GPL is not the only free licence, and FSF not the only holder
By being the first, and most frequently mentions Free Software license the GPL
has become the best known. Most authors of free software are not as interested
in licensing as the members of this debate. They just stick some words about
the GPL somewhere, often dont bother with including a copy in their source
distribution, and get on with the interesting coding part.
I am sure many of these authors would be just as happy with the Artistic
license
if they thought it would give them less hassle.
In addition the copyright has been assigned to FSF in only a small number of
cases. It may be that, to save wasted intellectual effort from all concerned,
the maintainers of packages where copyright has been assigned to the FSF should
include a copy of the GPL in those packages
(as an indication of willingness to maintain good relations with the copyright
holder - rather than as a precedent)
This would free up the FSF lawyers to look at more interesting questions, such
as,
if I am installing 20 servers with RedHat Linux, how many copies do I need to
buy ?
(Note that replies on RedHat licensing are off topic for Debian Policy, so
mail solely on that direct to me only please)
John Lines
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