Re: one of the many reasons why removing non-free is a dumb idea
On Wed, Jan 07, 2004 at 09:18:25AM +1100, Craig Sanders wrote:
> > > One thing that all of the advocates for dumping non-free have in common is
> > > a complete disregard for the actual contents of non-free. they like to
> > > pretend that it's all proprietary software, that it doesn't even come close
> > > to free, that source-code isn't available.
> >
> > As a long-time advocate for dumping non-free software, and someone that has
> > maintained a package in non-free, I can readily disprove that by stating that
> > your statement does not describe my beliefs.
>
> then explain why software that is almost-free (e.g. software that is free for
> use or modification but is prohibited from commercial sale) should not be
> distributed at all by debian. explain why free-but-patent-restricted software
> should not be distributed at all by debian. explain why software that is free
> for personal or educational use should not be distributed at all by debian.
> explain why software that is free for all but use by government agencies or
> spammers or whoever should not be distributed at all by debian.
The simple answer is: the reason that we should not distribute them is
the same as the reason that they are not DFSG-free. You can, I'm sure,
search voluminous archives for illuminating discussions upon all those
points with relation to the DFSG. The fact that some software has
source and others don't; or that some can be used by only certain
people; is an irrelevant distinction to me.
There are several reasons that we should not distribute software that is
not DFSG-free. Some include:
Confusion. Many people incorrectly assume that software in non-free is
a part of the Debian Distribution. This is not the case, even though we
frequently refer to Debian as "distributing" non-free software. We wind
up with arguments from even seasoned Debian developers complaining that
we are removing some bit of functionality from our operating system
distribution, when in fact that is not the case, since the functionality
was never there.
Quality. Contrib and non-free long been the bastard son of the Debian
quality process. Autobuilders do not build non-free, and thus packages
are often significantly out of date. Worse, our BTS closes bug reports
when they're fixed on one arch. The state-of-the-art packages on some
architectures may have bugs fixed so long ago that they are not even
listed on the BTS anymore. We are not able to maintain non-free up to
our (already paltry) standards. We do not support it with security
updates. We may be providing people with software with known security
holes, and doing nothing about it. This is not worthy of Debian. This
is not something Debian should associate itself with. And, what's more,
this is something that could be improved more *outside* Debian than
within it. If we cannot distribute and support software in a quality
fashion, we should not do so at all.
Ethics. We are here because we value Free Software and believe that it
is valuable to us and the world. Non-free software is everything that
we are not. Non-free means lack of freedom to use software like you
want. Non-free means lack of the ability to alter it like you want. It
means lack of ability to give altered copies to people you want to. It
may even mean lack of the ability to fix grave bugs in the software.
There is nothing more antithetical to the very foundation of Debian than
this.
We have proven to the world that a free operating system can compete
with the best proprietary operating systems.
Now let us prove to the world that this operating system can stand up on
its own, without the crutch of non-free.
*That* should be a powerful motivator to all those people that need one
to relicense their software.
> there is a huge difference between almost-free software and proprietary
> software.
If you are a business and almost-free means home or educational use
only, that difference is practically non-existant.
> there are some items in non-free that i personally think should not be there,
Then you are confusing the "what should be allowed in main" argument
with the "whether we should distribute things that are not allowed in
main" argument. They are two distinct questions, and it seems to me
that you are attempting to influence the second because your opinions on
the first were not shared by a majority of Debian developers.
-- John
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