Re: Artistic and LGPL compatibility in jar files
Andrew Dalke wrote:
> On Dec 14, 2009, at 9:16 PM, Anthony W. Youngman wrote:
> > I can't be bothered to read the book, but if it's the book I think it is, then I already have read it and came to the conclusion that the author was blind.
[...]
> > Read it for yourself, make sure you've got a copy of the GPL next to you so you can *check* every reference he makes, and see if you come to the same conclusion I did, namely that the black letter of the GPL flatly contradicted the core assumption on which a large part of this book is based.
>
> You haven't read it and you made that conclusion? It sounds like you are promulgating hearsay and rumor. There's a free online copy which I linked to, and if what you are saying is right then it should be easy to point out some of the contradictions.
This part followed "if it's the book I think it is, then I already
have read it". Maybe the contradictions aren't in the part of the
book linked, but elsewhere in the book read. The link seemed to be to
a PDF of part of a book and Anthony W. Youngman wrote that he couldn't
be bothered to read it. Maybe a proper citation instead of a bare URL
would have helped avoid this confusion. (Line wraps would help too.)
Further, Anthony W. Youngman isn't the only debian-legal contributor
to think Larry Rosen's interpretations should not be taken wholesale,
nor the only one who can't give full citations because those
impressions were formed by interactions as much as literature. I'm
another and I'm pretty sure there are others.
> BTW, none of the reviewers on Amazon agree with you
> http://www.amazon.com/Open-Source-Licensing-Software-Intellectual/product-reviews/0131487876/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1
> and I thought that if the the book would be that poorly written then there would be some evidence. [...]
So people who were persuaded to buy the book were persuaded by the book
- is that surprising for this type of book?
Also, remember that Amazon filed the notorious click-to-buy patent,
uses DRM/TPM to erase books from their e-book reader (RMS called it
the Amazon Swindle) and tries to overthrow laws they don't like (such
as France's Lang Law), so some free software fans won't touch them
with a bargepole. It's not a good place to go for reviews of free
software related books.
It scores 3.8 our of 5 on http://www.librarything.com/work/72601
(compared to 4.17 for Free Software, Free Society: Selected Essays of
Richard M. Stallman http://www.librarything.com/work/179957 which
I think is the highest-rated book in the cluster: read them yet?)
As far as I recall (I read it too long ago), the book was partly a
sales pitch for Rosen's licences and also included an attempt to
correct one of the big mistakes of the Open Source Initiative and pick
a 5-point definition of Open Source which could actually compete with
the 4-point Free Software Definition. I think OSI still use 10
points, so that's how convincing the book is.
Even without knowing the problems of the choice-of-venue and
pay-my-lawyers clauses in Larry Rosen's quesionable licences, it
should be immediately obvious that that book is probably going to have
an inflammatory perspective. Its title is "Open Source Licensing:
Software Freedom and Intellectual Property Law" which manages to
squeeze two of http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/words-to-avoid.html into
one book title.
Hope that illuminates,
--
MJR/slef
My Opinion Only: see http://people.debian.org/~mjr/
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