Re: Software patents and Debian

[Weakish Jiang <weakish@gmail.com>]

Stephen Gran wrote:

>> Unless the patent is licensed for everyone's free use or not licensed at
>> all, it won't conform to the DFSG, even if it is not actively enforced.
> 
> This is untrue.  The DGSF does not address patents.  It's also the
> opposite of current practice.

I think it's against the DFSG1 "Free Redistribution" and the DFSG3
"Derived Works".

If Debian distributes these software via main, users may thought they
are free of problem, and, say, modify or/and redistribute it for profit.
Then the patent owner sue them. Is this the good behavior for us to set
up this situation?

IMO, we shouldn't put them in main, in order to reminder users.