Re: Candidate social contract amendments (part 1: editorial)
On Sat, 27 Dec 2003 06:27:47 +0000, Andrew Suffield <asuffield@debian.org> said:
> 1. Debian Will Remain 100% Free Software
> We promise to keep the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution entirely free
> software. As there are many definitions of free software, we include
> the guidelines we use to determine if software is "free" below. We
> will support our users who develop and run non-free software on
> Debian, but we will never make the system depend on an item of
> non-free software.
> New text:
> 1. Debian will remain 100% free
> We promise to preserve your right to freely use, modify, and
> distribute the Debian system and all its components. We provide the
This does not provide as strong a guarantee that Debian is
going to be entirely free. You can freely use, modify, and
distribute the Debian system and all its components, since we give
you a special license to do so (in violation of the DFSG, but hey, we
are no longer promising to adhere to the DFSG). So, you may use and
distribute it, but the people you distribute it to would have no
rights whatsoever.
> guidelines that we use to determine if a work is "free" in the
> document called the Debian Free Software Guidelines. We will support
> people who create or use non-free works on Debian, but we will never
> make the system require the use of a non-free component.
No promise, implied or otherwise, that Debian itself will
actually follow these guidelines.
I think the wording needs some work.
manoj
--
T-shirt: Life is *not* a Cabaret, and stop calling me chum!
Manoj Srivastava <srivasta@debian.org> <http://www.debian.org/%7Esrivasta/>
1024R/C7261095 print CB D9 F4 12 68 07 E4 05 CC 2D 27 12 1D F5 E8 6E
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