Re: GR proposal: the AGPL does not meet the DFSG (take 2)
I moved the discussion to debian-vote where it belongs.
(please CC me).
On Mon, Nov 16, 2009 at 06:05:25PM +0000, Mike Hommey wrote:
> On Wed, Nov 11, 2009 at 11:45:25PM +0000, brian m. carlson wrote:
> > Again, this is not the language that the AGPL uses. It requires that
> > "your modified version must prominently offer all users interacting with
> > it remotely through a computer network" the source. Notice the text
> > "your modified version". It's not acceptable to offer it out-of-band.
> > Also, it says "all users". That means anyone who calls connect(2),
> > whether they can authenticate or not. POP can't do that. Neither can
> > DNS. Those protocols almost never have any indication to the user that
> > they are working. Most users don't even know that they're there.
> >
> > This doesn't even mention the situation for HTTP, where it could be
> > interpreted to mean that every response requires a modification of the
> > data in some way so that the user can be offered the source, since the
> > header is not displayed to the user, let alone "prominently".
>
> Stupid question: with this wording of the AGPL, who, in his right mind,
> will be licensing a DNS or POP server under this license ? (Except maybe
> someone who didn't read it)
This is a good question and there are two answers:
1) Someone might want to reuse part of some AGPL software in a completly
different work. For example, a AGPL-licensed blog system might include a
code that implement an authentification scheme that you want to reuse in your
POP3 server. If a license actively prevent you from doing that, then it is
non-free.
2) People tend to have lots of misconception about software licenses and
especially about the AGPL, and on the face of it, the AGPL might look as a good
license to use: it is GPL3 compatible, new and shiny, supposed to close a GPL
loop-hole, etc. and nowhere it is said it is only approriate for software doing such and such, so it is only a matter of time before Debian is confronted with
this issue.
Cheers,
--
Bill. <ballombe@debian.org>
Imagine a large red swirl here.
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