Re: "keep non-free" proposal
Raul Miller <moth@debian.org> writes:
> > Necessary for what purpose?
On Wed, Mar 10, 2004 at 11:25:51AM -0800, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
> You seem to be saying that there are lots of necessary things in
> non-free. It's the pro-non-free people who have been saying how
> necessary it is. I'm assuming that you have some sense of what that
> word means for you, and that we could work from there towards a common
> understanding.
A variety of purposes, yes. Satisfying a variety of needs for a variety
of people, yes. Whether or not this qualifies as "lots" is a different
issue.
> We can work out the details of what is the standard of necessity. I
> already gave some suggestions that I might accept: hardware drivers
> for closed drivers, non-free documentation for free software, for
> example.
I agree that those are in the set.
> > Lots of people seem to be taking the view that if they personally don't
> > need anything in non-free, that means that something's broken.
>
> I haven't heard anyone take that view.
I said that wrong. However:
[a] most of the people who advocate dumping non-free do not have a
personal need for any of it, and
[b] most of the people who advocate dumping non-free do not state how
dumping non-free is good for people who do have a need for some of it.
The closest to [b] I've seen is a statement of the idea that people <<will
get desperate and write better free software to address those needs>>.
[As opposed to giving up and going with some other distribution.] But no
one has presented any concrete facts to suggest that "people will write
more software is a likely response" and "people will abandon debian"
is an unlikely response.
Personally, I think that until Debian is a lot more "developer friendly",
"abandon debian" is the more likely response. [When -- perhaps --
independent sites, like maybe slashdot, freshmeat or lwn are saying how
great Debian is for hacking/developing new software.]
> > > I agree with you that the non-free packages need to exist. What I
> > > disagree about is that it must be Debian's job to provide them.
> >
> > I agree that we shouldn't make any kinds of guarantees that we provide them.
>
> First, some people have been reading the social contract as if it were
> a promise to provide non-free packages to users.
I think you're overstating that case. I think you're confusing the
distinction between practical promises (which might include non-free
as an element) and specific promises about non-free (regardless of the
ultimate value to the user).
> > But that's not the same as agreeing that we should forbid them from
> > being provided.
>
> We can't forbid them. How could we? What we can do is not make it
> Debian's job to provide them.
I meant there to be an implicit "with Debian" at the tail end of that
sentence. We can forbid them from being provided from our archives.
> > Right now, if there's some kind of copyright problem which doesn't prevent
> > distribution, but which requires significant time to sort out, the
> > package can be moved to non-free, until it's solved.
>
> How exactly does the presence of non-free, as opposed to non-free.org,
> help this?
That depends on whether non-free.org is a part of Debian or not. If it's
not, then there's a whole bunch of coordination issues that need to
be addressed.
Or are you saying we should explicitly point our users at some non-debian
outfit, if they want their system to work in a comprehensible fashion?
> > In my experience, either [a] upstream genuinely wants the software to
> > be free, or [b] upstream could care less. Who is it that cares about
> > Debian and is satisfied with non-free?
>
> We hear of upstream maintainers sometimes say they want their stuff to
> be in Debian, and say that it's important, but resist making it free.
> An excellent example is the FSF, but there have been others.
>
> Moreover, why is it Debian's job to provide them advertising?
That's easy: it's not Debian's job to provide them advertising.
> > > But this may not really respond to your question; I could only guess
> > > at just what you were looking for, so if it is not as responsive as
> > > you'd like, then please amplify the question a little or explain in
> > > more detail what the flexibility is that you have, and what about that
> > > flexibility helps our goals.
> >
> > Well, for example, I want to be able to distribute documentation which
> > has "no modify" clauses.
>
> Sure, but the question here is: can you explain why non-free.org is so
> much worse than non-free? Note that BTS is far less relevant to a
> documentation package...
Well, for example:
What happens when the copyright changes and we can distribute it?
What happens when non-free.org messes up the package?
How do we NMU non-free.org?
Thanks,
--
Raul
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