Re: Social Contract
Michael Marsh wrote:
On 4/27/06, Mike McCarty <Mike.McCarty@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
I'll quote a short piece from the page [Johannes Wiedersich] put below, which goals
I do not support...
[snip]
Now, this does not mean that I think that people who want to do this
are bad. It's just not something I particularly support or want to
participate in. If you want to give your stuff away, that's fine.
But to require others to do so in order to contribute is not fine,
and I'll not contribute, participate, or support such an attempt.
I read this completely differently. My reading is that the Debian
Apparently not. What you stated is how I read it, and it's not
something I support. It is a social agenda.
project wants to create a distribution that is completely unrestricted
as to people's ability to distribute it further and make
modifications, with the caveat that any modifications are similarly
unrestricted. That is, Debian wants to do in aggregate what the
individual software projects are doing individually. There's nothing
Yes, and as I stated the GPL, LGPL, and similar licenses are not
something I support, agree with, or even like.
in that quoted section about wanting all software to adhere to these
conditions, merely that Debian will only incorporate software adhering
to the conditions.
Umm, I'll let this pass without argument, but I do not accept
your reasoning on this point.
One of the worst things for freedom of software, IMO, was the
development of the GPL. I do not like, and do not support the GPL,
LGPL, or similar types of license, which Debian *does* support,
promote, and even require contributors to use. The GPL, LGPL, and
similar kinds of license, which Debian supports, defends, promotes,
and requires are an attempt to change the social order.
Debian contains plenty of code released under other licenses, such as
BSD, Mozilla, Apache, X, etc. In any event, while the GPL might be
intended to change the social order, that's not a necessary
Death is not the necessary consequence of the use of bombs, either.
So?
consequence of its use. At its heart, the GPL merely says that the
software is being given away freely, and you can do anything you like
with it except rescind that freedom.
This is emphatically not what the GPL and similar licenses say.
If, for example, you incorporate a library built under GPL by
linking with it, then the license forces you to release *your own*
code under GPL or compatible license. This is not freedom as
I define it.
If Debian really wanted all their stuff to be truly free, then
they would have to prohibit all the GPL stuff from being in
it. But promoting and incorporating GPL stuff means that they
also support that social agenda. The one cannot be separated
from the other, as the social agenda is what the GPL is about.
Umm, you never did have that license, then, and you used the software
in an unauthorized manner. In short, you used a pirate copy.
Wow -- way to libel someone! He *did* say the issue was when
switching employers. Presumably, employer A had a license for the
software, but employer B did not. That license doesn't extend to the
data files that users create using the software.
Either
he used the tools to create his own files, not his employer's
files, in which case he used the copy as a pirate copy
or
he used the tools to create files for his employer, in which
case they belonged to his employer, and he had no right
to take them with him.
Which is it?
Mike
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I can explain it for you, but I can't understand it for you.
I speak only for myself, and I am unanimous in that!
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