debian.
But Debian contains essays, logos, and licenses that cannot be
modified. These are not programs; are they software?
Yes, they're software. We don't require licenses --- especially as attached to programs --- to be modifiable; that's just the way to law is, of course. Other than that, the non-modifiable essays, logos, sounds, whatever in Debian are bugs.