On Wed, May 12, 2004 at 03:59:56AM -0500, Branden Robinson wrote: > On Tue, May 11, 2004 at 10:06:31PM +0200, Andreas Barth wrote: > > Hi, > > > > though LGPL is quite OLD, AFAICS there is no summary. To put it on the > > web pages, I wrote one: > > > > Debian-legal has concluded that the LGPL (Library Gnu Public License) > > v2 and LGPL (Lesser Gnu Public License) v2.1 is a DFSG-free license. > > > > The licenses are included on every debian system in > > /usr/share/common-licenses, so I ommited the full reference > > I think your intentions are noble, but I don't think we should do this. > > Not because the LGPL doesn't deserve a summary, but because it hasn't > been done right. The entire license needs to be posted and carefully > scrutinized. > > I would suggest that we postpone such an exercise until after the GNU > FDL situation is resolved. > > Furthermore, it might be wise if we only attempt to adjudicate licenses > that are brought to us for consideration. I'm not sure we should go on > hunts for licenses to audit ourselves; to do so might damage the > impression of impartiality that we should attempt to cultivate and live > up to. Besides, we adjudicate the application of licenses, not licenses in general, and I'm pretty sure you can apply the LGPL in a non-free manner; it's a fairly slippery bastard. You might be able to do it with the GPL, but I'm not so sure about that (the result would probably be entirely non-distributable, while the LGPL leaves enough holes to wriggle out of). Some licenses are just too complicated for a "yes" or "no" answer; at best they get a "sometimes", or even a "maybe". -- .''`. ** Debian GNU/Linux ** | Andrew Suffield : :' : http://www.debian.org/ | `. `' | `- -><- |
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