Re: Poll results: User views on the FDL issue
On Thu, Apr 21, 2005 at 11:52:17PM -0700, foo_bar_baz_boo-deb@yahoo.com wrote:
> --- Glenn Maynard <glenn@zewt.org> wrote:
> > The GPL is about making sure everyone that receives the work receives
> > permission to do things to it (modify, distribute, and so on), and
> > making sure that everyone gets source (so they have the ability to
> > do so, as well).
> >
> > Invariant sections are irrelevant to this.
>
> That's because free _software_ (in the 'literally computer programs'
> sense) has not been used for dissemination of political and
> philosophical ideas such as those introduced in GFDL invariant
> sections.
To expand: invariant sections are irrelevant to preventing "misappropriation
into proprietary software", and there are less onerous ways to prevent
"twisting to misrepresent its original intent"--just require that a work
not be represented as the original is sufficient for the latter, which is
explicitly allowed by DFSG#4.
> > > > Free Software is "what's in it for the public", and it is
> > > > specifically
> > > > not "what's in it for the copyright holder"--that's what
> > proprietary
> > > > software is about.
> > >
> > > Not always. Often the copyright holder's concerns factor into
> > choice of
> > > license. If the copyright holder did not give a damn about his/her
> > > concerns, wouldn't he/she always just use the BSD license w/o
> > > advertisement and w/o non-endorsement clauses or public domain?
> >
> > This doesn't contradict what I said, though. Certainly, copyright
> > holders have freedom to determine how they release their work, if
> > at all, but that's orthogonal to Free Software.
>
> Not always orthogonal to Free Software. Sometimes a copyright holder's
> desire to push the software in certain directions via license choice
> (copyleft to prevent hoarding, for instance) is very much in sync with
> concerns of the movement collectively. But admittedly, this is a pretty
> trivial issue.
Sure, authors have a lot of influence on the terms, since Free Software
is flexible enough to give a lot of choices; this means that authors are
able to choose a license based on "what's in it for them".
But that's not "what Free Software is about" (except as far as "the
copyright holder" is a member of "the public", of course). In fact,
if you're contributing to a GPL-licensed project, as the author of
those changes, you have very few options in your licensing: you can
either use the GPL, or refrain from releasing the changes at all.
> The right is not really being abolished. Invariant sections are a small
> percentage of the work. You can still change the rest of the work, or
> editorialize on the invariant portions. I don't agree with the extreme
> connotation of abolish in this context. But admittedly, this too is
> relatively minor.
Freedom isn't determined by percentages; a Free work is completely Free.
This perspective is based on the knowledge that freedom goes away in
little pieces, not big ones; the only way to prevent erosion of freedoms
is by extrapolating any sacrifice to the whole work.
> I know that perhaps it does not sound this way from the tone of my
> writing (I have a way of getting frustrated more easily than I should),
> but I am trying my best to keep a cool head and provide some decent
> backing for the proposal.
Me too. Patience is eroded, too, over the course of a long thread,
and can take active maintenance. :) (And I've participated in more
of these threads than I can recall ...)
--
Glenn Maynard
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